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  #1  
Old 03-22-2012, 09:00 PM
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How to Project Manage a Consultancy

Hi,

I need help on how to manage a project I have been put in charge of.

Essentially there are 4 consultants working on a project (who all work in separate locations around the world) and I need to keep a track of 'who has worked on what' and 'how long they have spent working on each task'. There is an estimate for the number of hours each task of the project is expected to take and I would like to keep a track of 'hours worked' with this estimate and keep track of progress against this estimate (note: each individual consultant will be working on every task).

Initially I was thinking of using Microsoft Project (as this is what I was trained in using at Uni) however I don't think this would be the best method to use considering there is no definitive time constrains for the project. Currently I think a Excel spreadsheet is the way forward....

I just want to know what you guys think is the best way or how you would approach this type of project?
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Old 03-23-2012, 07:20 AM
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For this you have to understand the market and need in the market.It will be best for you.
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Old 03-24-2012, 07:24 AM
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I don't understand what you mean by this! I need to keep track of hours worked and compare it with the estimated number of hours for each task... the main problem is 'how do I keep a track of what each consultant has done and how long they have spent on each task?
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Old 03-28-2012, 08:22 AM
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Don't know if this would be of any help to you, but [URL="http://www.corasystems.com/products/projectvision/"]ProjectVision[/URL] has a fully functional time tracking incorporated into its software. It will enable your organization to manage its resources time schedule easily with its simple user interface.

If you require any further information please let me know.

Best of luck with your projects.

Regards,
Marian
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  #5  
Old 03-30-2012, 02:19 AM
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Hi

A few ideas:

Paid

If you are looking to introduce a new system then you could consider something like Wrike.com. This is a planning tooling that allows collaboration straight from your project plan. Each task can have hours logged against it. Team members can also mark tasks as complete, and can add comments against each task to keep a log of events. You will be emailed (if you wish to be) whenever your team update tasks.

Wrike is very useful from a getting things done point of view but is limited in terms of project tools i.e. no baseline, critical path etc.

Also currently you cannot assign target hours / cost attributes to each task so again, limited.

Communication and collaboration is spot on though and this makes up for it's limitations.


Free

If you just want a stand alone tool, use Google docs.
Create a spreadsheet and share it with the relevant people.

You can track every task and assign target hours, % complete, actual hours spent to date, costs etc.

Google will keep a version history showing who made what changes and when the changes were made. All users can edit the document at the same time which is nice.

You can also use Google Docs as a project log to capture issues and risks from all relevant parties.

Drawback is that you will need to duplicate some of the info from your project plan to enter into the Google spreadsheet. With Wrike you create your plan once and everything is communicated and tracked directly from your plan, which is very visual also since you can see relationships of task dependencies.

Hope this helps

Nick
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