Project 2016 Best Practice for Entering Training Days in a Plan

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    • #415616
      Alasdair MacKinnon
      Guest

      Project 2016 Office 365. Interested in discovering what is the best practice for entering training days in a plan. Read extensively that the use of constraints should be avoided. In my case I have a project plan that is geared towards specific development objects for a training organisation – which I’m fine with. However interspersed throughout the plan is confirmed training dates, which can’t move. I do need these displayed on the plan so simply using individual trainer calendars alone is no good. Any ideas?

    • #415617
      Larry Christofaro
      Participant

      Alasdair, great question. It is true that everyone will tell you that constraints should be avoided, but they are there for a reason and should be used when it makes sense. The key here is that the schedule should follow your requirements without contradicting it. Lets take a look at typical training requirements. They are sometimes scheduled to occur at a best timing in the schedule in the beginning (with predecessors and successors), but once booked they are fixed. Timing within the schedule doesn’t matter, and is now independent and a priority over other activities for those attendees. The training class must start on a specific date with no predecessors or successors…it stands alone.

      Now the one consideration is the people you have scheduled in the class and how that class affects their schedule. That will need to be managed and dependent on how you are managing the schedule as a whole (from manually scheduled to resource leveling). That is a different question. Hope that helps.

    • #415620
      Alasdair MacKinnnon
      Guest

      Hi Larry
      Thanks very much for your prompt reply. I think your suggestion is great. If I understand
      correctly once confirmed I should enter a task for the training dates e.g. 2 days duration, making it stand alone. So therefore it displays visually on the Ghantt Chart. Ensuring that it has no predecessors or successors. Thus not impacting on the schedule. I would then enter the dates in the Instructors resource calendar the actual training days as an exception, so that they are not available for any other work. Would work, do you agree?

    • #415621
      Larry Christofaro
      Participant

      Yes, even better if all you are concerned about is the trainer. Nice addition to the solution with the resource calendar. Also know that predecessors and/or successors are perfectly valid if they are requirements of the training (training prep, post training review, etc.) Nice work…

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