Time Management (Video)

Learn how time tracking and task management are connected to project schedules. Know where time is going and meet your project deadlines.

Planning, prioritizing and tracking are core skills for effective time management that can be strengthened by using tasks to prioritize work, plan projects and account for other demands on your team's time. 

Tasks can be assigned to one person or they can be shared with other people, resources and placeholders.

Tasks are essential for planning. In Project View, the task list and schedule bars show what everyone is working on, how long each task will take and when the project is expected to finish. 

Tasks are prioritized so people don't waste time on the wrong work. It's easy to see this under My Work. Tasks from all your projects are listed in order. Start at the top and work your way down. When priorities change, this list will change too. 

Assignments break the work down into manageable pieces. As assignments are marked done the next one schedules automatically.

Every task has an estimate for how long it could take to finish. That's the planning part of time management. We can show where our resources are committed.

Tracking helps us understand where the time actually went which improves time management over the long run. And in Portfolio Manager, Logging Progress has an additional benefit, it reduces the estimate which updates the schedule in real time.

Tracking is a way to communicate progress. Another way is by updating Task Status. Each status corresponds to a scheduling behavior – Active, On Hold, or Done.

Map this feature to your organization's workflow and when people update their tasks you'll know exactly what's happening. When the task is marked done, the next priority item is served up automatically and you can keep right on going.

Board views are a great way to monitor status. You can see exactly where everything stands and who might need your help.

Data is captured every time someone updates a task. Planning and work metrics are available in Priority Views, on Dashboards, downloaded from Timesheet Export and Grid Views.

Plan, prioritize and track to make the most of time and resources as your team collaborates to get things done.