Good scheduling program for general use
August 25, 2017

Good scheduling program for general use

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Microsoft Project

We used MS project for granular scheduling of manufacturing projects at plant level and below. Our company level project management software (Windchill) was not well suited to quickly adapting and updating detailed schedules at lower levels. MS Project gave us the ability to schedule projects at a lower level level within the company and a higher level of detail than Windchill.
  • Critical path analysis
  • Linking tasks and automatically updating the schedule as things change
  • Quickly and easily update the schedule with changes
  • Didn't really use the man hour calculations.
  • If you don't understand how to correctly link and build your schedule, it's easy to lose many of the benefits of the program.
  • Facilitated communication within the project team so that everyone was on the same page regarding the project schedule.
  • Allowed for quickly updating the schedule with changes.
  • Could easily see the overall impact of a delay on the project schedule.
I had previously used MS Excel to create schedules while in the Army, but Project is unsurprisingly a far more powerful scheduling tool. There are more powerful programs out there, but MS Project is a good balance of power and features for general use. It integrates well with the rest of the MS suite, and is user friendly enough that most people can pick it up fairly easily.
MS Project was great for making Gantt charts and easy to read visuals to make project schedules more clear to people. We used it to create and update quick snapshots of sections of projects (for example, a look-ahead for the next 8 weeks). We could easily import images into PowerPoint or export as a PDF, so we could present the schedule in a meeting, then share it afterward in the minutes.

Microsoft Project Feature Ratings

Task Management
8
Resource Management
Not Rated
Gantt Charts
9
Scheduling
9
Workflow Automation
Not Rated
Team Collaboration
8
Support for Agile Methodology
Not Rated
Support for Waterfall Methodology
Not Rated
Document Management
Not Rated
Email integration
Not Rated
Mobile Access
Not Rated
Timesheet Tracking
Not Rated
Change request and Case Management
Not Rated
Budget and Expense Management
Not Rated
Quotes/estimates
Not Rated
Invoicing
Not Rated
Project & financial reporting
Not Rated
Integration with accounting software
Not Rated