How to get planned % complete based on number of days

Question

Hello:
I a trying to figure out a way(best way) to determine a "planned % complete" simply based on the number of days in a task.
For example:
Task Start Date = 3/1/15
Task Finish Date = 3/20/15
So the task is 20 days long
Today is 3/10/15 so "planned % complete" should be 50%
(Today-Start) / (Finish-Start)
=
((3/10/15)-(3/1/15)) / ((3/20/15)-(3/1/15))
=
(10) / (20)
=
50%
Do I just enter this into a custom field as a formula or is there a better way of doing this?
Also, when I tried to do this with a formula, it did not apply to the roll up tasks. So, the bolded tasks were blank.
I am trying to get to a calculated number of the % I should be completed based on the current date and length of the task. I realize this might not be the best way so any
suggestions are greatly appreciated.
I would like to be able to look at my project and see that I am 35% complete, but I should be 50%.
Any guidance is greatly appreciated.
I am using MS Project 2010.
Thanks
kp

Answer 1

Hi kp,
You are typically asking for Earned Value indicators. You could of course use the kind of formula you are refering to, but have in mind that MS Project proposes by default a large number of EV fields, such as CPI, SPI and all variance fields. Although it
requires a certain maturity in scheduling (cost, baselines, status date, tracking), it will provide you a large set of EV indicators out of the box.
See an excellent article
here.
Hope this helps,
Guillaume Rouyre, MBA, MVP, P-Seller |