This post is part of a series I’m creating connected with Project Service Automation (PSA) for Microsoft Dynamics 365. This time I will consider the project tracking view.

As the project is being delivered you can use the project tracking view to review time recorded on the project and remaining effort. You access the project tracking view from the navigation on your project.

Effort Tracking

As you can see below the project tracking view shows effort and progress on each task. Along with details of schedule variance. Also in the header we can see the latest deliver date, current estimated cost, percentage of costs consumed percentage of the project completed.

On the effort tracking sheet, we can edit the remaining hours as required. Notice below that I have a 30-hour discovery task and 8 hours has been recorded against it. But I have changed the remaining hours to be 25, to signify either that progress has been slow or maybe the task is larger than we firs thought.

Effort Hours – this column reflects the original estimate.

Remaining Hours – reflects the time left on the task. The remaining hours will be automatically reduced as actual hours are booked against the task. Meaning it will default to the difference between the estimated hours and actual hours. But you will also find that it will be quite common to adjust this figure during project delivery.

Progress % – This is calculated as (actual hours / EAC) *100. The percentage reflects the progression on the task.

Actual Hours – As time is approved from time sheets that actual hours field will increase.

Effort Estimate at Complete (EAC) – The EAC is a estimate on how many hours will have been booked by the time the task completes. It is a sum of the remaining hours plus actual hours. In my example above the task started off as 30 hours but we now expect it to take 33 hours in total.

Schedule Variance – This column reflects the number of hours variance from the original estimated effort and the revised EAC. A negative value signifies an overrun. Whilst a positive value will show that you are ahead of schedule.

Tip:
You can edit the remaining hours directly on the tracking view.

Cost Tracking

Additionally, we can use the taskbar button to swap to a cost tracking view. This then allows us to compare planned and actual costs. And observe any cost variations. With the “cost estimate to complete (EAC)” field giving us a revised cost estimate for the task.

Also, notice that we can change the cost tracking view to use bill rate rather than cost. And then in turn see the billable revenue %, estimated revenue at completion etc.

Total View

The rolled-up impact of revisions made in cost tracking can be observed on the main project page. You can see this on the status tab for the project. See below that system calculated fields are telling me that we are behind schedule and over budget! The project manager and optionally set the project status and enter a comment.

Also, notice that I have two charts, one showing the % progress and the other the % cost consumption. On my project I have consumed 10% of the costs but only made 6% progress, meaning I am behind schedule!

I hope you can see that the tracking view will be a very important one for the project manager to work with during project delivery. Updating the remaining effort on tasks and observing the impact on costs and bill rates to the customer will be key project management activities.
J