Book Image

Learning Microsoft Project 2019

By : Srikanth Shirodkar
Book Image

Learning Microsoft Project 2019

By: Srikanth Shirodkar

Overview of this book

Microsoft Project is one of the most popular project management tools for enterprises of all sizes thanks to its wide variety of features such as project scheduling, project budgeting, built-in templates, and reporting tools. Learning Microsoft Project 2019 will get you started with the basics and gradually guide you through the complete project life cycle. Starting with an overview of Microsoft Project 2019 and a brief introduction to project management concepts, this book will take you through the different phases of project management – initiation, planning, execution, control, and closure. You will then learn how to identify and handle problems related to scheduling, costing, resourcing, and work allocation. Understand how to use dynamic reports to create powerful, automated reports and dashboards at the click of a button. This Microsoft Project book highlights the pitfalls of overallocation and demonstrates how to avoid and resolve these issues using a wide spectrum of tools, techniques, and best practices. Finally, you will focus on executing Agile projects efficiently and get to grips with using Kanban and Scrum features. By the end of this book, you will be well-versed with Microsoft Project and have the skills you need to use it effectively in every stage of project management.
Table of Contents (32 chapters)
1
Section 1: The Iron Triangle – a Quick Primer for Project Management
3
Section 2: Project Initiation with Microsoft Project
8
Section 3: Project Planning Like a Pro!
13
Section 4: Project Execution – the Real Deal
15
Chapter 11: Overallocation – the Bane of Project Managers
18
Section 5: Monitoring and Control with Microsoft Project
23
Section 6: Project Closure with Microsoft Project
Appendix A: Using This Book as a Textbook
Appendix C: Keyboard Shortcuts
Appendix D: Glossary

Introduction to customized reports

We studied a multitude of prebuilt reports available to us in Project in Chapter 17, Project Reports 101. There are three fundamental categories of report communications in Project, detailed as follows:

  • View-Table reports: These are lightweight reports created (usually printed) from combinations of views and tables, mostly for consumption by the internal project team.
  • Graphical reports: These are the prebuilt reports most popularly showcased by Project practitioners. They are dynamic, intuitive, and visually attractive. These reports are mostly suited for client meetings or similar. This category is the main theme of the current chapter.
  • Visual reports: These reports allow you to export prebuilt report templates to applications capable of better number-crunching, such as Microsoft Excel.

In this chapter, we will first learn how to modify (or tweak) existing reports to suit our needs. Then, we will proceed to create custom...