How are you using Project Tasks?

[sonja1]

I'm very interested to learn how other organizations are using Project Tasks.  

I would like to hear from everyone to know whether they are:

• maintaining the overall project plan completely within ServiceNow, or
• managing a select subset of tasks in ServiceNow

Thanks!

[kellykaufmann]

Hi Sonja

Larger organizations that I've worked at absolutely have standard PM tasks and I would suggest to them to have a template for these & pull them into applicable project schedules. We're not that large nor are we ready for such standards at this point.

Which SN version are you on that you're finding it painful to modify a project plan? Perhaps you could get these PM tasks into a 'template' project and use the 'copy partial project' feature to pull in those tasks (just pull in the 'header' task # for the PM tasks and it'll pull in all the sub-tasks and their dependencies etc).

Hope this helps

- Kelly

[sonja1]

Hi Kelly, Fuji for the win! There is a nifty feature in Fuji that allows a project template to be created that completely cascades project tasks along with the timing set for them.   I agree with the thought that while these are available for the initial project setup, if the item needs to have tasks inserted or be re-baselined due to whatever reason, it doesn't seem to as simple to do as it might be in MS Project.  

Although export and re-import can be used, at that point I am wondering if there is an inherent value in maintaining the PM / business coordination tasks in the tool that I am missing?

This is one of the reasons for the question out to the community as a whole - "how are you using Project and Project tasks?"    

Thanks, Sonja

[toneyvecchio1]

Hi Sonja, I've outlined some of my feedback from experiences:

- SN is our primary task system for all IT, help desk to programmers and so forth. Project work was big missing piece to a staff's documented work load so it was important to us.

- 1 time Export / Import from MS Project / Eclipse to SN was fine, but back and forth was not real option.

That said, today our PMs use SN as their main tool for Projects and all Tasks. A few nuances and feedback in how we use it in the real world:

• We don't template much, our Projects vary quite wildly once we get past the obvious level structure
• For the traditional PM, there is a feeling that creating tasks and modifying large numbers of tasks is more time consuming relative to MS Project. This gap has decreased over time after some learning curve. However, it would be a challenge to say it is quicker for the traditional PM.
• For the... less than traditional PM, the suite offers some great tool suites in the form of Project Workbench and Visual Task Boards, as well as some integration with AGILE and agile-esque creation of work. I am sure any demo now-a-days sells this approach and some people love it.
• All tasks are created, internal and external. If task owner is someone outside of IT and no ServiceNow access, assigned to is Project Manager
• We use Demand module to stage requests for Projects.

[kellykaufmann]

Yeah I haven't dug into the new project template feature. It's on my list! Does it also copy basic form fields or is it just for a project schedule? If the former, that doesn't work for us (like 'copy project' won't work for us) since we start from Demand and pull in fields.

The PM / business coordination tasks is always awkward IMHO. It's been awkward at every company and regardless of the tool, and I think every company will have a different preference. Many places don't think to see that the project 'starts' when someone starts coordinating it. They want that all to magically happen and then the project to 'really' start at project kickoff (for which will have the project team magically identified, a meeting invite magically sent, core project information magically gathered & put into a presentation with EVERYTHING anyone might possibly want to know in the kickoff meeting, etc) without acknowledging all the time & work needed to get to the project kickoff point. The team will say "How can you say the project started a month ago, we just attended the kickoff session yesterday! You really condensed our timeline!". (OK, rant over) When leadership looks at the 'start date' of a project, they typically assume that's the 'hit the ground running' date and not date to start project preparation, unless you run reports giving them dates by project phases (instead of project start date) which I believe currently can't be done in SN.

[jbolick]

We are new to the SN PM module and honestly, are struggling with it.   It mostly centers around rolling up dates that we do not want to roll up (regardless of the auto/manual flag).   Ideally, we create a master project and then project tasks underneath it as categories.   Under a category, we break out the work tasks as sub tasks.   The problem is that we cannot complete these tasks without dates and statuses rolling up and closing the parent.   It is very frustrating and throws off any hope of pulling accurate reporting.   If there is a way to make this not happen, I would love to hear it.   It would improve my quality of life beyond measure.