Depending upon your project and portfolio management needs, you can use either a stand-alone Microsoft Office Project 2007 program or deploy one or more of the technologies that form the Microsoft Office Enterprise Project Management (EPM) Solution.

Office Project 2007 includes several offerings designed to help meet your specific business and project management needs. The fundamental question is if you need a single user version for individual contributors or if you need a server-based solution that permits multiple users working together with common data.

Project Standard 2007 or Project Professional 2007 : Office Project 2007 helps project individual managers, business managers, and planners manage schedules and resources.

If you manage projects independently and do not need enterprise project management capabilities, you will want to choose Microsoft Office Project Standard 2007 or Microsoft Office Project Professional 2007. Learn more about these programs for individual contributors.

EPM Solution: The Microsoft Office Enterprise Project Management (EPM) Solution can help your entire organization work together to more efficiently complete projects. You can have more control over projects, centralize resources, automate processes, and improve team collaboration.

You will want to choose the EPM Solution if you need to:

• Communicate and collaborate with project team members and other stakeholders or partners over the Web, an intranet, or an extranet.
• Standardize project management processes across the organization.
• Understand resource workload and availability across all projects, whether managed by you or others in the organization.
• Report across all projects in the organization and roll-up scorecard reports.

Project Programs for the Individual Contributor

Office Project Standard 2007

Office Project Standard 2007 provides the core tools that project managers, business managers, and planners need to manage schedules and resources independently. With Office Project Standard 2007, you can efficiently organize and track tasks and resources to keep your projects on time and within budget. Smooth integration among Office Project Standard 2007 and other Microsoft Office system programs like Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007, Excel 2007, and Visio Professional 2007 enables you to present project status effectively. Extensive help resources and printing assistance make Office Project Standard 2007 easier than ever to learn, so you can be productive quickly. For additional information on capabilities in Office Project Standard 2007, visit the Office Project Standard 2007 home page or view the Office Project Standard 2007 demo.

Office Project Professional 2007

Office Project Professional 2007 provides all the capabilities in Office Project Standard 2007. If you think that your needs will grow and you will want to collaborate with others, then you should consider obtaining Office Project Professional 2007, which also integrates with Microsoft Office Project Server 2007. When used with Office Project Server 2007, Office Project Professional 2007 provides capabilities such as up-to-date information on resource availability as well as skills and project status. For additional information on the capabilities of Office Project Professional 2007 when used in conjunction with Office Project Server 2007, read about the Microsoft Office Enterprise Project Management Solution.

Microsoft Office Enterprise Project Management (EPM) Solution

The Microsoft Office Enterprise Project Management (EPM) Solution enables organizations to manage their project portfolio effectively, establish standards and best practices, centrally manage resources based on skills and availability, and enable effective communication and collaboration within project teams. An extensible, enterprise-scale architecture enables effective integration with other line-of-business (LOB) systems as well as other Microsoft Office system applications. To learn about the benefits of the EPM Solution, visit the EPM Solution home page. To learn about the capabilities in the EPM Solution, view the EPM Features demo.

Learn how to acquire the components of the EPM Solution:

• Office Project Professional 2007
• Microsoft Office Project Server 2007
• Microsoft Office Project Server Client Access License (CAL)
• Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 External Connector
• Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server 2007
• Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server Client Access License (CAL)
• Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server External Connector

 Note   The products in the EPM Solution are designed to work together but must be acquired separately. Please also see the system requirements for additional products that enable the EPM Solution.