project management

1. Yom Institute of Economic Development
Joint Masters of Science Program
with Debre Markos University
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Software Applications in Project
Management (PPM 512 )

2. Dealing with Task
 How to Enter Task
 How to insert or delete task
 How to set up duration
 How to Link Task
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3. Tasks, sub tasks and summary task
• Task: a task is an activity that must be completed in
order to eventually complete the project
• Summary Task: is a headings or collections of group
tasks
• Sub Task: is a task under main task
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4. Task Creation
 The order of entry for tasks does not need to
follow any set pattern
 For simplicity and clean Gantt Chart,
chronological order might be good
 But this is by no means essential
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5. Task Creation …
• Create a project and name it “Dealing with Tasks”
• Enter the below tasks
• ABC Bank IS project
• Initial Study
• Feasibility Study
• Requirements Analysis
• Requirements Specification
• System Design
• Coding & Testing
• System Testing
• To delete tasks, select the task and use the Delete key. If you inadvertently delete a task
immediately click the Undo button on the toolbar.
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6. How to insert Task
• Select the Feasibility Study task. Then either use the Insert key on the keyboard or choose
New Task from the Insert menu. This enters a blank line above the current task.
• Repeat until there are three cells between "Initial Study" and "Feasibility Study".
• In the three blank cells enter:
• Study Existing System
• Carry Out Interview(s)
• Prepare Documentation
• Under "Feasibility Study" enter:
• Identify Problems
• Understand and Analyse Problems
• Estimate Project Cost
• Assess Project Risk
• Propose Solution
• Task Scheduling
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7. How to insert Task …
• Under "Requirements Analysis" enter:
• Investigate Current Environment
• Investigate and Define
Requirements
• Under "Requirements Specification" enter:
• Prepare Specifications
• Prepare Use Case Diagram
• Prepare Data Dictionary
• Prototyping
• Under "System Design" enter:
• Design New System
• Design Test Plan
• Under "Coding & Testing" enter:
• Coding
• Unit Testing
• Integration Testing
• Update Data Dictionary
• Under "System Testing" enter:
• Hardware & System Testing
• Acceptance Testing
• Prepare Documentation
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8. Durations and Milestones
• With your tasks entered, you are now ready to enter duration for each
task in the Duration field.
• Duration is an estimate of how long it will take to complete each task.
• You can enter durations by using a number followed by a letter to
indicate the unit of measure: days (d), weeks (w), hours (h), and minutes
(m). The default duration is 1d.
• Duration for Each of the tasks will be given later
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9. Milestones
 A vital part of project management is to place "milestones" in
order to identify significant events in your schedule or to
measure the progress of your project.
 A milestone is created by declaring it as a task of zero days
duration.
 Microsoft Project displays the milestone symbol on the Gantt
chart at the start of that day. To the right of the milestone symbol
is the start date for the task, such as:
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10. Add Milestones
• Lets add milestones, which are the dates project
deliverables are due. To enter the first milestone:
• Insert a blank task line above Requirements Analysis
and type "Deliverable to Project Manager".
• Repeat this process one more time at the end of the
project, after “Prepare Documentation”.
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11. Set Duration
• The durations shown in the Gantt chart on the next
Slide are to be entered in the Duration column
• Select the Duration field for the first task.
• Type a number for the duration length followed by the
duration unit abbreviation.
• Press the enter button or the tick mark.
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13.  Your Gantt chart shows that the project will take 10 working
days (2 weeks, there are 5 working days per week), as defined
by the duration of tasks 26 and 27, to complete the project (the
red bars).
 By definition, these are the critical paths and are shown in red
on your screen. However this assumes each task is independent
and running in parallel with each other, starting at the same
time and date.
 But this is not what we wanted, so lets change the duration and
set the relationship with links
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Set Duration …

14. Designating tasks and sub-tasks
 To show the structure of the project, that is the hierarchical nature
of task headings and subtasks, the subtasks are indented to the
right of the task heading.
 To do so
 Select the subtasks and click the Indent button
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15. How to indent Task
• Under “Initial Study” Indent
• Study Existing System
• Carry Out Interview(s)
• Prepare Documentation
• Under "Feasibility Study” Indent
• Identify Problems
• Understand and Analyse Problems
• Estimate Project Cost
• Assess Project Risk
• Propose Solution
• Task Scheduling
• Under "Requirements Analysis” Indent
• Investigate Current Environment
• Investigate and Define Requirements
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16. • Under "Requirements Specification” Indent
• Prepare Specifications
• Prepare Use Case Diagram
• Prepare Data Dictionary
• Prototyping
• Under "System Design” Indent
• Design New System
• Design Test Plan
• Under "Coding & Testing" enter: Indent
• Coding
• Unit Testing
• Integration Testing
• Update Data Dictionary
• Under "System Testing" enter: Indent
• Hardware & System Testing
• Acceptance Testing
• Prepare Documentation Yom Institute 16
How to indent Task …

17. How to indent Task …
 Now it is necessary to make all the tasks part of the project.
To do so, indent all Task Summaries so that they become a
sub-task of ABC Bank IS project
 Note how the ABC Bank IS project Summary Bar now takes
on the duration of the longest Task Summary (10 days) as
shown below
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18. Linking Tasks
• Linking tasks allows you to create relationships
between tasks. For example, you may want one task to
begin after another task ends.
• There are four types of relationships between tasks
• FS - Finish-to-Start:
• SS – Start-to-Start:
• SF – Start-to-Finish:
• FF – Finish-to-Finish:
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19. • FS - Finish-to-Start:- Default, most often used. A task begins after the
previous task finishes
• SS – Start-to-Start: Both tasks start at the same time.
• FF – Finish-to-Finish: Both tasks finish at the same time.
• SF – Start-to-Finish: Uncommon. The completion of one task depends on
the start of a later task.
• A task that must start or finish before another task is called a predecessor
task. A task that depends on the start or finish of a preceding task is
called a successor task.
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Linking Tasks

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Linking Tasks

21. • On ABC Bank IS project do the below links between tasks
• Select tasks 3 - 5 inclusive and link these in a Finish-to-Start
relationship.
• The duration of "Initial Study" is the sum of all linked
subtasks and equals 10 days (3 days + 2 days + 1 week
[which is equivalent to 5 working days]).
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Linking Tasks

22. Complete linking the tasks by linking them in a Finish-to-
Start relationship:
 Link tasks 7 - 13 inclusive
 Link tasks 15 - 16 inclusive
 Link tasks 18 - 21 inclusive
 Link tasks 23 - 24 inclusive
 Link tasks 26 - 29 inclusive
 Link tasks 31 - 34 inclusive
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Linking Tasks

23. • Tasks 9 and task 10 can go in parallel so they both
finish at the same time (a finish-to-finish
relationship). Change the finish-to-start relationship
to finish-to-finish relationship as discussed above.
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Linking Tasks

24. Exercise:
The scenario: You are a project manager at Aster Publishing. You’ve collected the
initial task names for a new book launch and are ready to start.
Create the Publishing Task plan in Project and perform the following tasks:
1. Enter the following task names:
• Assign launch team members
• Design and order marketing material
• Distribute advance copies
• Coordinate magazine feature articles
• Launch public web portal for book
While reviewing the tasks you entered, you realize that you missed a task. Insert
‘Public Launch Phase’ so that it will appear above the ‘Distribute advance copies’
task.
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25. Using Lag (delay) & Lead time
 To model delay between tasks you can either:
 Double click on the arrow linking the tasks or
 Double click on the name of the successor and choose the
predecessor tab then
 In the lag field add the number of days, estimated days or %
delay
 A negative value produces “lead” rather than lag, and
brings the successor earlier into the plan as opposed to
delaying it.
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26. Setting Constraints
• Use constraints to model dates that affect the start or finish
of your tasks.
• All automatically scheduled tasks have a constraint. By
default this is set to As Soon As Possible (ASAP).
• This means that unless another task or link gets in the way
Project will position the task as early in the plan as it can.
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27. Setting Constraints …
• Constraints can be modified by:
• Double clicking on the name of the task to be constrained then from the
advanced tab choose the constraint type and if appropriate add a date:
• As Late As Possible (ALAP) the task will take place as late it can
• Finish No Earlier Than (FNET) models a task that is not able to finish
before a certain date, but could be delayed beyond it
• Finish No Later Than (FNLT) is used to describe tasks that are not able to
finish beyond a date, but are able to finish earlier
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28. Setting Constraints…
• Must Finish On (MFO) positions the task’s finish on the specified
date
• Must Start On (MSO) as MFO but positions the task’s start on the
specified date.
• Start No Earlier Than (SNET) the task starts on or after the
specified date but no earlier
• Start No Later Than (SNLT) for activities that must start on or
before a specified date.
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