Goal: Show the project's organization - Project

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Goal: Show the project's organization

Applies to
Microsoft Office Project 2003 Microsoft Office Project Server 2003 Microsoft Project 2000 and 2002

Whether your project consists of 100 or 1,000 tasks, you probably want a way to divide those tasks into manageable chunks. Organizing your tasks into an outline helps you and others to quickly decipher the picture of your project. The outline also helps you think of your tasks in their related areas, whether they're related by time, phase (phase: A group of related tasks that completes a major step in a project.), milestone (milestone: A reference point marking a major event in a project and used to monitor the project's progress. Any task with zero duration is automatically displayed as a milestone; you can also mark any other task of any duration as a milestone.), deliverable (deliverable: A tangible and measurable result, outcome, or item that must be produced to complete a project or part of a project. Typically, the project team and project stakeholders agree on project deliverables before the project begins.), or category. You can have as many outline levels as you need.

Tip This article is part of a series of articles that describe a broad set of project management activities. We call these activities "goals" because they are organized around the project management life cycle: Build a plan, track and manage a project, and close a project. The project life cycle is outlined in The Project Map, where you can find a link to an article about each project management goal. Most of the articles include links to supporting information or procedures that you perform in Project or Project Server. These "goal" articles were designed to help you not only use Project but also better understand project management.

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See all goals on the Project Map

number 1 Develop strategies for organizing your tasks There's no one "right way" to organize your tasks. Depending on your working style and that of your team, you can create your task outline by using a few different methods.

More . . .

The top-down approach Think high-level first. Consider the broad phases of the project as a whole, and enter those as summary tasks (summary task: A task that is made up of subtasks and summarizes those subtasks. Use outlining to create summary tasks. Project automatically determines summary task information [such as duration and cost] by using information from the subtasks.). Then, enter subphases (subphase: A summary task that is nested within another summary task. With the Project outlining features, you can designate subphases.) as subtasks (subtask: A task that is part of a summary task. The subtask information is consolidated into the summary task. You can designate subtasks by using the Project outlining feature.) beneath the summary tasks. Finally, enter the individual tasks at the bottom level. Have your team members fill in the tasks as details for your phases. Not only does this flesh out your task organization, it also fosters team member buy-in to the tasks to which they'll be assigned.
The bottom-up approach If all your tasks are entered and in a logical order already, you can just insert a new task above the first in a logical grouping of tasks and make that new task the summary task.
The brainstorming method Work with your team at first to come up with all the possible tasks needed for the project. Don't worry about sequence or organization just yet. When you are finished, turn the higher-level tasks into summary tasks, and then move the related tasks together and sequence them by using a cut-and-paste operation. Delete any duplicate tasks, and add any new tasks as necessary.

Number 2 Copy or move a task To rearrange the order of tasks in the task list, you can copy or move a task.

Copy or move a task

Number 3 Structure the task list You can use outlining to organize the tasks into a hierarchy of summary tasks and subtasks that reflects the structure of phases, subphases, and individual tasks in your project.

Structure the task list by outlining

Number 4 Change the view of phases and subtasks Project provides several ways to display your project's existing structure.

Click all of the following that apply:

Show or hide subtasks to collapse or expand your outline (outline: A hierarchical structure for a project that shows how some tasks fit within broader groupings. In Project, subtasks are indented under summary tasks.) to the level that you want to view. You can also specify the number of outline levels (outline level: The number of levels that a task is indented from the top level of the outline. You can indent tasks up to 65,000 levels in Project.) to show.
Show or hide summary tasks to display summary information about the entire project on a single row.

Number 5 Use work breakdown structure codes If you want to show WBS (WBS: A hierarchical structure that is used to organize tasks for reporting schedules and tracking costs. With Project, you can represent the work breakdown structure by using task IDs or by assigning your own WBS code to each task.) codes, you can use the existing structure in your project or create a custom WBS code mask to specify the structure of WBS codes when creating tasks.

Click all of the following that apply:

View work breakdown structure codes to add a WBS field (field: A location in a sheet, form, or chart that contains a specific kind of information about a task, resource, or assignment. For example, in a sheet, each column is a field. In a form, a field is a named box or a place in a column.) that shows the WBS code for each task in your project.
Create a work breakdown structure code if you want to create your own WBS code mask that specifies the structure of WBS codes for your project. For example, you can create custom WBS codes to match your customer's WBS codes.
Renumber custom work breakdown structure codes when you move or delete tasks and you want to reset the custom WBS field so that your tasks match the new structure.

Number 6 Use outline codes You can define a different structure for your tasks, such as accounting codes or an organizational breakdown structure, in addition to the existing structure of your task list.

Click all of the following that apply:

View outline numbers to display built-in outline codes in Project. These numbers reflect the way that you outlined the summary tasks and subtasks in your task list. These codes cannot be edited.
View custom outline codes to see up to 10 different outline codes you can use to show different organizational structures of your project. If you are using Microsoft Office Project Web Access 2003 (Project Web Access: The Web-based user interface that is used to access information in Project Server.), you can use up to 30 enterprise custom outline codes.
Categorize and structure tasks or resources with outline codes
Click in the following order:
1. Create an outline code to specify the structure of custom outline codes for tasks or resources. You can also create a lookup table to define entries that users can choose from when they are assigning an outline code.
2. Assign outline codes to tasks or resources to add another organizational structure by defining outline codes for specific tasks or resources.
Group the task list or resource list by an outline code to visually organize the tasks into a hierarchy based on a set of outline codes that you define. For example, you can create accounting cost codes for tasks or job codes for resources.

Number 7 Add supporting information about a task You can add a note, attach a document, or create a hyperlink to clarify the organization of your project.

Click all of the following that apply:

Add a note to tasks, resources, or assignments if you have only a small amount of information you want to include directly in your project file. You can also add a file from another program to a project note.
Copy a picture to an Office program if you want to present your project to a wide audience in an attractive way.
Insert a hyperlink to link to information about a task. A hyperlink can go to another document, file, or Web page; a specific place in a file or Web site; or another part of your project file. After it's created, the hyperlink appears in the Indicators field (indicators field: A field containing a graphical indicator that provides information about the state of an assignment, resource, or task. For example, a check mark indicator shows that a task is completed.).

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