Microsoft Project
Guidelines

Microsoft Project is a powerful

project management tool that can

help you generate important parts of

your project management plan. If you

have not used Project before, be sure

Course Resource

to budget time to learn how to use

the features you will need for this

project.

Ask your instructor if you do not

know how to gain access Microsoft

Project.

Finding Tutorials

For assistance with common tasks in

Microsoft Project such as those listed

below, enter these exact phrases in

the search box:

“Project help—Office Support”

“Basic tasks in Project”

“Show the critical path of your

project”

“How Project schedules tasks:

Behind the scenes”

“Office Quick Starts—Office

Support” (Click the first link

returned by the search engine.

Scroll down to Standalone Apps

and click Project Quick Start)

“Microsoft Project support

resources”

“Microsoft Project Videos and

Tutorials”

Creating Your Gantt
Chart

Your team should have drafted a

work breakdown structure based on

the provided template. Open a new

blank project to begin and follow

these steps:

Verify your view is Gantt view.

When this view is turned on, the

Gantt chart will fill in on the

right side of your screen as you

add tasks, with dates on the left.

Enter tasks.

Use the indent key to create

subtasks, if necessary.

Modify duration and start

and finish dates for each

task.

Create milestones, if desired.

Turn your task list into a work

breakdown structure, and insert

outline numbers, if needed.

Link tasks, also called adding

task dependencies.

Identify the critical path in red.

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