MS Project: Plans and Resource Pools

Name: MS Project: Plans and Resource Pools
Author: Elissa Smith

How to effectively manage your projects progress.

Preview the first lesson free — get full access to all 7 lessons.

Course: On-Demand

Hi. In this lesson, we want to explore a very important project management tracking tool called a baseline. Now, at this point in my project, I have a very developed Gantt chart. I've even assigned resources to my tasks. The project is ready to begin, and I'm at the point of my project where I can say that my Gantt chart is very solid. This is really how I would like my project to develop, especially when it comes to the start dates and finish dates of tasks. Also very important, we have established a summary task subtask hierarchy. The project is ready to begin. Now, we all know that we start out with a picture perfect plan of how we want things to go. However life happens, and the same thing happens with projects, things change. But it would always be nice if I could come back to this point and see how far I've deviated from my original plan. This is where a baseline plan comes into play inside of project. It's a way to take a snapshot of your project as it starts, the way you think everything's going to go, so that as the project progresses and as things adjust, you can come back and compare. This is what we thought we were going to have. This is where we are now. So to save a baseline with your project, you're going to come up to the project ribbon tab again. This is something that deals with the project as a whole, so it makes sense that we go to this ribbon to deal with it. In the middle right side of this ribbon, there's a group called schedule, and you'll see that there's a schedule baseline button. When I click on this, I can either set a baseline or clear a baseline. My project doesn't currently have a baseline, so let's go ahead and set one up. I'm going to click on it and you'll notice that it gives me an option to set a baseline. Now, what's interesting here, when you click on the arrow next to the baseline, you'll see that you have up to eleven different baselines that you can save per project. Why so many? Because some projects can be five and even ten years in length. This would allow you to have a baseline for each year, or even maybe each phase of the project. And baselines can be saved at any time throughout the management of your project. It's up to you. I'm saying do it at the beginning, but sometimes people will replace the original baseline with an additional one as they move forward. By default, the first baseline you save is always called baseline. The second one would be called baseline one, but that's why we see so many options in this box. The second thing I'm going to do is select what part of the project I want to save my baseline for. I can do the entire project or just selected tasks. In my case, I want to do the entire project. I'm going to click on ok, and that's it. My baseline has been saved. Now, how do I know it's really there? If I come back here to the set baseline box, you'll see that when I go to set baseline, it will show me that there is a baseline and the date that it was saved on. Another place where you can go to see if a baseline has been saved inside of your project, I'm going to click on cancel is to the project information box from the project ribbon. If you go to project information and come into this box, you'll see that when we come into this box, if we come down to the bottom and select statistics, this will take us in and let us see that indeed a project again baseline has been saved for this project. Throughout the project, you can use the statistics box to compare your baseline with the current project, and again, it will show you the difference between the two and that difference is called variance, another common project term. Thanks so much for watching. In the next lesson, we're going to look at how to clear a baseline from your project if it becomes inaccurate or unnecessary. Thanks so much for watching. Bye.

Intermediate Provider : Elissa Smith 7 Lessons · 19m in Arabic, English

Course Description

Knowing where you started and how you’re progressing is an important function in project management. In this course, you’ll learn how to use the baseline and interim plan functions to track your project’s progress and how to shift plan status in light of any deviations. You’ll also learn how to format your Gantt chart to show tasks and utilize the resource pool feature for resource sharing across projects.

What You'll Learn

Use the baseline and interim plan functions to track your project's progress
Save and clear the baseline plan in Microsoft Project
Format the look of tasks in the intermediate Tracking Gantt chart
Create a resource pool file and share resources across projects
Remove resource pool files when they are no longer needed
Shift plan status in response to deviations from your plan

Key Takeaways

Knowing where you started and how you're progressing is an important function in project management.
The baseline and interim plan functions let you track your project's progress and shift plan status when deviations occur.
Formatting the Gantt chart lets you control how tasks are displayed in the Tracking Gantt view.
The resource pool feature enables resource sharing across multiple projects.

Frequently Asked Questions

What will I learn in this course?

You'll learn how to use the baseline and interim plan functions to track your project's progress and shift plan status in light of deviations, how to format your Gantt chart to show tasks, and how to use the resource pool feature for resource sharing across projects.

What topics do the lessons cover?

The lessons cover Saving the Baseline, Clearing the Baseline Plan, Formatting the Tracking Gantt, Saving an Interim Plan, Creating a Resource Pool File, Sharing to a Resource Pool, and Removing Resource Pool Files.

What skills does this course build?

It builds skills in Microsoft Project, Project Baselines, Project Management, Project Planning, Project Portfolio Management, and Resource Planning.

How does this course help with managing resources across multiple projects?

It teaches the features of the resource pool, including creating a resource pool file, sharing to a resource pool, and removing resource pool files, to manage resources across projects.