If you are moving off Microsoft Project Online, the practical approach is to decide what you want to import, what you want to connect, and what you want to leave in Microsoft and link.
Import from Excel or elsewhere
Bring actuals in through time entries, imports, or connections with other tools
Keep reporting and document workflows tied to Power BI and SharePoint where needed
Best-practice order to move from Project Online
If you want the simplest path, migrate in this order:
Export and import project plans
Validate task structure and save templates
Decide how actuals and expenses will come in
Connect Power BI if you already rely on it
Link SharePoint documents instead of moving them all at once
Before you import: confirm your mapping choices.
Before exporting anything from Microsoft Project Online, take a minute to confirm how you want key items to map into Project Insight. This prevents avoidable cleanup after import and helps ensure reporting stays consistent.
1. Resource mapping (people).
Decide how Project Online resource names will match to users in Project Insight. If the import includes a resource sheet, you will be prompted to map imported resource names. Confirm whether you want to map to specific users, or keep some work assigned to generic placeholders.
2. Resource type and role mapping.
Decide whether assignments should map directly to specific users, or map to a Resource Type or Role (for example, Developer, Project Manager). This is useful when you want the plan structure to stay consistent even when staffing changes.
3. Task structure mapping (WBS).
Confirm that your export preserves the task hierarchy so work breakdown structures come in cleanly. If you use phases, summary tasks, or milestones, verify those are included in the exported plan.
4. Dependency mapping.
If your schedule relies on predecessors and cross-task dependencies, confirm those relationships are included in the export so dates and sequencing behave as expected after import.
5. Status mapping (optional but recommended).
If you use custom work statuses or project statuses, confirm the corresponding add-ons are enabled in your Project Insight workspace before you import. This helps your imported work land in the right reporting buckets immediately.
6. Actuals and expense source of truth.
Decide where actuals and expenses will come from after cutover: entered in Project Insight, imported on a schedule, or connected from another tool. Making this decision early keeps budget vs actual reporting consistent.
7. Reporting field alignment.
If you rely on Power BI dashboards, confirm which project, task, resource, time, budget, and expense fields those reports depend on so you can keep those fields consistent during import and setup.
8. Document linking approach.
Decide whether documents will be stored in Project Insight or linked to SharePoint. If you are using SharePoint, decide how folders should be structured and named so projects have a consistent document home from day one.
Once these mapping choices are set, you can move into exporting your project plans and importing them into Project Insight with far fewer surprises.
1. Move Your Project Plans
The easiest things to move are the plans themselves. The best place to begin is with the project information your team uses every day: project schedules, task lists, and work breakdown structures. These are the pieces people rely on to understand what needs to happen, when it needs to happen, and how the work is organized. Starting here gives you the fastest path to getting active work visible in Project Insight.
Read Moving Projects from MS Project Online to Project Insight
What to do
Export the project plan from Microsoft Project Online into Excel.
Clean up the file so it contains the key planning fields you want to keep.
Import that plan into Project Insight.
Review the imported tasks, dates, owners, and structure.
Save it as a template if it is something you will reuse.
In practice, you can export the core project plan from Microsoft Project Online, bring it into Project Insight, and then review the structure, dates, and assignments. Once the plan is in place, you can refine it and, if it is a repeatable workflow, save it as a template for future use.
2. Turn good imported plans into templates
Imported project structures can be “templatized” and then redeployed as you want.
What to do
Once you import a solid version of a project plan:
confirm the structure looks right
confirm dates, dependencies, and assignments are clean
save it as a template for future projects
This is one of the easiest wins in the move from Project Online because it keeps teams from rebuilding plans over and over.
3. Decide how actuals will work going forward
Do not try to solve every data source at once. Decide which of these is your future-state model:
Option A: Use Project Insight for time entry
Choose this if you want PI to become the main place where actuals are captured.
Option B: Import actuals
Choose this if another system still holds the actuals and you want to load them in on a schedule.
Option C: Connect another tool
Choose this if actuals already live in another operational or financial system and should continue to flow in.
4. Decide how expenses will work going forward
Do not try to solve every expense data source at once. Decide which of these is your future-state model:
Option A: Use Project Insight for expense entry
Choose this if you want Project Insight to become the main place where expense actuals are captured and managed.
Option B: Import expenses
Choose this if another system still holds the expense actuals and you want to load them into Project Insight on a schedule.
Option C: Connect another tool
Choose this if expense actuals already live in another operational or financial system and should continue to flow in from that source.
5. Keep your Power BI reporting workflow.
If your organization already relies on Power BI dashboards, you do not need to pause reporting while you transition away from Microsoft Project Online. Project Insight can send data to Power BI if you want to continue reporting there, and that the setup is straightforward using the API and a token.
The goal of this step is continuity. Your executives and PMO leaders can keep using familiar Power BI views while teams begin working inside Project Insight. Most customers start by identifying the reports they use most often, then connect Project Insight as the data source so those dashboards can continue with minimal disruption.
In practical terms:
List the Power BI reports you want to preserve first.
Confirm what project, task, resource, time, budget, and expense fields those reports rely on.
Connect Project Insight to Power BI through the API using a token.
Validate that the data is flowing correctly and that key measures match expectations
6. Keep documents in SharePoint and link them to the project.
Documents do not need to be migrated first. You can either store documents inside Project Insight or link to an external repository like SharePoint.
If your organization uses SharePoint, SharePoint folders can be created based on the project, and the SharePoint location can be linked to the project record. This keeps files in the Microsoft environment your team already uses while still tying documentation directly to the project where schedules, tasks, budgets, and reporting live.
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