Project Planner - Basic (Excel template)

I am glad to announce that my next template (Project Planner - Basic) is available for download. 

Summary Report

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• Download indzara Project Planner (Basic) Excel Template for Free

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Our Project Planner (Advanced) is available now.

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The purpose of the template is 

• To know if and when projects will complete given each project's tasks, task duration, resource availability and project priority.

• If you have any due dates for projects, the template can determine if project will complete by due date.  

• To understand resource utilization and identify opportunities for re-assignment to improve project completions.

• To determine how many hours of work are still pending after the planning period is over, so that you can request more resources.

• To prepare printable project schedule (Gantt chart) and resource schedule.

Project Schedule (Gantt chart)

Features

• Can plan up to 25 projects at a time and a total of 150 tasks

• Up to 15 resources can be included in planning

• Each task is assigned to one and only one resource. A project can have multiple tasks and hence multiple resources.

• Project Start Dates can be restricted (optional)

• Project due dates can be input to compute if projects complete on time

• Planning period is 60 working days from planning period start date

• Only workdays are included (Weekends are not in the plan)

• Takes into account up to 10 holidays (optional)

• Planning is done at the granular unit of hours

• Resource can be assigned to multiple tasks on the same day.

• Hours available to work per day (for the duration of the planning period) is customizable for each resource.

• Projects need to be prioritized and prioritization is followed when resources are assigned

• All the tasks within a project inherit project's priority

• Each task can have up to two predecessors (dependencies). They can be within project or from other projects.

• A task can begin only the day after its predecessors have completed.

• PTOs can be accommodated by creating one separate project with the priority 1 and adding all PTOs as tasks. 

• No Macros

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If you like this template, you may like the latest Event Calendar Template

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How to use the template?

• Use the menu bar at the top in each sheet for navigation

Project Details

• Enter Project and resource details in Projects sheet. Watch the Data validation box for any errors. Correct all errors for proper functioning of template. 

Resource Details

Data Validations

Data Validations

• Enter task details in Tasks sheet. Watch the Data validation box for any errors. Correct all errors for proper functioning of template.

• Use the Advice box for any tips to re-assign resources to improve project completions.

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• View and Print Project Schedule, Resource Schedule and Summary Report
• Project Schedule: 

indzara Project Planner Basic Excel Template - Project Schedule

• The top priority projects will be listed first. This shows the plan for each task, the number of hours a resource will work on a task on each day. 
• In this example, Project 6 Task 4 is not starting until Feb 1st because the project has a start date restriction and thus cannot start until Feb 1st. However, the resource A can be utilized earlier and you see that the resource A will begin work on Project 2 Task 2.

• Resource Schedule

indzara Project Planner Basic Excel Template - Resource Schedule (Scheduled Time)

indzara Project Planner Basic Excel Template - Resource Schedule (UnutilizedTime)

• This is the schedule from the resources' perspective. You can see the hours of work scheduled for each resource on each day. The top table is the time scheduled and the bottom table is unutilized time (time that the resource is available to work but doesn't have any task assigned).
• Summary Report:

indzara Project Planner Basic Excel Template - Summary Report

• At the top you see the summary statistics.
• The chart on the left shows the expected project completion dates for each project shown on a timeline. The chart on the right indicates the utilization rate for each resource. 
• The table on the left has more details about the projects. For each project, Earliest Possible Start Date, Delay in Start, Expected Start Date, Expected Completion Date, % Tasks Completed, On Time Completion, Hours Pending and Hours Completed. 
• In this sample data, we have Project 1 incomplete and has 39 hours still pending. Project 2, though it is expected to complete, doesn’t complete on time. It Is expected to complete on March 28th while the due date is Feb 20th. 
• The table on the right is the resource summary. For each resource, you can see the hours they were available for the entire planning period, utilization rate and unutilized time. 

I hope you find the template useful. Please provide your feedback via comments below. If you like the template, please share with others.