Using Project with multiple users   

Hi,
I was recently put in charge of finding project management software to help 
our company run more efficiently when a work order is issued.  I have looked 
primarily at Project to solve this problem, but I have a question.  I would 
like to be able to connect with other departments here on site. Would I need 
to get Project installed on all computers to accomplish this? My goal is to 
have each department update their progress or give explanations for delays in 
real-time.  I know I could send e-mails in Excel and they could update it and 
send it back, but that would seem to be awfully tedious work.  
I have seen some of the web-based applications, but would prefer not to have 
the monthly fees that are associated with them. However, buying the Project 
software for all the computers that would require it would be costly as well. 
Any suggestions?

date: Wed, 8 Oct 2008 13:59:01 -0700   author:   J.S. Peters J.S.

Re: Using Project with multiple users   

Firstly, you are probably never going to get all users up to speed to 
firstly do a weekly upgrade and secondly do it to a required standard. I 
suspect the most effective solution for you is to use a part time project 
administrator to collect updates then accurately update your schedule. This 
will give you accuracy, timeliness and someone to offload some of your work 
re reporting and chasing others for updates. They would need their own copy 
of Project for their PC, but that's it.

If your users are good users of Project then you could look at solutions 
like Microsoft Project Server or other tools, but there is an overhead that 
would be greater than a project administrator.

-- 

Rod Gill
Microsoft MVP for Project

Author of the only book on Project VBA, see:
http://www.projectvbabook.com



"J.S. Peters" <J.S. Peters@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message 
news:DC654018-E1C3-4095-AADF-884E556B3DBD@microsoft.com...
> Hi,
> I was recently put in charge of finding project management software to 
> help
> our company run more efficiently when a work order is issued.  I have 
> looked
> primarily at Project to solve this problem, but I have a question.  I 
> would
> like to be able to connect with other departments here on site. Would I 
> need
> to get Project installed on all computers to accomplish this? My goal is 
> to
> have each department update their progress or give explanations for delays 
> in
> real-time.  I know I could send e-mails in Excel and they could update it 
> and
> send it back, but that would seem to be awfully tedious work.
> I have seen some of the web-based applications, but would prefer not to 
> have
> the monthly fees that are associated with them. However, buying the 
> Project
> software for all the computers that would require it would be costly as 
> well.
> Any suggestions?

date: Thu, 9 Oct 2008 10:21:02 +1300   author:   Rod Gill rodATproject-systemsDOTcoDOTnz