Project reporting apps like OnePager Pro import your budget and cost variance information from Microsoft Project and create colorful budget charts that are easy for busy executives to understand. If you don't already use OnePager Pro, you can download a free trial and try it out today.
Here's how to get started:
- Open your Microsoft Project plan. The simple plan below has budgeted costs, actual costs, and the cost variance included for each task:
- Double-click the OnePager Pro icon on your desktop to start building your project budget report. From the Start screen that pops up, choose New.
- Choose your Microsoft Project plan as the source file for your OnePager Gantt chart.
- An import wizard will appear. Type in a name for your budget report, and pick today’s date as your snapshot date, as shown below:
- Click the Create New Chart button, and OnePager Pro automatically imports your information from Microsoft Project to create an initial project timeline:
- Now, we want to format the report to call out items that are over or under budget. Go to Home > Chart Properties > Task Bars, and click on the Manage Rules button.
- OnePager Pro adds conditional formatting to Microsoft Project, meaning that with a few simple rules, we can color-code each task on the Gantt chart based on whether it is over or under budget. These three rules look at the Cost Variance column from Microsoft Project to assign colors based on budget status:
- With the conditional formatting rules in place, we can make a few minor edits and end up with a colorful project budget report like this:
This project budget makes it really easy to see which tasks are over-budget and which tasks are under-budget. It also rolls the financial information up to a summary level so that we can understand how each overall phase of the project is doing. For example, even though Phase 2 had two tasks go over budget, it was still under budget overall.
OnePager Pro is the most direct way to create a budget report out of a Microsoft Project plan. Because OnePager Pro is a reporting app, it gives you all of the power of MS Project with the visual capabilities of PowerPoint.
Get started today by downloading a free trial.
15-DayFree Trial