How to use the combination of WorkPoint and MS Project

Some of our clients are involved in big projects with labor intensity in the thousands of hours, giant teams, and complex structure to tasks. Managers of such projects require more advanced versions of management software, such as Microsoft Project.

At the same time, our clients are companies working in the field of professional services, and they use a specific corporate solution for time tracking.

As a result, one day the manager has to face the following problem: project management is carried out in one application, while all the information about labor intensity is tracked in a second one.

The second problem is the fact that the project, the team, and the tasks have to be created in both applications at the same time.

In the majority of cases, nobody wants to solve this problem. The process of project management is the headache of a specific project manager, while the administration wants to get consolidated information about time and finances. In order to obtain such information, one doesn’t need detailed data on the planning and execution of the project from MS Project.

The second option is to switch time tracking to the project management platform, such as MS Project Server. However, such a solution has several disadvantages:

• Project Server is created for project management, not for the field of professional services, thus it doesn’t have a wide range of required tools and instruments.
• Project Server is a relatively complex solution for the daily tracking of time for companies with a large number of employees.
• It’s relatively expensive, and sometimes it’s impossible to purchase licenses for all employees.

There’s also a third option, which is the combination of WorkPoint and MS Project. In general, it looks as follows:

Working scenario:

1. The Project Manager creates a project in MS Project, choosing the members of the team, assigning tasks, and selecting the responsible employees.
2. After that, the project is published in WorkPoint.
3. The employees use WorkPoint to track their working time, while the management has access to the general stats and analytics.
4. The project manager updates the project on a permanent basis, uploading actual information.

There’s no difference between a local project, i.e., a file saved on a local computer, or a project located on Project Server. Synchronization with WorkPoint is available all the time. At the very same time, Project Plugin is totally free, and one needs an active user in WorkPoint.