Collaboration in projects using Windows SharePoint Services

Efficient collaboration is definitely a key factor for successful projects. However, not all companies use Windows SharePoint Services v2 with their Project Server installation, for whatever reasons. This post should give you a quick overview on what benefits await you when using WSS with Project Server 2003 and which restrictions and problems you may encounter.

You can look at Windows SharePoint Services as a free and light version of Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server. WSS has similar functionality, however SPS offers even more features and is designed to be a web portal.

Windows SharePoint Services enables you to create a so called project workspace individually for all projects of your Project Server installation. The administrator can choose whether sites should be created automatically when a new project has been published or manually. This workspace is designated to be the one virutal place where all members of a project team get relevant project information. There are sections where especially the project manager can post risks and issues and assign them to other project team members or himself. With given permissions all project team members can work with risks and issues and update them with new information. Unfortunately you will soon find out that there is no way to have all your risks graphically represented in a nice risk graphic, at least not out-of-the-box.

Another key section of the project workspace is the shared documents section. This is where you can upload all project relevant documents to share them with all project team members. You also have the possibility to create a confidential document folder that can only be accessed by the project manager and e.g. selected managers or executives. However, with WSS v2 you do not have the possibility to change permissions on folder or even item level. You will have to create a new document library with restricted access.

I would recommend you to look at the shared documents feature only as a way to share the most important projects documents. It is not designated to replace file systems you may currently have running on a file server. You may also run into some problems when you have a very deep folder structure in shared documents. When browsing through this structure have a look at the URL in your web browser, it will of course get longer when you browse deeper into the structure. As soon as the length of that URL exceeds 255 characters you will not able to work with documents in that location anymore.

Another thing you may be looking for but will certainly not find out-of-the-box is a recycle bin for your project workspace. This means that by default all the deleted items are definitely gone - if you deleted them intentionally or not. Fortunately you will find add-ins for WSS v2 providing you with the functionality of the recycle bin, something you simply must have when seriously considering using Windows SharePoint Services with Project Server.

People and processes in EPM implementation project

If you have been involved in an implementation project of Microsoft's Project Server as an EPM (Enterprise Project Management) solution you can probably imagine what awaits you in this post. It is all about people being parts of processes when working with Project Server.

From experience I can tell you that the installation of Microsoft Project Server - even including configuration and deployment - is only one major step in your implementation project. At least equally important is the training of the future users of all levels, from team members to top level executives. They must become aware of the level of transparency that is achieved when working with Project Server.

On one hand these training sessions will of course cover functionality of Microsoft Project Server in Project Web Access as well as Microsoft Project Professional. You might want to show the project managers how to work with enterprise resources or explain team members how to use timesheets. But on the other hand I would strongly recommend you to equally emphasize the company's strategic vision of future project (portfolio) management and the processes that will lead to that. New processes, processes that have been changed as well as processes that do not exist anymore. For example you will certainly have to come up with a new process for project initiation as you probably do not want permit everybody to create and save new projects to the Microsoft Project Server.

This of course means that working on the processes has to begin early on in the implementation project. Make sure you bring the right people to the table and have them talk about all the upsides and downsides of Enterprise Project Management and the impact the solution will have on the current processes. After all, you want the new processes to be widely acknowledged so these people should represent all the departments affected by the project. This however will likely make the definition of the processes more complex but will also result in a broader user acceptance.

Keep in mind: Even the greatest software will not help supporting your business if people do not work with it!

Workflow support for Office 2007, SharePoint 2007

Business processes optimization is among the #1 strategic goals of most major companies. Thus workflow support of computer software is becoming more and more important.
As you may know there was some workflow functionality implemented in the Microsoft EPM 2003 solution. These workflows however were almost impossible to customize. Let's have a look at what the workflow support for the upcoming Microsoft Office 2007 products looks like!

The Office 2007 workflow support is based on Windows Workflow Foundation which is a part of the .NET 3.0 framework (WinFX). Workflows can be created or customized using Microsoft VisualStudio or Microsoft SharePoint Designer (formerly known as Microsoft Frontpage). Hence the entire workflow functionality is not intended to be designed by the end-users such as project managers or team members using Project Server. The developers will not have to write much code themselves since the workflows can be edited/created using a GUI. The biggest advantage is that changes in business processes which affect document workflows can be updated a lot quicker.

In SharePoint v2 meta data of documents could only be changed in SharePoint itself. Now all that data is being displayed when a user actually works with a document, for example in the new Microsoft Word 2007. All the data on the document can be viewed and edited there. That of course makes the use of meta data much easier and more appealing to users.

So with all that being said, the new workflow support is definitely a big improvement compared to the workflows in SharePoint v2 that you can look forward to!

Microsoft Office 2007 Beta 2 available

As you may have heard the new Beta 2 release for the Microsoft Office 2007 is now available. Go to betaplace and start downloading now. The new products offer great new features and a whole new look-and-feel that you gonna like!

From an EPM (Enterprise Project Management) point of view these are the products you might want to have a closer look at:

• Project Server 2007 (including SharePoint)
• Project Professional 2007
• Windows Workflow Foundation
• (SharePoint Server 2007)
• (SharePoint Designer 2007)

In the next couple of days I will make posts about the exicting new features particularly in Project Server and Project Professional, as well as SharePoint and Windows Workflow foundation - so stay tuned!

Bear in mind that it's still a beta version of the product, so you'll definitely have to cope with bugs here and there. However Beta 2 is way better stability-wise than Beta 1 TR was, so it's definitely worth trying it. Also keep in mind that the Beta 2 license key you will get when downloading will expire in early 2007.

Swiss EPM community

On Monday this week the kick-off meeting for the Swiss EPM community took place at Microsoft in Zurich. Approx. 15 people (from Microsoft, partners and customers) attended the one-day meeting where presentations where held by each customer about their current Microsoft Project Server implementation. Later on the day the goals and content for the EPM community itself have been defined by the members.

Everybody enjoyed the day and is looking forward to the next community meeting that will be held somewhen in November. On that day there will be workshops on resource management and the EPM architecture.

If you and/or your company have a Project Server implementation tied to Switzerland and want to become a member of this community, just let me know, I'll hook you up.

Welcome to Marc's EPM blog

Thank you for reading my blog! I want to provide you with everything you might want to know if you're interested in Enterprise Project Management. Stay tuned for the next posts!