"Microsoft Project doesn't work for my business"

It never ceases to amaze me that every time I speak to large audiences about Project Scheduling, Resource/Capacity Planning, Project Collaboration or integration with Microsoft Dynamics SL, I always ask two questions:
1)How many of the people in the audience have used Microsoft Project (every time nearly everyone in the audience raises their hand).
2)How many people that raised their hand to question number 1, still use Microsoft Project (every time I lose almost half of the hands).

After the usual laughs that incur and the usual quotes about MS Project like:
· "We use it for the initial schedule that the Client requires, then we don't use it anymore"
· "We bought it thinking it would solve our Scheduling conflicts, but it only made it worse"
· "All of our Project Managers keep their individual schedules on Project, but spend all their time e-mailing project plans to each other, which actually takes more time than not using Project."
· "We bought xx number of copies of Project, but now only 1 or 2 people still use Project".


I usually take this opportunity to ask the following questions:
· "Have you ever heard of Microsoft Project"
· "Are you using Project Server with Microsoft Project"?
· "What if I told you that Project Server is the key to making Microsoft Project work for your business"?


We then go through the usual comments about they don't understand hardware or IT items and they typically think Project Server is a big computer that IT needs to deal with related to Microsoft Project. What amazes me is that Project Server is the key to making Microsoft Project work properly for project organizations. It is funny because it is an easier tool to use than Microsoft Project, and it is the key to unlocking the potential that makes companies buy Microsoft Project to begin with. I guess you can say I am on a personal mission to help companies understand the value of Microsoft Project Server. I talk to companies about the fact that running Microsoft Project without Project Server is like running Microsoft Outlook without Exchange. So if Project Server makes Microsoft Project work for project organizations, what does it do?


Here is a list of some of the basic features that you can immediately take advantage of:

· Project Server immediately takes all Microsoft Project plans, that in the past, were on individual project managers computers and publishes them to everyone in the organization to provide visibility to all projects.
· Project Server takes the tasks of all projects and publishes them to all project resources.
· Project Server takes control of provisioning a Project SharePoint site so that everyone can collaborate about the project. This includes Project Resources, Subcontractors, Owners/Clients, and Project Executives. This SharePoint site then becomes the common location to surface issues/risks, document management, and review project plans.
· Project Portfolio management allows the organization to view all the projects that your organization is either working on or considering working on. This provides breakdowns by divisions, project managers, type of work and location.
· Resource Planning to view either individual resource capacity or global resource capacity.

This is just a basic list of the immediate advantage of turning on Project Server for your organization. I guess I hope that between now and the release of Project 2010, New Vision can start doing a better job of evangelizing the value of Project Server to the non-Microsoft Project Server community. It is easier to use than Project, provides value to the whole project organization and gets information to project stakeholders when they need it and where they need it. If you haven't looked into Microsoft Project Server I encourage you to look into the value of turning on Microsoft Project Server to connect project plans, communicate project data to your whole organization and to most importantly resolve the question where I don't have to hear anymore at these meetings "Microsoft Project doesn't work for my business".

www.nvprojectsolutions.com