Glossary

8/80 rule A general guideline regarding the estimation of task duration. Task durations between 8 hours (1 day) and 80 hours (10 working days, or 2 weeks) are generally sized to a manageable duration. See Chapter 4.

accrual The method by which a plan incurs the cost of a task or a resource. The three types of accrual are start, prorated, and end. See Chapter 10.

actual A detail about task progress recorded in a plan in Project. Before actuals are recorded, the plan contains scheduled or planned information. Comparing planned project information to actuals helps the project manager better control project execution. See Chapters 8 and 14.

Agile A project management approach for when you want to obtain incremental results in a shorter timeframe. You make decisions based on priorities and what you have learned. See Chapter 21.

allocation The portion of the capacity of a resource devoted to work on a specific task. See Chapter 12.

assignment The matching of a work resource (a person or a piece of equipment) to a task. You can also assign a material or cost resource to a task, but those resources have no effect on work or duration. See Chapters 6 and 11.

AutoFilter In a table, a quick way to view or organize only the task or resource information that meets the criteria you choose. See Chapter 13.

automatically scheduled task A task for which Project dynamically adjusts the start or finish date to account for schedule changes in a plan. See Chapter 4.

Backstage view The view accessed from the File tab that is standardized across Project and most Microsoft programs. This view contains customization and sharing options, in addition to the essential commands for file management, such as Open, New, and Save. See Chapter 2.

base calendar A calendar that can serve as the project calendar or a task calendar. A base calendar also defines the default working times for resource calendars. Project includes three base calendars, named Standard, 24 Hours, and Night Shift. You can customize these or use them as a basis for your own base calendar. See Chapter 3.

baseline The original plan, saved for later comparison with the revised or updated plan. The baseline includes the planned start and finish dates, durations and work values of tasks and assignments, and planned costs. Plans can have up to 11 baselines. See Chapters 8, 14, and 15.

bottom-up planning A method of developing a plan that starts with the lowest-level tasks and organizes them into broad phases. See Chapter 4.

Burndown report A report that shows you what has been completed, how much remains, and the predicted rate to completion. The report contains both task and work charts. See Chapters 15 and 21.

calendar The settings that define the working days and times for a plan, resources, and tasks. See Chapters 3 and 5.

Calendar view A simple view in Project that shows tasks in a “month-at-a-glance” layout. See Chapter 16.

consolidated plan A plan in Project that contains one or more inserted plans. The inserted plans are linked to the consolidated plan so that any changes to the inserted plans are reflected in the consolidated plan, and vice versa. A consolidated plan is also known as a consolidated project or master project. See Chapter 20.

constraint A restriction, such as Must Start On (MSO) or Finish No Later Than (FNLT), that you can place on the start or finish date of a task. See Chapter 9.

contour The manner in which a resource’s work on a task is scheduled over time. Project includes several predefined work contours that you can apply to an assignment. For example, a back-loaded contour schedules a small amount of work at the beginning of an assignment and then schedules increasing amounts of work as time progresses. Applying a predefined contour or manually contouring an assignment causes Project to display a work contour icon in the Indicators column. See Chapter 11.

contouring Manually editing work values for an assignment in a usage view, such as the Resource Usage view, to create a custom contour. See Chapter 11.

cost The expenses of the resources required to carry out a plan, including the people who do the work, the equipment used, and the materials consumed as the work is completed. May also include fixed costs. Cost is one side of the project triangle model. See Chapter 15 and Appendix A.

cost rate table The resource pay rates that are stored on the Costs tab of the Resource Information dialog. You can have up to five separate cost rate tables per resource. See Chapter 11.

cost resource A type of resource used to represent financial costs associated with tasks in a plan. Use cost resources to account for standard categories of costs that you want to track in a plan, such as costs for travel or catering. A cost resource does no work and has no effect on the scheduling of a task to which it is assigned. See Chapters 5 and 6.

critical path A series of tasks that, if delayed, will push out the end date of a plan. See Chapters 10 and 12.

daily scrum meeting A short daily meeting in which team members communicate about work items and collaborate on issues. See Chapter 21.

deadline A date value that you can enter for a task to indicate the latest date by which you want the task to be completed. If the scheduled completion date of a task is later than its deadline, Project notifies you. The benefit of entering deadline dates is that they do not constrain tasks. See Chapter 10.

deliverable The final product, service, or event that a plan is intended to produce. See Chapter 4 and Appendix A.

dependency A link between a predecessor task and a successor task. A dependency controls the start or finish of one task relative to the start or finish of the other task. The most common dependency is finish-to-start (FS), in which the finish date of the predecessor task determines the start date of the successor task. See Chapter 4.

destination program The program into which you place the data when exchanging data between Project and another program. See Chapter 19.

driving predecessor A predecessor task that directly affects, or drives, the scheduling of its successor task. See Chapter 9.

duration The span of working time that you expect it will take to complete a task. See Chapter 4.

effort-driven scheduling A scheduling method in which the work of a task remains constant, regardless of the number of resources assigned to it. As resources are added to a task, the duration decreases, but the total work remains the same and is distributed among the assigned resources. Effort-driven scheduling is turned off by default, but it can be turned on for fixed-unit or fixed-duration tasks. Effort-driven scheduling is always turned on for fixed-work tasks. See Chapter 6.

elapsed duration The uninterrupted span of time that it will take to finish a task, based on a 24-hour day and a 7-day week. Elapsed duration is not limited by project, resource, or task calendars; it is continuous. See Chapter 4.

Entry table The grid on the left side of the default Gantt Chart view and default Resource Sheet view. See Chapters 4, 5, and 6.

export map The specifications for exporting fields from Project to other file formats, such as a tab-delimited format. Project includes several export maps, which you can use as they are or modify. Import maps and export maps are sometimes referred to as data maps. See Chapter 19.

field The lowest-level information about a task, resource, or assignment. See Chapters 1, 3, and 4.

filtering In a view, a way to see or highlight only the task or resource information that meets the criteria you choose. See Chapter 13.

fixed consumption rate A fixed quantity of a material resource to be consumed in the completion of an assignment. See Chapter 11.

fixed cost A set amount of money budgeted for a task. This amount is independent of resource costs and task duration. See Chapter 10.

fixed duration A task type in which the duration value is fixed. If you change the amount of work that you expect a task to require, Project recalculates the resource assignment’s peak units for each resource. If you change duration or units, Project recalculates the work. See Chapter 9.

fixed units A task type in which a resource assignment’s units value is fixed. If you change the duration of a task, Project recalculates the amount of work scheduled for the task. If you change units or work, Project recalculates the duration. See Chapter 9.

fixed work A task type in which the work value is fixed. If you change the duration of the task, Project recalculates the resource assignment’s peak units for each resource. If you change units or work, Project recalculates the duration. See Chapter 9.

flexible constraint A constraint type that gives Project the flexibility to change the start or finish dates (but not the duration) of a task. As Soon As Possible (ASAP) and As Late As Possible (ALAP) are examples of flexible constraints. See Chapter 9.

free slack The amount of time that a task can be delayed without delaying the start date of another task. See Chapter 10.

fully allocated The condition of a resource when the total work of his or her task assignments is exactly equal to his or her work capacity. See Chapter 12.

Gantt Chart view A predefined view in Project consisting of a table (the Entry table, by default) on the left and a graphical bar chart on the right that shows the plan over time. See Chapters 7 and 16.

global template A template in Project named Global.mpt that contains the default views, tables, filters, and other items that Project uses. See Chapter 18.

group A way to reorder task or resource information in a table and display summary values for each group. You can specify several levels of groups. (The term group is also used to refer to the Resource Group field, which is unrelated.) See Chapter 13.

Group field A resource field in which you can specify a group name (such as a department) with which you want to associate a resource. If you organize resources into groups, you can sort, filter, or group resources by group name. See Chapter 13.

hyperlink A link to another file, a specific location in a file, a webpage, or a page on an intranet. See Chapter 4.

import map A set of specifications for importing specific data to fields in Project. Project includes several built-in maps, which you can modify or use as they are. Import maps and export maps are sometimes referred to as data maps. See Chapter 19.

inflexible constraint A constraint type that forces a task to begin or end on a certain date. Must Start On (MSO) and Must Finish On (MFO) are both inflexible constraints. See Chapter 9.

inserted plan In Project, a plan that is inserted into another plan, called a consolidated plan. An inserted plan is also known as a subproject. See Chapter 20.

interim plan A task’s start and finish values, saved for later comparison. Each plan in Project can have, at most, 10 interim plans. See Chapter 14.

Kanban Based on a manufacturing Agile framework that uses cards on a board to track the progress of work. See Chapter 21.

lag time A delay between tasks that have a task relationship. For example, lag time causes the successor task in a finish-to-start (FS) relationship to begin some time after its predecessor task concludes. See Chapter 9.

lead time An overlap between tasks that have a task relationship. For example, lead time causes the successor task in a finish-to-start (FS) relationship to begin before its predecessor task concludes. In Project, you enter lead time as negative lag time. See Chapter 9.

line manager A manager of a group of resources—also called a functional manager. A line manager might also have project management skills and responsibilities, depending on the organization’s structure. See Chapter 20.

link A logical relationship between tasks that controls sequence and dependency. In the Gantt Chart and Network Diagram views, links appear as lines between tasks. See Chapters 4 and 9.

macro A recorded or programmed set of instructions that carry out a specific action when initiated. Macros in Project use Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). See Chapter 18.

manually scheduled task A task for which Project does not automatically set a start or finish date or duration. Such a task can include any type of value you want in some fields. See Chapter 4.

material resources The consumables that are used up as a plan progresses. As with work resources, you assign material resources to tasks. Unlike work resources, material resources have no effect on the total amount of work scheduled on a task. See Chapter 11.

maximum units The maximum capacity (as entered in the Max. Units field) of a resource to accomplish tasks. If you allocate the resource beyond its capacity, Project alerts you that the resource is overallocated. See Chapters 5 and 6.

Microsoft 365 The cloud-based service from Microsoft that offers programs and solutions on a subscription basis. See Chapter 1 and Appendix C.

milestone A significant event that is reached within the plan or imposed upon the plan. In Project, milestones normally are represented as tasks with zero duration. See Chapter 4.

negative slack The amount of time that tasks overlap because of a conflict between task relationships and constraints. See Chapter 9.

Network Diagram view A Project view that focuses on activities and their relationships. Tasks are represented as nodes, and the relationships between tasks are drawn as lines connecting the nodes. See Chapter 16.

Night Shift base calendar A base calendar included with Project that is designed to accommodate an 11:00 PM–8:00 AM (23:00 to 08:00) night work shift. See Chapter 3.

noncritical task A task that has slack. Noncritical tasks can finish within their slack time without affecting the plan’s completion date. See Chapter 10.

note Supplemental information (including linked or embedded files) that you want to associate with a task, resource, or assignment. See Chapters 4 and 5.

ongoing operations An activity that has no planned end date and is repetitive in nature. Examples include accounting, human resources, and some manufacturing tasks. See Chapter 1 and Appendix A.

Organizer In Project, a dialog containing commands that you can use to copy views, tables, filters, and other items between the Global.mpt template and other plans, or between two different plans. See Chapter 18.

outline A hierarchy of summary tasks and subtasks within Project, usually corresponding to major phases of work. See Chapter 4.

overallocated The condition of resources when they are assigned to do more work than their maximum work capacity. See Chapter 5.

phase A sequence of tasks that represent a major portion of the plan’s work. In Project, phases are represented by summary tasks. See Chapter 4.

plan The Project document type, also referred to as a schedule, project, or MPP. Project plans have an .mpp file extension. See Chapter 3.

Planner A task-focused solution that may connect to a Project task. This app requires a Microsoft 365 subscription and requires a PPM solution such as Project Online to connect to Project. See Appendix C.

planning The first major phase of project management work. Planning includes all the work in developing a schedule, up to the point at which the tracking of actual work begins. See Chapter 14.

predecessor task A task whose start or end date determines the start or finish of another task or tasks, called successor tasks. See Chapters 4 and 9.

product backlog The set of work items that define the overall product in terms of the customer’s desired functionality. See Chapter 21.

product scope The quality, features, and functions (often called specifications) of the deliverable of the plan. See Chapter 4 and Appendix A.

progress bar A graphical representation on a bar in the Gantt Chart view that shows how much of a task has been completed. See Chapter 8.

project A temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service. See Chapter 1.

project calendar The base calendar that is used by the entire plan. The project calendar defines normal working and nonworking days and times. See Chapter 3.

Project for the web A browser-based solution for managing plans with Grid, Board, and Timeline views. This app requires a Microsoft 365 subscription and may accompany a PPM solution such as Project Online. See Appendix C.

Project Online desktop client The subscription version of Project Professional with additional features. See Chapter 1.

Project Online/Project Server The project portfolio management solution used to manage plans across the organization. See Appendix C.

project portfolio management (PPM) Project management practiced in a formal, consistent way throughout an organization. See Appendix C.

Project Professional An enhanced version of Project Standard with additional features. See Chapter 1.

project scope The work required to produce a deliverable with agreed-upon quality, features, and functions called product scope. See Chapter 4 and Appendix A.

Project Standard The entry-level desktop program. See Chapter 1.

project summary task A summary task that contains top-level information such as duration, work, and costs for the entire plan. The project summary task has a task ID of 0 and is displayed through the Show/Hide group of the <View Name> Format tab. See Chapter 4.

project triangle A popular model of project management in which time, cost, and scope are represented as the three sides of a triangle. A change to one side affects at least one of the other two sides. This model has many variations. See Appendix A.

Project Web App (PWA) The browser-based interface to Project Server running on-premises, or to Project Online hosted in the cloud. See Appendix C.

recurring task A task that repeats at established intervals. You can create a recurring task that repeats for a fixed number of times or that ends by a specific date. See Chapter 10.

relationship The type of dependency between two tasks, visually indicated by a link line. The types of relationships include finish-to-start (FS), start-to-start (SS), finish-to-finish (FF), and start-to-finish (SF). Also known as a link, a logical relationship, a task dependency, or a precedence relationship. See Chapters 4 and 9.

report A graphic format that includes a dynamic mix of tables, charts, and textual content, and is highly customizable. Project includes several predefined reports, each focusing on specific aspects of your plan. You can also define your own reports. Another type of report is a visual report, which exports structured data to Microsoft Excel or Visio for graphical representation and analysis. See Chapters 2, 7, and 17.

resource calendar The working and nonworking days and times of an individual work resource. See Chapter 5.

resource leveling A method of resolving resource overallocation by delaying the start date of an assignment or an entire task or splitting up the work on a task. Project can level resources automatically, or you can do so manually. See Chapter 12.

resource manager A person who oversees resource usage in a plan’s activities, specifically to manage the time allocation and costs of resources. A resource manager might also have project management skills and responsibilities, depending on the organization’s structure. See Chapters 15 and 20 and Appendix C.

resource pool In Project, a plan that other plans use for their resource information. Resource pools contain information about resources’ task assignments from all plans (called sharer plans) linked to the resource pool. See Chapter 20.

resources People, equipment, and materials (and the associated costs of each) needed to complete the work on a plan. May also include expense categories such as travel that are designated as cost resources. See Chapter 5.

ribbon interface A user interface design used by Microsoft programs. In the ribbon interface, commands are organized into groups and tabs for quick access. See Chapters 2 and 18.

risk An event that decreases the likelihood of completing the plan on time, within budget, and to specification (or, less likely, an opportunity to improve project performance). See Chapters 4, 8, and 14.

scheduling formula A representation of how Project calculates work, based on the duration and resource units of an assignment. The scheduling formula is Duration × Assignment Units = Work. See Chapters 6 and 9.

scope The products or services to be provided by a project and the work required to deliver it. For planning, it’s useful to distinguish between product scope and project scope. Scope is one side of the project triangle model. See Appendix A.

scrum An Agile framework that is characterized by frequent meetings (normally daily) that focus on learning and adapting to reach a final customer-approved solution. See Chapter 21.

semi-flexible constraint A constraint type that gives Project the flexibility to change the start and finish dates of a task within one date boundary. Start No Earlier Than (SNET), Start No Later Than (SNLT), Finish No Earlier Than (FNET), and Finish No Later Than (FNLT) are all semi-flexible constraints. See Chapter 9.

sequence The chronological order in which tasks occur. A sequence is ordered from left to right in most views that include a timescale, such as the Gantt Chart view. See Chapter 4.

SharePoint Online The cloud-based, information management solution from Microsoft that integrates with Project or a PPM solution. See Appendix C.

sharer plan A plan that is linked to a resource pool. Sharer plans use the resource pool to generate assignments. See Chapter 20.

shortcut menu A menu that you display by pointing to an item on the screen and then right-clicking. Shortcut menus contain only the commands that apply to the item to which you are pointing. See Chapter 2.

slack The amount of time that a task can be delayed without delaying a successor task (free slack) or the plan end date (total slack). Slack is also known as float. See Chapter 10.

sorting A way of ordering task or resource information in a view by the criteria you choose. See Chapter 13.

source program When exchanging data between Project and another program, the program in which the data resided originally. See Chapter 19.

split An interruption in a task, represented in the Gantt bar as a dotted line between segments of a task. You can split a task multiple times. See Chapter 9.

sponsor An individual or organization that both provides financial support and champions the project team within the organization. See Chapters 6, 8, and 15.

sprint A repeating period of time in which work will be done on your plan. Sprints are typically 1 to 4 weeks in duration. See Chapter 21.

sprint backlog A subset of work items that will be completed within a sprint. See Chapter 21.

sprint review A meeting conducted at the end of each sprint where you gather feedback from the team and possibly adjust the product backlog. See Chapter 21.

stakeholder A person or organization that might be affected by project activities (those who “have a stake” in its success). These also include the resources working on the plan, in addition to others (such as customers) external to the plan’s work. See Chapter 15.

Standard base calendar A base calendar included with Project designed to accommodate an 8:00 AM–5:00 PM (08:00 to 17:00) work shift Monday through Friday. See Chapter 3.

status date The date you specify (not necessarily the current date) that determines how Project calculates earned value data. See Chapter 15.

story points A value that represents the overall effort required to complete each work item or user story. See Chapter 21.

subtask A task that is indented below a summary task. Summary tasks and subtasks make up a plan’s outline structure. See Chapter 4.

successor task A task whose start or finish is driven by another task or tasks, called predecessor tasks. See Chapters 4, 9, and 10.

summary task A task that is made up of and summarizes the subtasks below it. In Project, phases of a plan’s work are represented by summary tasks. See Chapter 4.

table A spreadsheet-like presentation of a plan’s data, organized in vertical columns and horizontal rows. Each column represents one of the many fields in Project, and each row represents a single task or resource. In a usage view, additional rows represent assignments. See Chapters 2 and 13.

task An activity that has a starting and finishing point. A task is the basic building block of a plan. See Chapter 4.

task board card A virtual representation of a paper card/index card that contains the details about your work item. See Chapter 21.

task calendar The base calendar that is used by a single task. A task calendar defines working and nonworking times for a task, regardless of settings in the project calendar. See Chapter 9.

task ID A number that Project assigns to each task in a plan. In the Entry table, the task ID appears in the far-left column. See Chapter 4.

task priority A numeric ranking between 0 and 1000 of a task’s importance and appropriateness for resource leveling. Tasks with the lowest priority are delayed or split first, if necessary. The default value is 500. See Chapter 12.

task type A setting applied to a task that determines how Project schedules the task, based on which of the three scheduling formula values is fixed. The three task types are fixed duration, fixed units, and fixed work. See Chapter 9.

template In Project, a file format that enables you to reuse existing plans as the basis for new plans. Project includes several templates that relate to a variety of industries, and you also can create your own templates. See Chapter 2.

throughput metric A measurement of the quantity of a deliverable that can be completed over a specified time period, usually expressed as a ratio. For example, “paint one wall per day” describes a quantity of a deliverable (a painted wall) that can be produced in a given time period (a day). Note that the time period used in a metric is work, not elapsed duration. See Chapter 14.

time The scheduled durations of individual tasks and the overall plan. Time is one side of the project triangle model. See Chapter 4 and Appendix A.

Timeline view A Project view in which you can display select tasks and milestones against a simple timeline. See Chapters 7 and 16.

timephased field A task, resource, or assignment value that is distributed over time. The values of timephased fields appear in the timescale grid on the right side of a view, such as the Task Usage or Resource Usage views. See Chapter 14.

timescale The timescale appears in a view, such as the Gantt Chart or Resource Usage views, as a band across the top of the grid and denotes units of time. See Chapter 2.

top-down planning A method of developing a plan by identifying the highest-level phases or summary tasks before breaking them into lower-level components or subtasks. See Chapter 4.

total slack The amount of time that a task can be delayed without delaying the plan’s end date. See Chapter 10.

tracking The second major phase of project management work. Tracking includes all the collecting, entering, and analyzing of actual performance values, such as work on tasks and actual durations. See Chapters 8 and 14.

underallocated The condition of resources when they are assigned to do less work than their normal work capacity. For example, a full- time resource who has only 25 hours of work assigned in a 40-hour work week is underallocated. See Chapter 12.

units A standard way of measuring the resource capacity to work (Max. Units) and the resource capacity used when you assign the resource to a task (Assignment Units). In Project, Assignment Units are one variable in the scheduling formula: Duration × Assignment Units = Work. See Chapter 5.

user story An informal description of a user’s desired experience when interacting with the product or system. Entered as a work item in Project. A collection of user stories deliver the product scope. See Chapter 21.

variable consumption rate A quantity of a material resource to be consumed that will change if the duration of the task to which it is assigned changes. See Chapter 11.

variance A deviation from the schedule or budget established by the baseline plan. See Chapters 14 and 15.

view A visual representation of the tasks or resources in your plan. The three categories of views are charts, sheets, and forms. Views enable you to enter, organize, and examine information in a variety of formats. See Chapters 2 and 13.

work The total scheduled effort for a task, a resource, a resource assignment, or an entire plan. Work is measured in person-hours and might not match the duration of the task. Work is one variable in the scheduling formula: Duration × Assignment Units = Work. See Chapters 4 and 6.

work breakdown structure (WBS) The identification of every task in a plan that reflects that task’s location in the hierarchy of the plan. See Chapter 16.

work resources The people and equipment that do the work of the plan. See Chapters 5 and 11.