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How can MS Project plan on a monthly or quarterly basis?

Anonymous
2020-09-14T10:36:45+00:00

Hi,

I want to use MS project to do a program planning on monthly basis. Unfortunately MS project always calculates with days, which means, that the results are not as expected. One simple example:

Start-Date: 1.4.2020

Duration: 6 Months

Calculated Finish-Date: 15.9.2020

Expected Finish-Date: 30.9.2020

I understand, why technically this happens. But I think it is common practice to plan programs with this granularity. So I hope, that there is a way, to support this with MS project.

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  1. John Project 49,705 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2020-09-14T16:26:10+00:00

    oschl,

    First of all, Project can do planning on a monthly basis, BUT, in Project there is only one definition for a "month" (i.e. Project does not plan in calendar months). You can get close by using "emons" (elapsed months) but even that uses a fixed 30 days per month regardless of the calendar month.

    If you want to get exact and schedule by actual calendar months, it can be done, but it requires the use of some VBA.

    For reference, Project schedules everything down to the minute, regardless of the units the user has chosen to display in the Duration field.

    Hope this helps.

    John

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-09-15T07:22:27+00:00

    John,

    thanks for your explanation. As you already wrote, without additional VBA it is not possible to plan with calendar months. In Excel there is a function EOMONTH, unfortunately there is no similar function in Project available.

    As I wrote, it is common practice to plan IT programs at the beginning on calendar month basis. So this would be a nice feature, e.g. like a scheduling option, to define the granularity of planning.

    So I wait, maybe someone else has an idea or a solution proposal.

    Kind regards,

    Olaf

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  3. John Project 49,705 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2020-09-15T14:19:03+00:00

    oschl,

    You're welcome and thanks for the feedback. I suggest you post your request to the Project user voice channel at this URL:

    https://microsoftproject.uservoice.com/forums/914203-project-for-the-web

    John

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