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AlgieD's avatar
AlgieD
Copper Contributor
Jun 27, 2022

Microsoft Project - % and predecessors

Hi, 

i am new to using microsoft project 

I am tasked to maintain the project information using microsoft project. 

I have items linked to different predecessors but these items have certain percentages against them. This means when an end date changes on the predecessor, it is not automatically updating the start date for the item unless i put the percentage to 0% and then re-enter the percentage. 

 

Does anybody know how to overcome this problem

 

thanks in advance

  • John-project's avatar
    John-project
    Silver Contributor

    AlgieD 

    It sounds like your network logic is incorrect. Assuming you have normal finish-to-start predecessors, that means the predecessor task must finish before the successor task can start. However, you indicate that some of the successor tasks have already started which effectively cancels whatever predecessors that task had.

     

    I suggest you re-evaluate your network logic to better reflect what your plan is doing. If a follow-on task (successor) can start before the previous task (predecessor) is finished you need to determine how the two tasks are related. If the successor task can start independently of a predecessor task's completion, then perhaps there is no dependency and the two tasks should not be linked. Or, another possibility is that the successor task can start after the predecessor task is 75% complete. In that case you can use a start-to-start relationship with a lag, such as shown in this example. Note however, that once progress is declared on the successor task, that modified relationship is nullified.

    Another approach is to break the successor task into two parts, the first is independent of the predecessor but the second has a normal finish-to-start relationship like this:

    There may be other approaches that better meet your needs but keep in mind that in order to have a dynamic network, every task must have a successor, even if it's just the final milestone, and all tasks should have a predecessor unless that task starts when the project starts. A few start-no-earlier-than constraints may be appropriate but they should be avoided as much as possible.

     

    Hope this helps.

    John

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