The Magnitude of Microsoft Project

So, your boss just placed you in charge of managing your department’s training projects. Your new responsibilities include identifying course topics, hosting meetings, scheduling resources, performing quality assurance testing, and on and on – where do you start?

To help you effectively manage project development, take a look at Microsoft Project Office. From the intricacies of each task to the large-scale aggregations of information formed using Portfolio Analyzer, the magnitude of Microsoft Project Office is surprising, albeit a welcome surprise.

All projects have some level of planning that involves creating an “outline” of how the project will be developed and ultimately delivered to the customer. This planning phase is an integral part of a project’s success rate and can be the ultimate difference in the end product. Careful preparation provides the structure for implementing required instructional design principles, learning architectures, learner experience design attributes, and learning assessment methods. Without these necessary elements, the project may lead to an ineffective and poor learning experience, which of course may create an unhappy customer.

Microsoft Project Office provides an efficient means of outlining a project by making it easy to assign tasks, durations, required work hours, resources, and task linkages – just to name a few. I would be willing to go out on a limb and assume that before using this tool, the most efficient means most managers used was a bulleted list that spanned 5-10 indentations. Can you imagine the length of the document and how ironically unstructured the planning looked?

Learning Microsoft Project Office may pose some challenges. First, getting used to some of the little idiosyncrasies of the tool may be an adjustment, to say the least. For instance, there is a whole new toolset of shortcuts and rules you will need to get accustomed to using that will enhance the project – or create a firestorm if done incorrectly. Second, mastering the order in which the plan is created is a must. Not only will this process save you time and energy, but it will also make for a much more enriched project plan. Lastly, publishing plans will seem like an art form at the beginning of your learning adventure. However, as time progresses, experience and forming your own “rule of thumb” will make the process much easier.

All things considered, mastering Microsoft Project Office is an experience that bodes well from the “learn by doing” philosophy, otherwise referred to as the problem-based instructional model. Microsoft Project Office, coupled with sound project planning knowledge, can help you to create exceptional work on time, within budget, and within project scope requirements – not to mention the perks it will bring once your manager takes note of your progress and timely deliverables!

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