PROJECT CALENDAR

PROJECT CALENDAR 

The stress of handling a project can be so overwhelming, that at a point, you feel like wanting out. Right from the thought of planning to proposals, and up to its execution, you as a project manager need some sort of timetable to help you pull through.

With the help of a project calendar, you can perpetually recognize what to do today, tomorrow, next week, next month, and so on 

Though it could be burdensome to build a project calendar itself, as a project manager, it is necessary to have one. 

There are numerous elements to be evaluated when mapping out a project schedule. Which are identifying prerogatives, limitations and threats to the project.

Also, it can be discouraging to modify your calendar as entities alter. 

But in the long run, having a project calendar to help guide you through the duration of your project will save you time, resources and strength.

This article will enlighten you on how Project Calendars work. 

After reading through, you will learn:

* What Project Calendar is

* Types of Project Management Calendar 

* How to create a productive Project Calendar 

* Tools for creating Project Calendar 

What is Project Calendar?

A Project Calendar grabs the chunks of a project’s task and fixes them jointly in a basic, easily accessible setting that is available to the entire crew. 

With the project calendar, you’ll get a drone picture of the entire project plan so you can detect when different parts are expected to be delivered. It also enables sole contributors to prepare onward and tidy up their most significant projects. 

Project Calendar deduces the working and free days, the duration for activities. This calendar generally reflects the specific hours the company requires to get a job done. 

Project Calendar is largely used by project managers for the adequate arrangement of the time a team needs to get a task completed. It envisions the tasks of every unit and allocates the chore size specifically, in turn, it is adequate for maintaining clarity of the total strategy, and it is effective for evaluating the job’s responsibility and accomplishment down to individuals.

Now, let’s take a look at the types of project calendars we have.

There are four types of project calendars available for project management, and they are:

* The Base Calendar

* The Project Calendar

* The Resource Calendar and

* The Task Calendar 

THE BASE CALENDAR 

According to its name, the base calendar is a footing for other types of calendars, it is used as a template that the project calendar, resource calendars, or task calendars are based on. Base Calendar distinguishes the regular working and nonworking times for a project. Also, it designates the work hours for every workday, the workdays for each week, and any aberrations, like recesses, holidays, and the likes. Users can choose a base calendar to use as the project calendar or as the footing for a resource calendar. a base calendar can also be assigned to certain tasks.

The base calendar comes in 3 forms, they are:

*The Standard Calendar: This is the default calendar for the project and is the source for resource calendars. The standard calendar reveals a conventional work schedule of Monday through Friday, 8:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M, and gives just an hour off for a recess.

* The Twenty-four-hour calendar: This calendar indicates a roster with no non working duration at all. The calendar is best used when resources and tasks are slated for numerous transitions around the clock, or when tools and materials resources continuously work on tasks.

* The Nightshift calendar: This calendar assesses a night transition roster from Monday night through Saturday morning, 11:00 P.M. to 8:00 A.M., with 3:00 A.M. to 4:00 A.M. appointed as the only hour time for a break.

THE PROJECT CALENDAR

The project calendar is carved out from the base calendar. It displays days, dates, and time intended for the project team to function. The calendar of the project is precisely for an allotted project.

Hence, the calendar sends into account the specifications and constraints of the company. The project calendar repeatedly lists main projects and accomplishments to help keep the team in check.

THE RESOURCE CALENDAR

​​​​​​A resource calendar displays the attainability of resources, be it people or materials.

This calendar also indicates the dates and duration of the inaccessibility of resources. 

In summary, the resource calendar bestows project managers an overview of how resources are being used profitably, which resources are accessible and when.

A good resource calendar should contain The proportion of duration for which a worker can be hired, the time a worker gets appointed for a project. Realistically, an all-around appointment for one person shouldn’t surpass their availability. Another important feature is employee vacations, sick leaves, and any other category of absences. They all should be entailed in workers’ calendars, this would make project managers know when a member of his team won’t be available, so he can get a suitable replacement. Similarly to leaves, nationwide holidays should be noted in a resource calendar concurrently with the time resources would be inaccessible.

THE TASK CALENDAR

A task calendar assists members of a team strategize and implement certain tasks like audits and other reiterating tasks. 

Task calendar catches the subtasks and resources expected to finalize a task. This is frequently outside the spectrum of the project calendar.

HOW TO CREATE A PROJECT CALENDAR/TOOLS FOR CREATING A PROJECT CALENDAR

There are 3 common steps to building a project calendar but with the different tools, this article will enlighten you on how to use Microsoft Excel, Google Calendar and Edrawmax tools to create Project calendars. But let’s talk about the common steps before delving into the tools. 

Creating Project Calendars generally

The first step in achieving this is by interpreting every sole task and landmarks that are required to be attained in the project, afterwards, put in the people that these people that have been selected to carry out the task. Secondly, is slating tasks in a calendar for the project.

As a project manager, you can use a task management calendar if you have some minor tasks on the agenda that are not necessarily hanging on each other or part of a perpetual project. Lastly, it is important to plan future work. A task management project calendar will indicate the days and times your team is set to work on a project in the days, weeks, or months to come. So, it is required to be ahead of time.

Tools for creating project calendar

EXCEL

Microsoft Excel is a famous project calendar tool, which is readily accessible to vastly all project managers. Fair to their native table view, calendars arrangement in Excel is easy. It possesses a pre-built project calendar structure that saves users time to create one from scratch and instantly leap into preparation.

Pros

Widely-known, short knowledge twist, and user-friendly templates earn Excel a raw option for almost all project managers. Also, since MS Office is available to most office goers, there is no need of paying any extra fee.

Cons

Lack of interaction: Excel is completely offline, so there’s no realistic means to connect inside Excel.

Lack of notification: there are no tools for generating alerts and updates in Excel, it has no feature to allocate tasks too.

No access supervision: Once an Excel document is forwarded to someone, you cannot control who can access it.

GOOGLE CALENDAR

Google Calendar is another prominent calendar application (if not the most used) 

Most of us use google calendar daily to oversee our plan. 

Google Calendar is free when you have a Gmail account. It also has a decent and protected version on Google Workspace.

Users can create a special calendar for every team member, resource, or whole project with Google Calendar.

Calendars are coded in colours and they can be integrated with different calendars. 

These elements help managers envision the availability of resources.

Part of its numerous features is zooming in on a week or zooming out to an entire year. Calendars can also be viewed as a timeline from the Agenda link, events can be searched and notifications are received if changes are made.

Pros

It’s very possible to view one’s calendar and the company’s work events calendar at the same time because almost all calendar management systems can exhibit several calendars at once.

Also, there is a restriction over who can gain entry to the calendar. It is limited only to email addresses approved by the user for the exchange of documents, access can be restricted to the company too or the document can be made a read-only document.

Cons

Google calendar could be extremely sluggish for complicated projects. There is no provision for goal dependencies or resource management to be gauged.

Just like Microsoft Excel, users would have to amend items manually, if they want to make any modifications.

EDRAW MAX

With EdrawMax, users can effortlessly create their project calendar with just a few clicks, it’s done. Edraw max is effective in visualizing team work and analysing the tasks of each member. It is a user-friendly project calendar tool.

Pros

The software comes with tons of vector shapes and is easy to find one way around. Users can also bind data, amplify activities and track their daily plan.

Edraw max supports the export and import files in numerous formats. Microsoft Office, Graphs, PS, PDF, HTML, SVG, Visio all-inclusive.

Cons 

Files can not be shared on the desktop version on social media platforms, unlike the online version, which supports easy sharing.

Users might seldom experience complications when appointing tasks.

Conclusion

Having a project calendar makes team collaboration more effective and easier, regardless if there is an incredible working system in place, remember things don’t always go as planned, but having a project calendar can help you achieve great feats as a project manager.