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Project duration by number of man days, or crew days worked, not calendar days

Anonymous
2012-01-09T20:07:23+00:00

I have a project that will take 60 man days of labor.  If have two men working on the project it should take half of the calendar duration.  How do I set a project to compute this with this adaptability?

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  1. John Project 49,705 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2012-01-10T16:58:19+00:00

    Matthew,

    Without actually having your full task details, let me expand on my "simple form".

    1. Enter the task description
    2. Make sure the task type is Fixed Work
    3. Enter 480 hours into the Work field
    4. Assign the first resource. Assuming the unit assignment is 100%, that will yield a duration of 60 working days.
    5. Assign the second resource. Project will adjust the duration to 30 working days.

    Hope this helps.

    John

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  1. John Project 49,705 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2012-01-10T20:48:55+00:00

    Matthew,

    I agree with Mike that at least a 2 day training course is the minimum starting point for Project. Mike's tutorials are free. If you'd like to get a little more formal training, check out this site:

    http://msprojectexperts.com/.

    Hope this helps.

    John

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  2. Anonymous
    2012-01-10T20:14:46+00:00

    What was throwing my off was that i needed to assign the task as "auto Schedule" to activate the fixed work setting.  once i overcame that your steps worked like a charm.

    On a side note, what type of Project training do you recommend as it is apparent that i need it.

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  3. Anonymous
    2012-01-10T02:24:22+00:00

    That sounds right, but when i assign two of my workers as resources my calendar duration does not cut in half.

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  4. John Project 49,705 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2012-01-09T20:57:28+00:00

    Matthew,

    First you need to understand the difference between duration and work. What you describe as 60 man days is work effort, not duration. So assuming a normal 8 hour work day, 60 man days is equivalent to 480 hours of work.

    In simple form, you enter your task description, set the task type to be Fixed Work and then assign your two resources. Project will calculate the duration to be 30 days - that's 30 working days, not calendar days.

    Hope this helps.

    John

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