0264 - Introduction to Microsoft Project 2019/Office 365

Course Description

Course Details 
 
Microsoft Project is a staple for project management and remains the most widely-used project management software across all industries. If you manage projects in your organization, learning how to use this longstanding resource is key to successfully and effectively seeing your projects through to completion.  In this course, you will discover how to effectively plan, implement, and control projects using Microsoft Project 2019. From sequencing tasks, producing a baseline, and assigning resources and costs, to tracking progress and revising your project plan, Microsoft Project can help you organize all your project's details.  Armed with this information, you will avoid stalling or overloading your schedule. If you encounter trouble, you will know how to best utilize Project 2019 to get your project back on track. 
 
How It Works 
 
This course is fully online, you require internet access and an email account. The course duration is 6 weeks, followed by a 2-week period to complete the final exam (online, open book). Lessons are released on Wednesdays and Fridays of each week, for a total of 12.   You are not required to be online at any specific time. In addition to the specific lesson content, there is a discussion board with each lesson and often there is an optional assignment to apply the learning. Following each lesson,   there is a short multiple choice quiz. Your score on these quizzes does not count towards the final mark but completing these helps solidify your learning as well as prepare you for the final exam. The final exam is an open-book, multiple choice exam   and you need to achieve a minimum of 65% on the final exam to pass the course. There is only one opportunity to pass the exam. A certificate of completion from WatSPEED is available within four weeks of successful completion of each course and can be accessed in your student portal. Many of the Ed2Go courses are eligible towards the various online certificates offered by WatSPEED. 
 
Requirements 
 
Requirements: Hardware Requirements:   This course must be taken on a PC. A Mac OS is not compatible.  Software Requirements:   Windows 10 or later operating systems. Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge is also compatible. Microsoft Excel, a subscription to Office 365, or Microsoft Office Home and Student 2019 (not included in enrollment). Adobe Flash Player. Click here to download the Flash Player. Adobe Acrobat Reader. Click here to download the Acrobat Reader. Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.  Other:  Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.  Prerequisites: There are no prerequisites to take this course. Instructional Material Requirements: The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online. 

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Overview of Microsoft Project. Microsoft Project can help you manage your project's schedule, costs, and scope in a way that you've never dreamed of. Too often, Project users never use this powerful tool to its fullest potential. In your first lesson, you'll discover how to improve your project by adopting a formal management approach. You'll get a quick overview of Project Management, and then you'll learn the basics of Microsoft Project, including a summary of the Gantt Chart view and ways to create and enter project tasks.

Lesson 2 - Creating a Solid Foundation. If you're looking for ways to keep organized, you'll see just how to do that in today's lesson! We'll walk through steps to create a project schedule in no time flat. Once you create and enter tasks in Project's Gantt Chart view, you'll set a schedule by using a calendar and assigning lead times. Then, you'll need to create task dependencies, sometimes known as links. You'll see how to perform these activities, and in the process, you'll become comfortable using Project's many dialog boxes. Before you know it, you'll be creating schedules for all your projects with little effort.

Lesson 3 - Creating and Managing Resources. You won't get too far with your project without adding resources. While tasks create the backbone of your project, people, equipment, and material bring your project to life. In this lesson, you'll find out how to apply two types of Project resources, work resources, and material resources. We'll look at two more dialog boxes, Resource Information and Assign Resources, and you'll learn how to analyze resources by using the Resource Sheet and Resource Usage views.

Lesson 4 - Defining and Assigning Costs. No matter what project you work on, the bottom line is always important. So, get ready to add the final piece to your basic project schedule, costs. You'll start things off by looking through a brief overview of cost accounting, exploring fixed, variable, relevant, and accrued costs. After this review, you'll learn how to assign costs by using the Resource Sheet. You'll even discover how to assign different costs for the same resource and analyze the overall costs for your project by using the Cost Table.

Lesson 5 - Project Templates, Security, and Constraints. Successful project managers are known for their efficiency and for safeguarding private information. Microsoft Project provides two excellent methods to help you in these areas: project templates and project security. You'll find out how to use some of the many templates Project has to offer, including the Residential Construction template and the New Product template. You'll also learn how to protect your project information with backups, passwords, and write protection. Then you'll discover how to put Project's task constraints to good use.

Lesson 6 - Working With Views and Managing Information. In this lesson, you'll discover how easy it is to modify your basic schedules and work with project data. You'll look at the various Project views, such as the Calendar, Leveling Gantt, and the Network Diagram. And if you don't like the default colors or fonts in your schedule or table, you'll be well-prepared to make changes. You'll even learn how and why you might want to create a combination view add notes to your project or sort, filter, and group data.

Lesson 7 - Fine-Tuning Your Project Plan. Many projects experience schedule compression when management or clients ask that the project be completed sooner and for less. In today's lesson, you'll discover how to improve your schedule's performance. You'll explore the Project Statistics dialog box, and you'll learn how to determine the ideal starting point in terms of planned costs and completion dates. You'll see how to change task dependencies to speed up your project and also find out how to split tasks to add more lead time. You'll also learn how to create recurring tasks and attach notes to your project's taskbars.

Lesson 8 - Baselines and Tracking. Before you implement your project, you need to create a baseline. This will help you track actual results against what you originally set out to accomplish. Microsoft Project makes it possible to set up a baseline with a few mouse clicks. You'll learn how to create a baseline and then see a variety of ways, including using the Tracking toolbar, to record your actual project results.

Lesson 9 - Managing Variances. Here's where things really start to come together! You'll learn how to compare actual results to your baseline by using the Gantt Chart and reviewing a table. You'll discover how useful status identifiers and progress lines can be to gain information about your project's position quickly. You'll also begin using the Tracking Gantt and filters to identify slipping tasks automatically. You'll also take a stroll through the basics of variance analysis by discussing the Start and Finish Date, Resources, and Work Variance Tables.

Lesson 10 - Closing Your Project. No project is complete until it's officially closed. In this final lesson, you'll find out how to close your project and use the Organizer to help you customize and copy views for future projects.

Lesson 11 - Printing Views. Now that you're using reports to share project information, you'll occasionally need to print various views and tables. In this lesson, you'll delve into printing Microsoft Project documents. You'll be a master at creating different views of your project with the Page Setup dialog box, and you'll clearly understand the mechanics of the Print dialog box and the Print Preview.

Lesson 12- Using and Creating Reports. Once your project gets rolling, outsiders will probably want to know how things are going. It can be a real time drain answering each request individually. When others request information from you, Microsoft Project offers the perfect solution: Reports. You'll go over a representative sample of the standard reports as well as discuss how to modify and create new reports in today's lesson. By the time you finish, you'll be well acquainted with Project's reporting capabilities and also know how to develop Visual Reports as Project automatically exports data to Microsoft Excel and Visio.