PD-Trak™ Master Project Schedule

The PD-Trak™ Master Project Schedule (MPS) file provides a management summary of all of the current product development projects and is used as the basis for portfolio and resource management. It extracts key performance and portfolio information from each project file and uses this information to help key decision-makers manage the product portfolio of both active and proposed projects.

The Master Project Schedule can be set up for a business unit or for the enterprise. The Master Project Schedule may be used by the Senior Management team or gatekeepers as the basis for weekly or monthly status reports on projects of interest.

Project milestones or gates that are overdue for a review are highlighted in red. The MPS includes a baselining capability to show what has changed since the last program review. Such changes are shown in red text. The PD-Trak™ administrator updates the baseline (red text reset to black) after the management meeting, or on a monthly basis. If more detailed information is required for a given project, the Project File may be opened directly from the MPS by clicking on the project name.

The Master Project Schedule has a very flexible display and reporting capability that allows different categories of information to be displayed, different types of projects to be displayed, and a variety of sorting orders to be used. It can be used to display projects from all business units and product lines or from only a selected business unit or product line, depending on which level of management wants to review this information.

The Master Project Schedule is the starting point for portfolio management. It provides a summary of all active as well as proposed projects and classifies them by status (active, proposed, closed) and by business unit/product line. The Master Project Schedule provides additional information to help manage the portfolio including type of development project, development cost, projected sales, and financial return. This will allow management to develop a balanced approach to selecting and continuing with the appropriate mix of projects to satisfy product mix, financial return, investment and risk requirements. Additional portfolio management analytic and reporting capabilities are currently under development.

The MPS displays four sections of information: Project Metrics (shown above), Scoring Detail from gate reviews for prioritizing projects, the Gates Dates section, and a Gate/Milestone Calendar section.

The Scoring Detail section shows the project scores summarized by category to provide a further breakdown of the Score within the Master Project Schedule.

The Gates Dates section shows performance in meeting the project milestones as shown below. In addition to the gates, other project milestones can be defined and schedule performance tracked (see example under the Virgo project below).

The Gate/Milestone Calendar section shows the planned and actual stage-gate or milestone dates in a timeline format (the top line represents the original plan, the bottom line the current plan). This view is useful for gatekeepers to see what reviews are due for scheduling purposes as well as monitoring project slippage relative to the baseline schedule.

Portfolio Management Software  Resource & Pipeline Management Software  NPD Process Management Software
Project Management Software  Product Lifecycle Management Software Contact Us                

© 2007, PD-Trak Solutions

Stage / Phase-Gate Process Portfolio Management Software Pipeline Management Software Resource Management Software PLM Software Product Lifecycle Management Software Product Development Software New Product Development Software, NPD Process Management Software Stage / Phase-Gate Software Automating NPD stage / phase-gate process software project resource management project resource analysis project management software