Overview
Baselining a task plan is essential for project managers because it captures the original schedule and resource estimates, allowing you to track deviations as the project progresses.
When you baseline a task plan, it saves the original Planned Start, Finish, Hours, Duration, and Cost for each task in a Task Plan. This baseline serves as a fixed reference point, allowing you to measure actual performance against the initial plan. As the project progresses, comparing these baseline values with actual values helps you identify deviations in effort, cost, and schedule, providing insights into areas that might require adjustments to stay on track.
For example, if you’ve saved current baseline data for a task plan, you can view baseline dates, efforts, and costs, and compare these values with the actuals. This gives you a clear picture of any discrepancies in Effort, Cost, and Schedule over time.
What is Baseline in Tasks?
In every task plan, each task has Planned Start and Planned Finish dates, which are crucial for defining the project’s workflow. Often, these dates are influenced by predecessor tasks, meaning that a task cannot start until its dependent task is complete. For example, if Task 3 is a predecessor of Task 4, any delay in Task 3 will push the planned start and finish dates of Task 4.
When tasks start, the planned values (such as Planned Dates and Planned Hours) adjust according to actual progress. For instance, if Task 3’s Actual Finish date is delayed, the Planned Start date for Task 4 shifts accordingly. Without a baseline, there’s no way to compare these adjustments to the original plan.
But when you save the task plan as the current baseline after the planning, the original values for Planned Start, Planned Finish, Planned Hours, Planned Duration, and Planned Cost are locked in as Baseline Start, Baseline Finish, Baseline Duration, Baseline Effort, and Baseline Cost. To learn how to save a Baseline, click here.
As the Task progresses, the Actual Start, Actual Finish, Actual Hours, Actual Duration, and Actual Cost may deviate from the planned values. By comparing these with the baseline, you can track changes and spot tasks that are veering off schedule, effort, or budget.
Please note that in Simple Scheduling, the Planned Start and Finish dates won’t change, unlike in Advanced Scheduling.
From the above screenshot, you can clearly observe any deviations between the Baseline (originally planned) and Actual values.
- Schedule Deviation: For instance, Task 4 (Requirements Preparation) began 5 days later than originally planned, this delay reflects a Schedule Deviation. The Schedule Deviation metric shows the slippage in the project schedule by indicating the percentage of time taken to complete a task compared to what was initially planned. Learn more here.
- Effort Deviation: Also, Task 4 required more effort than expected, with Planned Hours increasing from 8 to 16, this represents an Effort Deviation. The Effort Deviation metric indicates the percentage of additional effort spent beyond what was planned or approved at the start of the project. Learn more here.