Microsoft Office Project 2007 70-632

This Nugget, the first in the major exam area of Configuring Tools and Options, reviews setting the configurable options in Microsoft Project as Microsoft Project. Unlike many of the other Microsoft Office tools, it has a high level of configurability. This Nugget reviews the configuration options related to how MSP determines the project schedule and how it calculates the many fields that MSP maintains for each project plan.

This Nugget is the first of five Nuggets which presents a series of sample questions similar to the actual questions that you will encounter in the 70-632 certification exam. Sample questions are presented at the end of each major exam segment -- this one being Configuring Tools and Options.

This Nugget, the second in the major exam area of Setting up a Project, is focused on calendar management and how MSP supports importing and exporting of project related data from other tools. The first segment in this Nugget, Using Calendars, reviews how MSP uses calendars when creating the project schedule. The project calendar defines working days, non-working days, holidays, etc, all critical information for the development of a realistic project schedule. The second segment reviews the functionality the MSP provides for importing data from or exporting data to a wide variety of tools and file formats. As MSP maintains a great deal of valuable information related to project schedules, it is important to be able to interface with other tools that project managers typically use.

This Nugget, the first in the major exam area of Estimating, Scheduling and Budgeting Tasks, is focused on Creating and Managing the WBS. The WBS, or Work Breakdown Structure, identifies all the work that is required to complete a project. Creating and maintaining the WBS is a core component of using MSP, and this Nugget reviews the support available in MSP for creating the initial WBS (task list) and the process for maintaining and updating this task list as the project is delivered.

This Nugget, the third in the major exam area of Estimating, Scheduling and Budgeting Tasks, is focused on Sequencing of Tasks. This Nugget is focused exclusively on defining the sequence that tasks in the project are to be completed, in a nutshell defining the dependencies between each task in the project plan. All project dependencies must be defined in MSP to ensure that the Project’s scheduling engine can create the appropriate schedule based on the project’s predecessor/successor relationships between tasks.

This Nugget, the fifth in the major exam area of Estimating, Scheduling and Budgeting Tasks, is focused on Managing Multiple Projects. This Nugget explores another advanced feature of MSP for managing multiple projects. Two features of MSP, related to managing multiple projects will be reviewed in this Nugget. The first of these defines a Common Resource Pool where all resources are defined supporting multiple delivery projects which share these resources. The second feature shows how MSP supports Master and Sub-projects allowing for multiple sub-projects to be combined into a master project allowing for management at either the sub or master project levels.

This Nugget, the first in the major exam area of Resourcing Project Plans, is focused on Creating Resources. Thus Nugget first further explores the three types of Resources; Work, Material and Cost that MSP supports and how/where each resource type should be used. It then focuses on how to use MSP to define the resources needed for project delivery.

This Nugget, the third in the major exam area of Resourcing Project Plans, is focused on Optimizing Resources Utilization. This Nugget demonstrated how you can use MSP to improve the overall resource utilization, i.e. ensuring that each resource on your project plan is working as close to available capacity as possible. This Nugget explores optimizing resource utilization within project by carefully managing resource assignments within projects and across projects using priorities.

This Nugget, the first in the final major exam area of Updating and Reporting on Project Performance, is focused on Entering Task Updates. This Nugget moves us from project planning to project delivery and explores how task updates, specifically tracking actual work results against the original project plan is done in MSP. This Nugget, and the remaining Nuggets in this exam area, explores the very powerful functionality provided by MSP to maintain the plan during delivery and how MSP can reschedule the project to reflect the reality provided by actual delivery details.

This Nugget, the third in the final major exam area of Updating and Reporting on Project Performance, is focused on Tracking Project Progress. Continuing on the theme set in the last two Nuggets of tracking project progress against the Plan, this Nugget explores how MSP reschedules the remaining work, reports on project progress and shows the variance of today’s version of the plan versus the original plan.

This Nugget, the fifth and final in the final major exam area of Updating and Reporting on Project Performance, is focused on Creating, Modifying and Deleting Objects. This Nugget is a house-keeping module which defines how you can ensure that any customization done on views, tables, filters, reports, etc can be maintained, preserved and shared with other project managers in your organization using the MSP Organizer.