Microsoft Project Reviews

We use it for the Gantt functionality. We can do project schedules and use the WBS piece to break down the work. We are able to generate reports for leadership to show project schedules, milestone schedules, etc.

It is installed on the desktop. It is not connected to the project server or anything like that. 

Being able to get a milestone schedule or a breakdown out of it is valuable. It can integrate into Visio, which is helpful.

Its user interface could be a little bit more intuitive. Not everybody has the luxury of going to training and understanding which button does what and the functionality. The user interface should be improved to make it a little bit more intuitive. It is not user-friendly. I've dealt with it for a number of years, so it is not hard for me to figure it out, but you would need a quick reference guide or something to say, "Here are the basics. This is how you do X."

I have been using this solution for about five or six years.

It is stable.

I haven't contacted them.

It takes a while to build, but it will probably depend on the project size and all the dependencies. So, it isn't exactly straightforward, but it also depends on the size of the project or the scope of the project.

It is pretty straightforward. There isn't anything heavy about it.

I would rate it an eight out of ten.

I am using the Microsoft Project App in Teams and I use it mostly for project scheduling. We don't use it for reports or anything else.

Microsoft Project has helped improve my organization by providing transparency. Everyone can see what they're assigned and other information.

The most valuable features of Microsoft Project are the availability of being online and within Teams. My entire team can use it and see it, versus the full Microsoft Projects, such as Project Professional, you need to have a license.

All the versions of Microsoft Project could use improvement one way or another, but the specific version that I'm using, the reporting capabilities, and/or being able to link think other projects to it could improve. If I have a portfolio of projects that I'm working on, I want to be able to see a dashboard of all of my projects in one place. I haven't been able to do that in this particular version without using coding or PowerBI or anything similar.

In a future release, the dashboard should improve because there isn't one, I had to create my own.

I have been using Microsoft Project on and off for approximately 20 years.

The stability of the Microsoft Project is good.

We have not scaled Microsoft Project, it is only our 25-person IT departments using it. We have desktop analysts, project managers, and directors using the solution.

We do plan to roll out Microsoft Project to our business professionals on the business side of the organization, in the next three or four months.

We have not had any issues using the solution to contact the support from Microsoft.

We used LiquidPlanner previously. It was more of a time-keeping tool versus a project management tool. If I only want to build a schedule, I couldn't do that in LiquidPlanner without my team tracking their time.

LiquidPlanner is only good for timekeeping, and I couldn't get my staff to keep their time, it wasn't practical for us. I needed to be able to build a schedule and be able to track it on my own, versus what was done, versus people having to go in and track the time they work on a specific task. Whereas LiquidPlanner doesn't give me the opportunity to build a project plan without using timekeeping.

The initial setup of the Microsoft Project is straightforward. However, it was a Team's deployment and Microsoft Project is part of that suite. It took us approximately six months for the complete deployment.

We did use a consultant to help us deploy Teams and we were involved too. The consultant has been very helpful, we use them for all kinds of different deployments.

We have two systems analysts who are in charge of keeping Microsoft Teams up updated which includes Microsoft Project.  

We're managing projects a little bit better, we're a lot more transparent, and Microsoft Project is easier to report on, versus LiquidPlanner, which we spent a lot of money on. We saved all that money not having to use LiquidPlanner.

You only need a Team's license in order to use Microsoft Project within Teams, which is very helpful.

If an organization already has Teams, they already have access to Microsoft Projects, or at least Microsoft Project Online. There's no reason to buy separate project management software, at least for a smaller company like ours.

We did not evaluate other options. We used what we had, and tried to save money. We already have Microsoft Project, and we decided to use it.

My advice to others would be to do extensive training and tutorials and create QRGs. It's new and not a lot of people know how to use it. Training is the most important.

I rate Microsoft Project an eight out of ten.

My primary use case is mainly to get down on paper the steps for our project - including who's responsible for them. We use it as a communication tool and then we (on a regular basis) review progress against the laid-out project plan or schedule.

I tend to step in and create schedules when project managers are too busy or oftentimes I'll create the initial schedule due to the fact that I know all the stuff that needs to go in it, and the project manager may or may not know that.

The solution is very useful for project planning.

The solution is extremely stable.

The solution can handle large-scale projects.

I'm totally confident that somebody that uses it more frequently and more deeply than I do certainly is aware of the features and functions in it that I just don't use. It's user-friendly, rudimentarily. I'm just creating tasks, linking tasks in terms of predecessors and successors, adding duration to the task, adding resources to the tasks, and coming up with the logical flow and the end dates. That's how I use it. And, in that sense, it's very easy to use.

One of the things that we struggle with is that we do a lot of smaller projects that end up using the same resources. We have difficulty managing or balancing workload across resources that are on multiple projects. 

For example, in project A we'll schedule Joel to do something in a certain timeframe. And then next day we have project B's schedule up, and he's scheduled to do something on that project in the same timeframe, and we don't have a way to expose those conflicts. We have to basically rely on Joe to say, "Hey, you've asked me to do different things. There's only one of me. I've got to manage my time. Either you give me twice as long to do both of those things, or you tell me which one to do first, and then move the other one."

It would be ideal if the solution itself could expose such conflicts.

One of the reasons that we have some projects using Jira as well as Microsoft Project is that we have to be able to access the project schedule to see, as an individual contributor, what the tasks are. It's not a great way to distribute that. In terms of Jira, where we create the Jira records, an engineer can go into the Jira database and search for his or her name, find all the tasks with the due dates on them, and anything assigned to them. If Project had a better mechanism to allow those who are not the project manager to see their own work tasks, that would be of help or of value to us.

I dabble in the product. We have actual project planners that are the experts in it, however, I've been using it for seven years at this point. It's been a while.

The solution is extremely stable. It's rock solid. I've never had a problem with not working. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.

Some people in our organization do keep super detailed, large project schedules in Microsoft Project. I'm not working on such a large project at the moment. I'm working on many small ones. I can't comment from direct experience, however, I'm confident that we are doing that within our organization and that it can scale to handle quite sizable projects.

I've never dealt with technical support. I cannot speak to how helpful or responsive they are when they receive queries.

I do not recall the company using a different solution. Certainly, when I started in the organization, I was using this product and not something else.

That said, we do have some projects using Jira as an agile approach to project management. With Jira, what they'll do is we'll have a project schedule, and then they'll break down the individual line items on the project schedule even further into Jira tasks in two-week bites. That's how they're managing projects there. 

I did not handle the initial setup. Our IT team handled that part of the process for the company. I just open it up and create a new project schedule. Therefore, I cannot speak to how difficult or straightforward the process is.

Our IT team did the initial setup.

I don't deal directly with sales or licensing. I can't speak to the exact cost or licensing structure of the product itself. It's not an aspect I deal with directly.

We likely have a support contract for the product.

We are customers and end-users.

I'm not sure which version of the solution I use. I don't use any advanced features. I basically put in tasks and assign resources, and assign predecessors, and successors. That's about the level I use it at. I don't do tons of work resource balancing, or Gantt charts out of it or anything like that.

I would rate the solution at an eight out of ten. It more than meets my needs for what I'm using it for. What a real project manager may rate it might be different.

Microsoft Project is one of the main tools our teams abroad use for planning, and it's very flexible. Local teams use it to manage small projects locally. It's also a repository for storing financial information that we don't want to track down. 

Teams use Microsoft Project for tracking tasks, managing requests, assigning resources, and following up. Workers can submit work to managers for approval and then it's submitted to the main process. 

Microsoft Project provides a starter tool that project managers can learn before moving on to solutions that are more convenient or widely used in the company. The interface is intuitive, so anyone can jump in and start planning. 

It's also a tool that is common among many companies, so if I take a new job at another firm, there's a good chance they will be using Microsoft Project, too. When we hire a new person, they can usually start working right away without any training. We only need to teach them how to apply that knowledge to the other tools we use.

Microsoft Project integrates well with the Microsoft Office family of applications. It has plugins that interact with it and you can use it with Microsoft Teams. We can use plugins to communicate with JIRA, Projectplace, and Planview. It's not widely used in the company, of course, but it's something that can interact with the official tools that we have. 

You can do a lot of stuff with Microsoft Project, but the licensing is for individual computers, so it's not connected to a central platform like the one that we have in Planview. 

Planview FLEX licensing gives us a central repository where all the projects are stored so you can check the finances, resources, etc. It's quite useful to have everything connected. We don't have that for Microsoft Project. It's disconnected. The reporting capabilities could also be better, especially with finance and resources. Everybody complains about reports. That's why we need another tool. 

I've only been using Microsoft Project for a year. I have more experience with Planview Projectplace, but we use this as well. I'm primarily responsible for Projectplace in my role. I do onboarding for other teams, create the workflows, and work with use case scenarios for various teams worldwide. 

It's an on-premise solution. It's never going to break down because it's installed on a local computer. It's highly stable from that point of view, but our use case is also limited. 

A project management application is only as powerful as the information you put inside. Projectplace is available to time reporters, developers, engineers, resource managers, and financial controllers. It is a powerful tool that provides a centralized way to gather information. 

A director can access Projectplace and see every project involving their teams. You can create custom reports. We have teams that design new reports for the various needs we have. That's the most powerful feature a project management solution can have—the ability to pull out information. That's something we don't have with Microsoft Project.

I rate Microsoft Project seven out of 10. Better tools are available. Microsoft Project is a decent tool for small startups and medium-sized projects, and it's widely used. 

We work with customers to develop products from scratch. The process involves multiple design teams, financial controls, and planning. Each project is part of a larger program, and we have to follow up on that. There are tons of tools that can do this way better. Microsoft Project, in my opinion, is for small and medium-sized projects.

We primarily use the solution for portfolio management, project management, and program management. It is also used for reporting to leadership on a portfolio level.

It gives the enterprise and leadership the visibility of what's going on with their enterprise. It provides visibility to all the projects that are going on within the company.

The integration between SharePoint and Power BI has been great.

The stability is good.

You can scale the solution as needed. 

We need more integration with Microsoft Teams and other collaboration tools.

The product could be more user-friendly in some areas. 

I've used the solution for a while. I've used it over the last 12 months at least. 

The stability is pretty good. It's easy to use and reliable. 

The solution can scale. It can scale for a company that's dealing with a medium-size company dealing with 10 to 20 projects, all the way to the large companies dealing with hundreds of projects it's very scalable.

We've got the technology department using the product. We also have businesses using it as well. We have a total of 100 plus people that are using it today in our company.

The solution is being used extensively. We do have plans on working with a third party to potentially make the solution even more user-friendly.

I haven't used their technical support, however, I've partnered up with Microsoft Partners to come up with potential future solutions.

Before Microsoft Project Online, we just used Microsoft Project Desktop and we utilized Microsoft SharePoint to create lists in order to create portfolio trackers and project trackers that way. We needed a more robust solution that can track risk management, budgetary prioritization, et cetera. Microsoft Project does that for us.

The setup can be both complex and easy. I'd rate it 3.5 out of five, with five being an easy setup.

Deployment involves usually implementing the new tools and then adopting and having people use it. Implementation took about three months and then the adoption took another six to eight to nine months of training and making sure people use the tool.

We have admins and that's one or two folks that can handle any maintenance requirements. It's not a high-maintenance product.

We had a consultant assist us with the implementation.

We've seen an ROI from the aspect of efficiencies and having information in one central location. We've cut time in reporting. We've cut time in the administration portion as well, of setting up projects so there's been efficiency. We hope the ROI might expand as we use it more.

I'm not aware of what the licensing costs are. There might be extra costs associated with maintenance. 

While it is my understanding that we did look at other solutions, I was not part of that tendering process. I don't know which ones were vetted.

We're a customer and end-user.

I'd advise potential new users to make sure they select a tool that will be useful to the end-user. This tool is really catered to project managers, while the majority of the folks who are executing projects are not what I call professional project managers.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

Microsoft Project is one of the only solutions you can use in just about any industry. It's difficult to do that with most other project management tools. There is a lot of flexibility within the product assets. Most sectors can utilize Microsoft Project successfully because it doesn't have any generic adapters. Primavera is a competitor from Oracle, and they've got adapters for some industries but not others. For example, they have adapters for construction management, so people who are on construction projects usually go for Primavera because the adapters make it easy for them to scale out a project.

With Microsoft Project, you need to do more work to get the same thing, but that is the advantage of having adapters. Adapters make it easy for certain sectors to implement their projects, but Project doesn't have that, so anybody can use it. That is the best thing about Microsoft Project

Microsoft Project has much room for improvement. The solution is still stuck where it was in 2013. Not much has changed since then. There is a lot that can be changed in the enterprise segment.

There hasn't been a significant addition to the enterprise part of Microsoft Project since 2013. The biggest change was the integration of Power BI reporting into Microsoft Project. Other than that, we are seeing still the same features 

Some of the underlying things have changed. For example, data management is quite different. It's called Dataworks, and database management is different. Data is handled differently, but there haven't been any new features on an enterprise scale. 

Microsoft has developed more user-friendly Project implementations beyond enterprise use cases. They're transitioning from the enterprise platform to something that everybody can use, but they are losing out on features.

We have been selling Microsoft Project for a couple of years.

Microsoft Project is stable, but it requires a lot of customization. 

Microsoft Project is highly scalable. It can handle anything from one user to 10,000. What makes Microsoft Project different is that a single person can handle thousands of tasks in a project easily.

We haven't spoken to anybody at Microsoft support because they do not have a big team on Microsoft Project for this region, but we learned about production solutions through implementation. 

We picked up a couple of orders for Microsoft Project for certain shipbuilding companies. We took their projects and did a study, then implemented a solution for them that was tailored to their particular needs. We learned on the job, but there was no guidance or support from the vendor.

Project is essentially an extension of an Excel sheet. You need to configure a lot of things to get your project management done correctly, and the use case scenario is different for each customer. Some require Project for certain needs, which may not be the same for the next customer. We need to understand the customer's work requirements, and we will build a solution on Microsoft Project.

Seven out of 10. My advice for Microsoft Project or any project management solution is to set clear goals. You need to have a vision in mind when thinking about Microsoft Project deliveries or any other project team delivery. If you don't have a clear vision, you may not realize project value, and that might lead to issues.

I have used Microsoft Project for mapping out projects and stuff like that. Though I am not heavily involved with Microsoft Project, I can say that it helps with project management purposes in my company.

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that the product's GUI is very good since it is very visual in nature. If you are in a project meeting and the customers want estimates of when the project will be done, I think they get the point instantly.

The stability of the solution is an area with certain shortcomings that need improvement.

I have been using Microsoft Project for a couple of years. I use the solution's latest version.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution an eight or nine out of ten.

The product's scalability is good. We have been using it in our company for quite some time. In our company, we have done many project plans with the help of the solution and haven't found issues yet with the solution.

Microsoft Project is a solution used by three or four people from the senior management in our company.

My company does not have plans to increase the solution's usage.

I have not dealt with the solution's technical support team directly. Some of my team members who have dealt with the solution's technical support team directly told me that Microsoft's technical support is good.

The initial setup of Microsoft Project was straightforward.

Microsoft Project's installation process took around two hours.

The solution is deployed on-premises.

Only one junior engineer is required to deploy and maintain the solution.

A consultant carried out Microsoft Project's installation process.

Microsoft Project's ROI has been good so far since we have had no issues in our company, because of which the company plans to renew the licenses whenever they expire.

I am not aware of any additional costs apart from the standard licensing fees of the solution.

I recommend this solution to those planning to use it.

Microsoft Project's potential users should plan their projects well enough before planning to use it. In general, Microsoft Project is one of the best tools available in the market.

I rate the overall solution somewhere between eight and nine out of ten.

The primary use case of the solution is for in-house IT projects such as network projects, and system projects.

The most valuable feature of Microsoft Project is planning.

The licensing cost for Microsoft Project is expensive and has room for improvement.

The initial setup is complex and has room for improvement.

I have been using the solution for several years.

The solution is stable.

The solution is scalable.

The initial setup of Microsoft Project is complex.

The deployment took one day.

The implementation was completed in-house.

The license for Microsoft Project is a one-time payment but it is expensive.

I give the solution a six out of ten.

We have 20 people using the solution in our organization.

Two people are required for the maintenance of the solution including one manager and one engineer.

I recommend the solution to other users.