Nenad Trajkovski

Hi,

I will explain hot to track Physical % Complete in MS PROJECT 2013.

In MS PROJECT you can Track %Complete, % Work Complete, and Physical % Complete. Where are the differences?

• % Complete is about Duration
• % Work Complete is about how much work (in hours, for example) is done
• Physical % Complete is how much Physical work is done

Let’s go! First I will make a brand new Project with one Task:

I’ll now add John as Resource and I’ll assign him to the Task:

and:

I’ll switch to the Task Usage View, and I’ll add Actual work field:

and I’ll get:

I’ll now change Work field, so John will have to work only 4 hours at Monday, and Tuesday:

Now, I’ll add %Complete, %Work Complete, and Physical % Complete fields on the right part of the screen:

Let say that it was 50% spent on the Task 1:

As you can see, %Complete is 50%, but % Work Complete is 38%. Where is the difference?

%Complete is 50%, and that means that John has worked 50% of duration, e.g. 5 Days * 50% = 2,5 days! So, if he worked only 2,5 days Actual work (in hours) is 4 hours at Monday, 4 hours at Tuesday, and 4 hours at Wednesday (half day, because John has to work 8 hours at Wednesday). This is what %Complete means = %Duration

On the other hand, John is supposed to work 32 hours to complete his Task. Hi already worked 12 hours (4 hours at Monday, 4 hours at Tuesday, and 4 hours at Wednesday). Simple math:  %Work = 12 hours (Sum of Actual hours)/ 32 (Sum of work) = 0,375 = 38%

OK! I know that, you idiot, you will say. You had the same example few days ago! I know! But what about Physical % Complete?

John spent 2,5 days (50% of Duration) and 12 hours (38% of %Work Completed), but, just for example, he completed 90% of Task! So next 2,5 days, he will spend 20 hours for finishing 10% of his physical work. If the Task is, for example, Publishing the Book, he might wrote in 2,5 days, but next 2,5 days (and 2’0 hours), he need for reviewing it with editor, fix misspelling etc.

For that purpose I will put 90% in Physical % Complete!

OK! What can you do with that? You can calculate EVM on that way! I’m not going to show you here EVM report, because I have to leave something for my further Posts.

But, as you can see there is 0% of Physical Complete in Project Summary Task. To have it roll up, you should follow this steps:

1. Make sure that you have put value greater than 0 in Standard Rate in Resource Sheet.
2. Change Earned Value Method to Physical % Complete:

3. Save the Baseline:

and:

And, here it is:

Regards!

Hi,

again, my Blog reader has a problem:

“Dear Nenad,

your blog is a real treasure and I am so happy I came across it a year ago when we started with the implementation of the MS Project Server 2010 and I was looking for quality blogs all around the world.

I have learned a lot from your practical tips of how to tweak the MS Project to optimize fine details, which may seem like hair-splitting at first sight, but are really important for users who use the system daily and appreciate every minute saved.

Now I came across a problem for which I am unable to find a solution and I would be immensely grateful if you could help me, at worst, at least finally establish that there is no solution.

The problem is that I would not like the change in »task completed« to affect actual numbers reported in the timesheet. Currently, when I progress task completion for a task (say, from 0% to 50%), planned hours get automatically recorded as actual in timesheets of users assigned to this task. Is there a way to disconnect setting task completion from automatically recording actual hours into the timesheet?”

After this beautiful words, I have to answer! I’m going to do that in MS PROJECT 2013

First I’ll create two Tasks in MS PROJECT 2013:

and two resources, as well:

I’ll assign John to the Task 2, and Mary to the Task 2:

Now I’m going to switch to the Task Usage View:

and I’ll get:

I’ll will now mark Task 1, and Task 2 as 50% Completed, and I’ll get:

After I do it for both Tasks I’ll get:

OK! I’ve got automatically Actual Work! But, that’s not what I wanted. I want that Actual Work remains 0 hours!

For That I must setup my Project:

then:

then:

and I’ll get:

Nothing happens?? Of course not! I’ll now mark both Tasks as 0% Completed, and again 50% completed. Then I’ll get:

You can see that I’ve added & Complete column! It says that Tasks are 50% Completed, but Actual hours are 0!

BUT! I’ll now mark Task 2 (for example), as 100% completed, and I’ll get:

As you can see, Actual hours are here!!!!

Now,  I will now mark Task 2 as 50% completed, and I’ll get:

So, Task 2 is 50% completed, but Work (hours) is 100% completed! And it does make sense! If you want to have Acutal hours = 0 , mark it again as 0% completed, than again 50% completed!

Hope this helps!

Regards!