Microsoft Project Integration with Dynamics GP Project Series
To drive profitability a firm must follow the endless cycle of tracking project components (tasks), measuring results, looking for better ways to accomplish the tasks, and building a self sustaining knowledge base along the way.
Microsoft provides excellent business software (building blocks) to manage your business tasks, but these building blocks must be assembled to match your business processes. Different types of business need the components assembled differently and while there are great technical standards that dictate how to integrate these products, there are almost no business process standards that dictate how two business software packages should work together.
If creating Microsoft projects from Great Plains project seems backwards from the way your organization works, our answer is a customized and rare integration between Microsoft Project and the Dynamics GP Project Series!
Companies traditionally use Microsoft Enterprise Project Server (MPS2003) to staff, propose and sell the project. Once the project becomes active, Great Plains is then used to contract, budget, and bill the project.
Our unique interface between the two programs allows the following:
• The Interface brings in fee bills from MPS2003 to Great Plains Project fee bills
• The interface brings in time transactions from MPS2003 into PDK
• The interface builds analysis server or excel based cubes based on projects, tasks and billable time.
• The interface can create one or many Great Plains Client/Contract/Project combos from one MPS2003 project
• Better manage and understand projects, tasks, resources, work flows and cash flows.
• Allows project managers to remain in Microsoft Project and create projects and budgets in Dynamics GP
• Once the project has been created project team members can submit timesheets from Project directly into the Project series, simplifying time collection and billing for clients
It is very easy to create a Microsoft Project on the fly and call it an integration. Our firm is the first firm to create the Back office job cost components from a Microsoft project. Employees using our system follow a natural flow of using MS Project to build and prototype the project, gain end user acceptance and once the project is accepted or baseline, create all the necessary back office items.
Project PSA solutions
A true PSA solution starts with a sales effort and winds up with project transactions recorded in a job cost package. One way to view the relationship between Project and Job Cost is that Microsoft Project basically controls the future while the MS Job Cost package manages the transactional history.
Integrating Microsoft Project with a job cost project tool is a complex task. Microsoft Project allows a “deep” work breakdown structure (WBS). The mere action of shifting a task to the right adds depth to the WBS. Most job cost system “shallow” WBS such as Phase/Task or Phase/Task/Subtask. We have devised a way to map any type of Microsoft Project WBS to Microsoft’s Great Plains Project Job Cost module.
Our interface also allows your firm to:
• Keep the Microsoft Project WBS structure reconciled with job costs tasks
• Keep MBSJC contracts and projects reconciled with Microsoft Project
• Keep MS Project tasks reconciled to Job Cost budget and task level items
• One to one project update or one to many project update
• Integrate Microsoft Project time-phased data into reporting tools
• Integrate Microsoft Project time-phased data into Microsoft Job Cost time keeper(PDK)
Project Data Services
Microsoft provides the Project Data Services as an interface to Project Enterprise. Our firm can provide PDS customizations that make Microsoft’s Enterprise Project Management systems work better for your business.
