Project plans

Introduction

The project plan is the project manager’s overview page of the project progress. You can select to see the project plan based on registered hours or the amount based on the project’s contracts.

It is also here you edit the project plan by e.g. adding more tasks, resources or adjust budgets.

Description

Project information

You can collapse this section, if you do not need to see all the information and would rather have more space to work with the project plan.

When you look at the project information, this section is divided into three sections:

1. The project information shows you:

• Overview: Here you see who the customer and contact are and the employees responsible for the project
• Status: Here you can see the following:
  - Project status: Here you see how far you are in the project, and you can easily change the status by clicking the arrow
  - Time tracking: Here you see the setup of your time tracking and who has access to see the project in their timesheets. You can easily change the setting by clicking the arrow
  - Project factor: Here you can keep an eye on how the project factor (the project’s profitability) develops based on the registrations and budgets on the project. Please note that you can select the calculation model for the project factor in the system administration under Reports -> Project factor settings.
• Graphical overview of the project progress: Here you see the progress status based on the different key figures shown in the overview. Click Show calculations, if you would like to see the detailed calculation.

2. The project totals show you:

• Contract value: Here we sum up the value of the contracts you have added to the project and can invoice the customer
• Project budgets: If you enable Project budgeting in the system administration, you can see the overall budget for:
  - Project: The overall budget for the project. You can edit the project budget by clicking the pencil to the right. You can use the calculator to help calculate your project budget
  - Tasks: An overview of the total budget for all tasks in your project plan
  - Employees: An overview of the total budget allocated to the employees
• The realised value on the project: Depending on your setup, you may see the below columns:
  - Cost price: Here you see the internal cost of the registered hours on the project based on the employees’ cost prices
  - Actual: Here you see the realised value of the registered hours based on the hourly rates set on each task. The number indicates what you will be able to invoice, if you do not change the value of the registrations when invoicing
  - Estimated: Here you see the value TimeLog suggests based on the project completion rate, the linked contracts and your estimated value calculation setup. On time and material contracts, this number will often be the same as the actual value, whereas the two numbers may differ on fixed price projects.
  - BAR: Here you see how much value has been booked as revenue so far. This key figure is used, if you work after the work in progress principle
  - Invoiced: Here you see how much of the project's value that has been invoiced to the customer

3. Description:
Here you can write a text e.g. about the project’s purpose or important contractual terms, or other information important on the project. You can edit the text by clicking the pencil to the right.

 

Common areas of the project plans

You get an overview of all tasks on the project and how many hours that are tracked on the single tasks. It is here you adjust your project on an ongoing basis by adding new tasks, budgets or e.g. employees.

A project can consist of five levels (depending on your version of TimeLog), the top of which contain the tasks which sum up the underlying task budgets and registrations.

Both project plans are divided into the following columns depending on your setup in the system administration:

• WBS: WBS is short for Work Breakdown Structure and makes it easy for you to refer to a specific task, if you have many tasks. If you want to move the tasks around in the plan, you can either use the arrows to the left and make use of the drag and drop function, or write which WBS no. you wish the task to have, and it automatically moves to the right place. Please note that you cannot turn a task into a sum task, if there is already registered time on the task. You can read more about WBS here.
• Task no.: It is optional, if you want a unique task no. for each task
• Name: Here you write the name of the task, which is also visible for the employees when they track time. You can always change the name by double clicking it
• Burger menu: Click the burger menu to find more actions for each task, e.g. adding one or more resources to the task or creating a sub task
• Budget: Here you write the total task budget. When you update your budgets on tasks and employees, the numbers are automatically updated in your project totals
• Alloc.: Here you see how many hours or which amounts that are allocated to employees on the single tasks. You can ”open” the task by clicking the little arrow next to the task name to see or change the detailed personal budgets per employee. When you update the number of hours, the numbers are automatically updated in your project totals
• Actual: Here you see how many hours or which amount that are registered on each task

Other actions on task level:

• Dollar sign: Here you can see whether a task is billalbe or not. You can click the icon to change status
• Pencil: Click here to edit the task. You can also click the task name to edit the details
• Trash can: Here you can delete a task. Please note that you cannot delete a task with time registrations attached. Here you first need to move them and then delete the task
• Action menu: If you mark one or more tasks in the checkboxes to the right, you can e.g. move tasks to a different project, make copies of the tasks and much more. See all the options in the action menu at the top in Select action

 

The project plan in hours includes these columns:

• Start and end date: They are especially used for your resource management, so you know when the different employees should work on the project
• Type: This is a category you set on each task and e.g. use in your reporting, if you would like to see how much time you spent on specific task types across your projects
• Status: Here you can e.g. mark if a task is in progress, on hold or completed. It controls if the task is visible for the employees in the time tracking. You can only track time on tasks set to In progress (play icon). You can click the icon to change status

Above the project plan in hours, you have a small search field, where you can search for specific tasks or milestones.

 

The project plan in amount includes these columns:

• Contract: You can see which contract the tasks belong to and change contract directly from the drop-down menu
• Target hourly rate (¤): Shows the hourly rate you selected for the employees' time registrations on the task. You can change the hourly rate directly in the drop-down menu

You can click the small triangle in the top right corner next to the numbers in the project plan or project totals to see the detailed registrations behind the numbers. From this overview you have the option to edit the registrations by e.g. changing the hourly rate and enter if they are billable or not.

 

Other actions on the project:

If you click the lightning icon in the top right corner, you get the opportunity to perform several actions directly from the project:

• Save as project template: If this project’s settings can be used for other customers, then save it as a project template. You will find all your templates in the system administration, where you have the opportunity to edit them.
• Add project template to existing project: If you would like to have all tasks from one of your templates on the project, if you e.g. make aftersales on your project. Then it is easy to add tasks incl. budgets, contracts and allocations, so you do not need to create them manually.
• Copy project: If you e.g. need to make a copy of the project for a different customer
• Delete project: If you created a project by mistake, and you have not yet added registrations or invoices
• New invoice: Shortcut to create a new project invoice
• New baseline: Take a snapshot of all budgets and financial figures as they look today. It is good to use, if you edit budgets afterwards and would like to see what the original budgets looked like
• Send e-mail: Send an e-mail with a project status to your colleagues. Then they receive an e-mail with the overall information from the project and a direct link to access the project

Special remarks

 

Recurring task structures and milestones

(This special feature will be released to customers on Advanced versions in the future.)

 

You can create recurring tasks and milestones in your project plan.

 

Recurring tasks

To create a recurring tasks do the following:

1. Click the little arrow next to the New task button and select Monthly recurrency
2. Enter the details for the tasks
3. Click Save or Save & New, if you want to add an additional task

This gives your project members one task to register time on for the work you do on a monthly basis. They will have the option to select the month when tracking time on the task in the timesheet, TimeLog Mobile and TimeLog for Dekstop.

 

You can mix ordinary tasks with recurring tasks. Please note: The recurrence pattern will apply to all sub-tasks you create for the main task, and you cannot add recurring tasks under a task, which does not have a recurrence pattern.

 

The budget you add on recurring tasks is an average budget for the monthly period and not the total for the task. This means that the budget figure you enter on the task will be available for the employees each month, and the budget figures will also be included in the value calculation of the project.

 

Allocations on recurring tasks

You can add recurring allocations too, once you have created your recurring tasks. Once you have added the resource, you can add recurrence patterns to the allocations. You can add as many recurrence patterns as you like, and you have four options:

1. Within a date span each month: Lets you set a time span for when the task is to be executed incl. an hour budget
2. On a fixed day each month: Lets you set which day in the month you want the task to be completed by incl. an hour budget
3. On a fixed weekday each month: Lets you set a specific day in the month you want the task to be completed by incl. an hour budget. It could e.g. be the third Thursday in the month with an hour budget of 1
4. On fixed days weekly: Lets you select a specific day for completion of the task incl. an hour budget. It could e.g. be each Monday or every second Friday with an hour budget of 2

The recurrence patterns you select on the allocations create hard bookings in the resource planner. The hard bookings are added on the matching dates based on the patterns. You will then be able to move the hard bookings around in the resource planner. Please note: If you change the pattern and update the allocation, all future hard bookings are deleted and replaced by the new pattern.

 

Recurring milestones

To create a recurring milestone do the following:

1. Click New milestone
2. Change the WBS no. to place the milestone under a recurring task
3. Add a name
4. Select Responsible
5. Add recurrence patterns to the right. You can add as many recurrence patterns as you like, and you have three options:
   1. On a fixed day each month: Lets you set which day in the month you want the milestone to be completed by
   2. On a fixed weekday each month: Lets you set a specific day in the month you want the milestone to be completed by, e.g. third Thursday in the month
   3. On fixed days weekly: Lets you select a specific day for completion of the milestone, e.g. each Monday or every second Friday

You can get an overview of the milestones by clicking the button Add resources to milestones. Here you have the option to search the list of milestones, see the completed milestones and change view from the overall level to the single instances of each milestone.

 

You can complete milestones from the list and get a good overview of the status of each milestone. You always see the milestones for the coming three months in the list.