Integrated Time Tracking in Microsoft Project Online
Team members ask for visibility into planned work and a good understanding of priorities to guard against frequent interruptions caused by unplanned and urgent activities. Enter Microsoft Project Online Time Tracking.
Organizations want to understand their true resource capacity and sources of demand, and improve the accuracy of on-going forecasting of project time availability.
Time Tracking in Microsoft Project Online helps teams and organizations meet these challenges with an integrated work management and time-tracking solution that accounts for project time, on-going support and non-working time. With all work in a single location, priorities are clearly communicated to everyone in the organization for improved productivity and simplified collaboration.
Tracking actuals and estimates-to-completion improves forecasting accuracy, helps ensure timely delivery of projects and advances estimating maturity through lessons learned.
Visibility to all Work Across Projects
Team members can easily see a master list of all work across projects with detailed supporting information about the scope of work, where it fits in the overall task hierarchy, work estimates, related risks and issues, related assignments and commitment dates. Having all of this information easily accessible helps to avoid confusion and reduces the need for back-and-forth clarification on detailed scope. As a result, the entire organization experiences improved productivity.
For ease of organization, tasks are grouped into ‘Planning Windows’ so that resources can focus on what is important “right now.” Filters can be applied to easily see all Incomplete, Overdue, Newly Assigned and Completed tasks.
Work can be displayed in a day-by-day view for tracking purposes, on a personal Gantt Chart, or on a traditional calendar for a more familiar
experience. This visibility into all planned work and priorities allows team members to minimize interruptions and urgent requests for support.
Organizations that require basic task updates only can have team members track time and update status in the ‘Tasks’ view using Time Tracking in Microsoft Project Online
Integrated Timesheet for Simplified Reporting
In the full timesheet, resources have access to their current tasks from all active projects across the portfolio as well as any ‘Administrative’ categories, such as Vacation, Sick and Jury Duty. These categories are easily tailored to your organization’s needs.
Team members can also add to the timesheet for any existing project work that started early, new tasks that were not planned for, tasks where a
colleague has asked for help, or team tasks. Your organization can configure which of these options are allowed and whether they require approval by the project manager. Infrequently used ‘Administrative’ categories can be hidden by default and then added by the team member as needed.
When submitting time, resources can track ‘Actual Work’ and re-evaluate the
Estimate-To-Completion (‘Remaining Work’) and provide ‘Comments’ to the project manager about any changes, which helps develop an accurate project forecast. For billing purposes, team members can also track Overtime and Non-Billable work.
Time Tracking in Microsoft Project Online Approvals
All Task updates are routed to the project manager who can preview the updates to see what impact they might have on the project schedule before accepting them. Administrative time is routed to the resource manager for review and approval.
Configurable to Business Processes
Time Tracking in Microsoft Project Online is highly configurable to match your organization’s business processes. Timesheet policies for future time reporting, personal tasks, top-level reporting and line approval before timesheet approval all help your organization comply with accounting and regulatory policies.
Work categories can be configured to support CapEx vs. OpEx reporting, and timesheet data can be exported to most third-party financial software packages for consolidated financial management.
Time Tracking in Microsoft Project Online across Devices
Users can submit both Task updates and Timesheets directly from all major browsers on computers and tablets as well as native apps on phones to improve compliance and participation.
