Project 2010 for Dummies (ISBN - 0470501324)

436 Pages·2010·8.03 MB·English

Nancy C. Muir
Author of Project 2007 For Dummies

Learn to:
• Manage project schedules with
Project 2010

• Work with new scheduling tools
and the Ribbon interface

• Assign and share resources and
understand calendars

• Create impressive reports

Project 2010

Microsoft
®

Making Everything Easier!™

Visit the companion Web site at www.dummies.com/go/
project2010fd to find additional project management
tools, including add-on software, bonus Project templates,
sample cases, and more!

Open the book and find:

• How to maximize control with the
new manual scheduling feature

• Your way around the Project
interface

• The new Timeline and Team
Planner views

• Tips on assigning resources

• Advice on communicating with
your team

• All about reports and how to use
them

• Scheduling help from the new
Task Inspector

Nancy C. Muir has written more than 50 books on technology and business
topics including Windows, Office applications, PCs, laptops, and Internet
safety. She has presented workshops to Fortune 500 companies on project
management and related software. Her credits include more than
a dozen For Dummies books.

$24.99 US / $29.99 CN / £17.99 UK

ISBN 978-0-470-50132-0

Computer Applications/
Project Management

Go to Dummies.com®

for videos, step-by-step examples,
how-to articles, or to shop!

In charge of a project?
Manage it better with
Project 2010 and this book!

If you’ve never used project management software before —
or you’ve used previous versions of Project and want to
master the all-new Project 2010 interface and features —
this is the book for you! You’ll find the project management
concepts you need to know, how Project 2010 works and
how to get up to speed, what’s new, and most importantly,
how to apply it to a real project.

• What do I do with this thing? — set up Project, learn what types
of input you need to provide, and begin building project plans

• Be resourceful — create and assign work resources, material
resources, and fixed costs, and manage resources effectively

• A perfect fit — ensure your project has a high chance of success
by fine-tuning your plan

• Running on rails — learn to use baselines, track progress and
materials, and create reports that help keep projects on track

• Enterprise options — get an overview of online collaborative
features using Project Server, Web Application, and SharePoint

Project 2010

Muir

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• Checklists

• Charts

• Common Instructions

• And Other Good Stuff!

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by Nancy Muir

Project 2010

FOR
DUMmIES

‰

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Project 2010 For Dummies®

Published by
Wiley Publishing, Inc.
111 River Street
Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774

www.wiley.com

Copyright © 2010 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana

Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana

Published simultaneously in Canada

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or
by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permit-
ted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written
permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the
Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone].
Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley
& Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://
www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley Publishing logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the
Rest of Us!, The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com, Making Everything
Easier, and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/
or its affi liates in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission.
Microsoft is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.
All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Wiley Publishing, Inc., is not associated
with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.

LIMIT OF LIABILITY/DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY: THE PUBLISHER AND THE AUTHOR MAKE NO
REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES WITH RESPECT TO THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF
THE CONTENTS OF THIS WORK AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WITH-
OUT LIMITATION WARRANTIES OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. NO WARRANTY MAY BE
CREATED OR EXTENDED BY SALES OR PROMOTIONAL MATERIALS. THE ADVICE AND STRATEGIES
CONTAINED HEREIN MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR EVERY SITUATION. THIS WORK IS SOLD WITH THE
UNDERSTANDING THAT THE PUBLISHER IS NOT ENGAGED IN RENDERING LEGAL, ACCOUNTING, OR
OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICES. IF PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANCE IS REQUIRED, THE SERVICES OF
A COMPETENT PROFESSIONAL PERSON SHOULD BE SOUGHT. NEITHER THE PUBLISHER NOR THE
AUTHOR SHALL BE LIABLE FOR DAMAGES ARISING HEREFROM. THE FACT THAT AN ORGANIZA-
TION OR WEBSITE IS REFERRED TO IN THIS WORK AS A CITATION AND/OR A POTENTIAL SOURCE
OF FURTHER INFORMATION DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE AUTHOR OR THE PUBLISHER ENDORSES
THE INFORMATION THE ORGANIZATION OR WEBSITE MAY PROVIDE OR RECOMMENDATIONS IT
MAY MAKE. FURTHER, READERS SHOULD BE AWARE THAT INTERNET WEBSITES LISTED IN THIS
WORK MAY HAVE CHANGED OR DISAPPEARED BETWEEN WHEN THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN AND
WHEN IT IS READ.

For general information on our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care
Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax [phone].

For technical support, please visit www.wiley.com/techsupport.

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not be available in electronic books.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2010925237

ISBN: 978-0-470-50132-0

Manufactured in the United States of America

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About the Author

Nancy Muir has written dozens of books on business and technology topics
ranging from desktop applications, project management, and distance learn-
ing, to an award-winning book on character education for middle-schoolers
and a textbook on computer science for community colleges. Prior to her
freelance writing career, Nancy taught workshops in project management to
Fortune 500 companies and was a manager in both the computer and publish-
ing industries. She lives in the Pacifi c Northwest with her husband Earl, with
whom she has collaborated on three books, including Nanotechnology For
Dummies. She writes a column on computers and the Internet for retirenet.
com, and has authored three books about computing for seniors: Computers
For Seniors For Dummies, Laptops For Seniors For Dummies, and Using the
Internet Safely For Seniors For Dummies (with co-author Linda Criddle).

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Dedication

To my husband Earl who puts up with my work schedule and makes every
minute away from work fabulous.

Author’s Acknowledgments

First, many thanks to my friend Elaine Marmel, author of the Microsoft Project
Bible from Wiley. Her advice and insight into the workings of Project always
help me see the forest for the trees.

Second I thank the folks at Wiley, including Kyle Looper, my able acquisitions
editor, and Blair Pottenger, the book’s project editor who is always incred-
ibly supportive and patient and helps me hold all the pieces together. Thanks
also to copy editor John Edwards and technical editor Thuy Le for keeping
my humble prose accurate and intelligible.

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Publisher’s Acknowledgments

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments at http://dummies.custhelp.com.
For other comments, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974,
outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax [phone].

Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

Acquisitions, Editorial, and Media
Development

Project Editor: Blair J. Pottenger

Acquisitions Editor: Kyle Looper

Copy Editor: John Edwards

Technical Editor: Thuy Le

Editorial Manager: Kevin Kirschner

Media Development Project Manager:
Laura Moss-Hollister

Media Development Assistant Project
Manager: Jenny Swisher

Media Development Associate Producers:
Josh Frank, Marilyn Hummel,
Douglas Kuhn, and Shawn Patrick

Editorial Assistant: Amanda Graham

Sr. Editorial Assistant: Cherie Case

Cartoons: Rich Tennant
(www.the5thwave.com)

Composition Services

Project Coordinator: Sheree Montgomery

Layout and Graphics: Ashley Chamberlain,
Joyce Haughey, Christine Williams

Proofreaders: Melissa Cossell,
Rebecca Denoncour, Toni Settle

Indexer: Becky Hornyak

Publishing and Editorial for Technology Dummies

Richard Swadley, Vice President and Executive Group Publisher

Andy Cummings, Vice President and Publisher

Mary Bednarek, Executive Acquisitions Director

Mary C. Corder, Editorial Director

Publishing for Consumer Dummies

Diane Graves Steele, Vice President and Publisher

Composition Services

Debbie Stailey, Director of Composition Services

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Table of Contents

Introduction ................................................................. 1

About This Book ..............................................................................................1
Foolish Assumptions .......................................................................................1
Conventions Used in This Book .....................................................................2
How This Book Is Organized ..........................................................................2
Part I: Setting the Stage for Project......................................................2
Part II: People Who Need People .........................................................3
Part III: Well, It Looks Good on Paper . . . ...........................................3
Part IV: Avoiding Disaster: Staying on Track......................................3
Part V: Working with Enterprise Projects ...........................................3
Part VI: The Part of Tens .......................................................................4
What You’re Not to Read ................................................................................4
Icons Used in This Book .................................................................................4
Where to Go from Here ...................................................................................5

Part I: Setting the Stage for Project ............................... 7

Chapter 1: Project Management: What It Is,
and Why You Should Care . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9

The ABCs of Project Management ...............................................................10
The three Ts: Tasks, timing, and dependencies
(well, two Ts and a D) ......................................................................10
Lining up your resources ....................................................................14
Spreading the news .............................................................................16
Planning to keep things on track .......................................................17
The Role of the Project Manager .................................................................18
What exactly does a project manager do?........................................18
Understanding the dreaded triple constraint ..................................19
Applying tried-and-true methodologies ............................................19
From To-Do List to Hard Drive .....................................................................22
Getting up to speed with Project .......................................................22
Collaborating with your project team online ...................................23
Getting Started ...............................................................................................24
Starting from scratch...........................................................................24
Starting with templates .......................................................................28
Saving a Project for Posterity ......................................................................30
Getting Help from Project .............................................................................31

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Project 2010 For Dummies
viii

Chapter 2: The Best-Laid Plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .33

Project 2010’s New Interface ........................................................................33
Using the Ribbon ..................................................................................34
The Backstage view .............................................................................35
Finding commonly used commands ..................................................36
Navigating Project .........................................................................................36
Changing views ....................................................................................36
Scrolling around ...................................................................................38
Getting to a specifi c spot in your plan ..............................................40
A Project with a View ....................................................................................41
Home base: Gantt Chart view .............................................................42
The resourceful views: Resource Sheet and Team Planner ...........43
Getting your timing down with the Timeline ...................................44
Going with the fl ow: Network Diagram view ....................................44
Calling up Calendar view ....................................................................46
Customizing Views ........................................................................................47
Working with view panes ....................................................................48
Modifying the contents of the Network Diagram boxes .................52
Resetting the view................................................................................54

Chapter 3: Mark It on Your Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55

Mastering Base, Project, Resource, and Task Calendars .........................55
How calendars work ............................................................................56
How one calendar relates to another ................................................58
Calendar Options and Working Times ........................................................58
Setting calendar options .....................................................................59
Setting exceptions to working times .................................................60
Setting the Project Calendar and Other Essential Project Information ...62
Modifying Task Calendars ............................................................................64
Making Resource Calendar Settings ............................................................65
Which resources get calendars? ........................................................65
Making the change to a resource’s calendar ....................................65
Do It Yourself: Creating a Custom Calendar Template .............................68
Sharing Copies of Calendars ........................................................................69

Chapter 4: A Tisket, a Task Kit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .71

User-Controlled Scheduling: Manual versus Automatic ...........................72
Tackling Your First Task ...............................................................................74
Identifying what makes up a task.......................................................74
Creating a task ......................................................................................75
You’re in It for the Duration .........................................................................82
Tasks come in all fl avors: Identifying task types .............................83
Setting task duration ...........................................................................84

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