By Kenneth Steiness, Raphael Santos, and Nate Auchter
DOWNLOAD: Power BI Template – Project for the web
With Microsoft Project for the web being ‘rolled into the new Planner’ as premium plans, you get some great new features like ‘My Work’ and ‘Copilot’ for AI to mention just a few. And, for reporting, you can dust off the free Power BI template (originally built for Project for the web) to report on the premium plans in the new Planner to get a view of your portfolio of projects and resources. It covers these 3 areas:
- Portfolio reporting: The first 3 pages provide insights into key data across the entire portfolio of projects, with the ability to filter by project progress and project manager. There is also a portfolio timeline and a summary of the key milestones across the entire portfolio.
- Resource reporting: The next 2 pages focus on understanding how resources are allocated across projects and the amount of work they have, including tasks that are running late or overdue.
- Task reporting: The last 4 pages drill down to a task level to help identify exceptions, such as overdue and late tasks, and to see the status of the detailed work across projects. The timelines show detailed tasks on projects and a view of the tasks by resource.
Watch this video walkthrough for the complete details of the Power BI template:
Related: FREE Project for the web e-learning
Power BI Reports for the new Planner
The following reports are included in the Power BI template.
Portfolio Dashboard
The Portfolio Dashboard provides an executive summary of all projects, with the ability to filter on ‘Project Progress’ and ‘Project Manager’. Users can also link back to the schedule in Project for the web.
Portfolio Timeline
The Portfolio Timeline shows visually where all the projects fall on a timeline, including their duration and progress to date. Projects are colored by Project Manager, and the tooltip on each bar in the timeline shows additional details.
Portfolio Milestones
The Portfolio Milestones report summarizes all milestones completed the past 30 days, those still listed to be completed in the past, and milestones planned for the next 30 days. The donut charts show the total count of milestones and how many are on each project, and the table shows each milestone along with which project they are from and what the finish date is.
Resource Dashboard
The Resource Dashboard allows managers to easily get an overview of where their resources are allocated to projects, including how many tasks they have, how much work is running late or overdue, the total effort completed and remaining by resource, and how many resources are assigned to each project.
Resource Assignments
The Resource Assignments report allows managers to see the details of the work their people are assigned to. The visuals show the total effort by the resources selected and the effort by project, as well as effort completed and remaining by project manager. The table shows each of the resources selected and expands to show which project they are assigned to, and then expands again to show the detailed tasks.
Task Overview
The Task Overview report focuses on the detailed tasks across projects and helps identify exceptions in the portfolio with key performance indicators. The visuals allow for additional filtering on ‘Tasks by Status’, ‘Tasks by Project > Bucket’ (drill-down from project to bucket), and ‘Effort by Project > Bucket’ (drill-down from project to bucket).
Project Timeline
The Project Timeline shows each project with the detailed tasks colored by status. The tooltip provides additional supporting detail about each task.
My Work
The My Work report focuses on work for one or more individuals. It’s a great way for a team member to see their own work or for managers to see what their teams are working on.
My Timeline
The My Timeline report is intended for individual team members to see their personal timeline of work across and within projects.
What’s Next?
As you can see, the Power BI template provides excellent out of the box reporting. Since Microsoft is providing the source files, you can tailor these reports to the specific needs of your organization.
To get started, download the Power BI template and follow the instructions on how to deploy it (see Connect to Project for the web data through Power BI Desktop).
BONUS: The Power BI Template also contains hidden queries for Roadmap data. To learn how to activate these queries and report on Roadmaps, see Enabling Roadmap Data in the Project for the web Power BI Template.
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