Project Health Configuration & Usage

Short video explains the configuration options for the Project Health and demonstrates their usage within the Project Insight application

Transcript:

In this video, I will show you the Project Health Indicators add-on. To configure your Project Health, you'll go to the add-ons and install the Project Health add-on. Once you have done so, you can configure it by selecting Project Health. You will be taken to a form where you can choose from the different options. The default setting is that it will appear like this: enable overall health and then show overall health on the project list. What that means is you'll have a dropdown with just green, yellow, and red options by default. You can change the health types by clicking here, modifying them, and adding your own health types. You can also relabel them if you wish, and you'll need to decide whether you want a default value. This means that when the form appears, the project will start as green, with all of the indicators showing green. If you want the health indicators to be undefined, meaning no health, you would simply uncheck the default value option. In my case, I have the default value set to green.

Additionally, you need to specify which options are default green, default yellow, and default red. This is for automation purposes, meaning that there are triggers that can activate a certain green, yellow, or red indicator. It's important to specify which one is your default green, default red, and default yellow.

From this point, you can also enable sub-health indicators. Some organizations track scheduled health, budget health, and resource health; they can toggle these options on and off to access additional settings. Another option available is to enable automated health indicators. If you have this feature turned on, you can configure automated health indicators. For instance, you might set rules that indicate when a project is behind schedule by 10 percent, it will show yellow; if it’s behind by 20 percent, it will show red. The same applies if the actual hours exceed the estimated hours—if the actual hours exceed the estimate by 10 or 20, it could indicate yellow.

These indicators will display with a calendar icon, a clock, or a dollar sign. They are automatically calculated, and while they won't change your overall health automatically, you can see the indicators when modifying your health. This option is for automated health indicators, and you can return to this form to proceed with the rest of your configurations. If you have automated health indicators, they can be optionally displayed at the bottom of the form, where you can decide whether or not you want the health to show on the project list or whether the automated indicators should show on the project list.

This means that they will appear on the project list if turned on; if turned off, they will not be visible. From here, I can also click on this link and be taken to the overview. On the overview, you can edit your values, and you will see these automated indicators. If it suggests red, but you believe the situation is manageable, you can change it. For example, the automated system may suggest yellow, but when you evaluate, you might find your resources are fine. This allows you as a project manager to modify the health indicators as needed.

Your health status can also be included in your reports. If you go to your reports, you might decide to insert all health columns—you could opt to show the health status, the budget status, and the resource status. This way, you can present all pertinent health indicators. If the project did not have any health indicators assigned, you could easily adjust them to green. Now, if this project were yellow in budget but green everywhere else, you could refresh the table to show those health indicators in your reports and edit them accordingly.