What is a Baseline?
A baseline is a recorded snapshot of the project schedule at a specific point in time. It serves as a crucial tool for assessing project performance and guiding informed decisions about progress. Essentially, a baseline provides a benchmark to compare actual performance against the original plan.
What’s New with Baselines?
Baselines were introduced into Microsoft Planner to act as a benchmark for your project schedule. These benchmarks help preserve the initial plan of your project to measure against real progress made by you and members of your team. Baselines enable your team to track variances and make adjustments when needed to ensure that your project can stay on course and ensure that milestones and achievements are accomplished.
With the latest Baselines Update, Microsoft has introduced:
- Plan-Level Variance Tracking
With Plan-Level Variance Tracking, you can now track Start/Finish, Effort, and Duration Variance at the plan level within Baselines. These insights provide a detailed comparison of you and your team’s project progress compared to the original project plan, allowing you to identify & resolve issues as they occur.
- Spotlight Tab
Along with Plan-Level Variance Tracking, Microsoft has introduced the Spotlight –Tab. The Spotlight Tab allows users to highlight essential plan insights. Insights can include:
- Critical Path Variance: Quickly spot delays in critical path tasks & take prompt action to manage risks
- Upcoming Tasks: Stay organized with a clear overview of tasks approaching their deadlines
- Overdue Tasks: Identify tasks needing immediate attention to maintain your project’s momentum
- Task-Level Comparison: Review finish variance for individual tasks to monitor progress effectively.
Let’s Get Started!
After creating your project schedule, you’ll then be ready to set your baseline. Ensure that you have Start, Finish, & Effort assigned for each task.
To get started, first you’ll need to create a baseline if you haven’t already. Simply head to the Baseline Button in your Project Plan and select “Create Baseline”
From here, you’ll be able to monitor the project status, enabling you to ensure that tasks in your project move forward as planned. On the side bar, under Baseline Details, view Baseline Start, Finish, Duration, and Efforts!
The Spotlight Tab was created to ensure that you’re able to stay on top of insights coming from your plan – whether that’s tasks that have become critical, any tasks that are overdue, or any tasks that are upcoming within your project plan.
In the Grid View, you can view other insights such as task-level delays or advancements in your project. To get these columns to appear, select “Compare All Tasks” from the Baseline.
Availability of Baseline Features
Users with a Planner and Project Plan 3 or Plan 5 license can access these enhancements in the Planner app within Microsoft Teams. If you don’t have a Plan 3 or Plan 5 license, click the diamond icon in the Planner app to either sign up for a free 30-day trial of advanced features (including the Baseline functionality) or request a license from your administrator.
