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Lab 4 - Tutorial on Creating Gantt chart using MS Project
What is Gantt chart?
A Gantt chart is a type of bar chart that illustrates a project schedule as shown below in picture. Gantt charts illustrate the start and finish dates of the tasks or activities. Some Gantt charts also show the dependency relationships between activities.
Gantt chart is an activity of Project Management that allows project managers to initiate , plan , execute , control and close a project as shown in below picture.
A Gantt chart is a time management tool that organizes tasks for a particular job. It allocates times (hours, days, weeks, months or years) for the successful completion of a project for each individual task.
Benefits of Project Management
- Better understanding of overall project goals
- Better understanding of alignment with business objectives
- More organized and streamlined way to manage a project
- More accurate and reliable project status
- More efficient use of project resources
- Lower project costs and fewer project failures
Getting Started Microsoft Project 2010
The first thing that is suggested is to open MS Project and get a feel for where things are within
the software. MS Project 2010 uses tabs along the top bar that open as graphical ribbon menus,
rather than the drop down menus that Microsoft use to use. Some of the sections of MS Project
are also highlighted in the figure below. You may also want to read the “Getting Started” section
of Project Help in MS-Project menu. Further help can be found online at the following link:
http://office2010.microsoft.com/en-us/project-help
c. Bottom Tier: bye default its units are set as Days
You can change these units depending upon your own project requirements. For example, if your project can be completed in few days and your activities (tasks) are of short durations e.g. hours, then you should set your Middle tier timescale to days and bottom tier timescale to hours. You can set your timescale by right‐clicking on the timescale ‐> click Timescale to view a Timescale window. You can switch between different timescale tiers from the tabs of new window.
- Task Information Dialog Box: This is very useful dialog box. It allows you to change activity name, its Duration, Start date, and Finish date. You can access it by double‐clicking on the task name in the task list area.
- Setting up task dependencies: You can set up task dependency (precedence) through the Task Information Dialog Box shown above and click on the Predecessors tab as shown below.
This is very easy to use. First select task in the task list for which you would like to set up the predecessors and the double click. This will open up the above window. Choose Predecessor as given in the original task list table.
Types of Task Dependencies – By default, in MS Project when you set up Predecessor, its relationship is Finish‐to‐Start (FS). However, activity can be dependant on other activity in four different ways.
- FS ‐ Finish‐to‐Start: Activity can only start when predecessor has finished
- SS – Start‐to‐Start: Activity and its predecessor may start simultaneously if resource is available
- SF – Start‐to‐Finish : Activity must finish before predecessor may start
- FF – Finish‐to‐Finish: Activity must finish at the same time as its predecessor.
- Once you have set up your all task dependencies. Your Gantt chart will look like following
