Achieve Time Management & Goal Setting Software Help

Project Information Form (Achieve Planner)

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The project information form consists of the following tabs: General, Stakeholders, Objectives, Vision, Risks, Strategy, Team, Contacts, Issues and Details.

While Achieve allows you to plan your projects in great detail, not all of them require or deserve the same amount of planning. Some projects just need to be done, while others will benefit from careful planning. See Project Planning for more information.

General Tab

The general tab consists of the following fields:

Name	Brief name for the project
Priority	Priority for the project (see Using Priorities)
Project Start	Target start date for the project
Target End	Projected end date for the project
Deadline	Deadline for the project (if any)
Expected Effort	Total expected level of effort required to complete the project from start to finish
Effort to Date	Actual effort performed to date
Effort Left	Expected effort still required to complete the remainder of the project
% Complete	Percent of the project that has been completed so far
Expected Cost	Expected total cost required to complete the project
Low Cost	Low estimate for the total project cost
High Cost	High estimate for the total project cost
Cost to Date	Actual cost of the project to date
Subprojects	Number of subprojects
Tasks	Number of tasks in this project
Scheduling Status	Current scheduling status for the project
Status	Current status for the project
Sensitivity	Sensitivity of the project
Effort Driven	Effort driven projects are automatically scheduled by Achieve based on effort estimates. Clear this box if you don't want the project to be automatically scheduled. You will have to enter start/end dates manually for all tasks of the project.
Expanded	Indicates if the project is expanded (children shown) or collapsed (children hidden)
Lead Time	Lead time value for the project used when setting the deadline for a new recurring instances (see Project/Task Recurrence)
Block Size	Default size for project blocks generated for the project
Label	Checked if the project label is active, unchecked if there is no label. Click Edit Label button to change the label. The project label is used in the Weekly Schedule view when displaying appointments associated with the project.
Result Area	Result Area associated with the project
Should Delegate	Check if you feel that you should delegate this project instead of completing it yourself
Assigned To	Name of the person responsible for completing the project (or best candidate for delegation if not yet delegated)
Description	Detailed description of the project
Categories	Categories for the project (keywords)
Place	Place/location context for the project (if any)
Reminder	Check to set the project reminder, uncheck to clear the reminder
Reminder Date/Time	Set the date/time for the project reminder

Stakeholders Tab

A stakeholder is a person or group that is affected in some way by the outcome of the project. You can capture and prioritize project stakeholders and describe the stake they have in the project's outcome.

Objectives Tab

The objectives tab allows you to define the project's purpose and objectives. The purpose is a simple statement that describes the main reasons for undertaking the project. It should answer the following questions: What are you ultimately trying to accomplish with your project? Why is that important?

The project objectives serve as criteria to determine whether the project succeeds or fails. A successful project meets or exceeds its objectives, whereas a failed project does not. For each objective you can define the criteria you will use to determine if the objective has been met and what stakeholders are affected by it.

Vision Tab

The project vision is a description of what the project will be like when it is finally completed. What will it look like? Who will be there? How will it affect you, your team, and the project stakeholders? How will you feel? All of these are questions that a good vision statement should answer.

Achieve allows you to define two visions for your project: ideal vision and sufficient vision. The ideal project vision statement should be based on the best possible outcome for the project. In fact, you might want to envision something even better than what you consider to be the best possible outcome. Remember that the purpose of the project vision is to inspire, motivate, and stimulate your creativity, and not to serve as a measuring stick for project success; that's the job of the project objectives.

The sufficient project vision statement describes what a successful outcome would look like (but not necessarily the best possible outcome).

Risks Tab

While the project vision looks at the best possible outcome for your project, the risks section forces you to examine the potential pitfalls and problems that may be lurking ahead. Risk management is important because it helps you detect, avoid, and mitigate risks before they can turn into project ending disasters. Most medium and large projects have at least one risk that can easily turn into a project killer if not managed properly. As Tom Gilb points out, "If you don't actively attack the risks, they will actively attack you."

The Risks tab allows you to capture, define and prioritize the project risks. You can enter the following information for each risk (open the risk row to provide all the details).

Priority	Priority of the risk
Title	Title of the risk
Description	Description of the risk
Severity	Severity of the risk from 0 (not severe) to 100 (very severe)
Probability	Probability that the risk will occur from 0 (no chance) to 100 (certain)
Detection	Steps you can take to detect the risk if it occurs
Prevention	Steps you can take to prevent the risk from occurring
Mitigation	Steps you can take to mitigate the risk if it occurs

Strategy Tab

The strategy tab allows you to capture the priorities/constraints for the project, the overall strategy you have chosen for the project, and all the candidate strategies that you may have considered.

Team Tab

The team tab contains the following items: team roles, pool, default resource and project resource assignments. Each is described below in more detail.

Team Roles

The team roles section allows you to define and organize the team for your project. You can capture all the roles/functions (like an organization chart) that your project requires and assign each role to one or more person or group. You can also have the same person play different roles in your team.

Default Resource

The default resource is assigned by default to all the tasks in the project that don't have specific resource assignments. See Project/Task Scheduling for more details.

Resource Pool

You can specify the pool of resources (team) available to work on this project.

Project Resource Assignments

You can use project resource assignments to limit the amount of a resource that is used for this particular project. Assignments can be constrained to a particular time period or remain unconstrained. For example, if John Smith is only supposed to work 50% of the time on this project, you can enter a resource assignment for John Smith indicating 50% availability. See Project/Task Scheduling for more details.

Contacts Tab

The contacts tab can be used to keep track of people or groups that are associated with the project in some way. The following fields are supported for each contact:

Name	Name of the contact
Association	How the contact is associated with the project
Contact	Contact record for the contact (if any)

Issues Tab

The issues tab can be used to track any issues or problems associated with the project. The following fields are supported for each issue (open the issue row to enter the detailed information):

Priority	Priority of the issue
Summary	A brief summary of the issue
Description	A more detailed description of the issue
Resolution	How the issue was resolved
Resolved	Indicates if the issue was resolved

Details Tab

Additional details and notes for the project.

Attachments Tab

Allows you to add/delete and launch attachments/URLs associated with the project. Use the "browse" button to associate an existing file with the selected attachment row, and the "launch" button to open the file/URL for the selected row.