Many, many times we see that project timing and project resourcing are managed in MS Project, while projectfinances are kept in Excel. Using the financial governance capacilities in MS Project is often an unexploited area. This is a waste, because only adding rates to resources will already bring you half way. MS Project can calculate anything for you directly from your schedule.
The trick here is also to keep the right balance between the amount of input and getting valuable output. Remember MS Project is not meant to be accounting software, MS Project is a modeling tool which should deliberately simplify the reality. Accountants cannot permit to simplify. Neither will it serve as an invoicing system.
What will we do in cost management (part of our Pro course)?
In the e-course 'cost management' you will enter a project budget for main cost types, compare planned cost against actual cost. Predict eventual cost at project complete based on actual progress, provide burn-down charts and earned value metrics to qualify the project's performance. All the things required to be able to perform quality cost control.In "CostManagement" (Pro course) we will teach you how to set up a financial governance way of work, that builds on what you already have in your schedule in MS Project.
How are you dealing with costs in your current schedule? Share your experience in the comments below!