With kind permission of www.projektmagazin.de Excerpt from the Software Review 04/2013 Blue Ant 10 New Design, Proven Solution by Elisabeth Wagner proventis GmbH With its web-based PM-Software Blue Ant, proventis GmbH appeals primarily to small and medium-sized companies, in which projects are included in their daily business. Blue Ant offers a comprehensive solution, established schedule and resource planning project management functions and the possibility to support the whole project management life-cycle up to the billing of services. Above all, Blue Ant keeps a close eye on the the resources and costs parameters during the entire project period, taking into account the fact that hardly anyone works 100% in just one project. The tools and processes stored in the system enable the easy recording and planning of employee utilisation - even outside projects so over the entire company. So not only resource conflicts between projects, but also conflicts between project and line utilisation are visible early. Founded in Berlin in 2001, proventis GmbH is a software and consulting company, which currently employs 35 staff working on professional project management solutions. Its core competence is the continued development of the webbased multi-project management software, Blue Ant, with its main focus on resource and cost planning, and multiproject management. Alongside the implementation of Blue Ant, proventis and its partners advise customers on the development of project management tools and methods. Blue Ant is used by around 380 companies. According to its manufacturer, projects with up to 1,000 processes are easily managed by Blue Ant. The number of users in the largest currently active application is about 2,000.
For the further development of Blue Ant, proventis applies the feedback from its users. So, since the last version 8.2 was featured in Projekt Magazin, the appearance has been enhanced and new functions added. The aim of the further improvement was to satisfy the requirements of (multi-) project managers and also to map companyspecific characteristics. Companies now have, for example, free rein in the categorisation of costs, as there are company and product-specific additions for almost all function fields. Reports can now be expanded by freely-selectable attachments. A new checklist function allows direct input procedure in some places. Above all, the entire look of the site has been made more relaxed and attractive. Shadow effects make screen elements hover, buttons are more distinct, colours matched more harmoniously. Targeted Jumps to the Functions The intuitive user interface is unchanged, and depending on the role Project Management Office, Project Manager or Project Employee offers a fast and compact overview with short paths: the navigation bar in the picture on the links to many areas within and also outside the project, for example, in risk management, which is perhaps integrated in a workshop, but otherwise has no function within the project A New Design for the User Interface Practical, friendly, but somewhat outdated was some clients opinion of the user interface in the past. In the development of the current version 10.0, the programmers and designers have therefore focussed on the design of the software, which has brought functional changes in some areas: for example, the project name, project number and other basic information now appears automatically in the header of project documents. An auto-complete function shortens the left leads directly to the desired module with a mouse-click. The fields on the start page, individually customisable in size and positioning, give an immediate overview of which tasks are currently pending in the My projects, My activities and My tickets windows. Everyone can create their own paths in the program easily via the Quicklinks at the top of the navigation bar or in the window, e.g. to frequently-used functions or views. Quickly See What Needs to be Done A widget, which contains the activities from all checklists created in the system, has been newlyadded. For example, in a Controller s checklist to release the budget for the Production project 2
phase, provision can be made for the approval of the Project manager and the Risk manager. All relevant bodies Controlling, Project management and Risk management see the respective tasks automatically in their personal checklist. The team member can click directly on the individual tasks, read them and finally save them as completed. Some of the activities displayed in the widget are generated directly from a workflow or are fed into it, e.g., when holiday requests need to be approved by the supervisor or a payment release generally needs the OK from the Account Manager so processes, which can also take place outside the project world. Further processing of information entered here as completed in the project plan, is done by the system. For example an e-mail or checklist entry can be initiated by the approval of the Account Manager, in which Controlling is prompted to pay an invoice within four weeks. The electronic ticking-off of the payment released item can lead to the corresponding amount to be booked in project controlling. The idea behind this is to include people with few points of contact in the project, such as typical Approvers via such a checklist function and also to include their tasks in the planning: whoever is not working in the project sees his/her checklist points on his/her personal Blue Ant Dashboard, or receives information by e-mail. But above all, this innovation is a further step towards the overall goal of involving all tasks and stakeholders in the project planning. The other key elements here are the windows with the activities and the ticket system, which are well-suited to non-project related ad hoc tasks. In combination with the time recording, valuable knowledge for future expenditure planning can be gained. If you realise, for example, that the repair at the customer s premesis has only taken two days instead of the five planned, you can use this knowledge in the next negotiation of the Service Level Agreements. And if you realise that five employees have reported a problem with a new software release, this information can be passed on to all users of the software. The sophisticated integration of time recording on the screen is still a highlight of the software: next to every activity, and every ticket entry is a small stopwatch button. One click, and the clock starts ticking. A click on the button next to another task stops the time recording for the finished activity. Alternatively, or rather additionally, there is a time recording form in which a workflow can be saved, which, for example, prevents the changing of already sent data (included since version 9.0). An additional feature, which for some fields was already available in version 8.2, has now been adopted for all functions: individual fields are now possible almost everywhere in the operating menus. They can be used for validation workflows or a link. So, for example, in the time recording an input field can be extended, which refers to the bug number (error number) of an external bug tracking system and allocates the recorded work time additionally to the bug. In all time evaluations, the corresponding entry can be generated within Blue Ant by clicking on the bug number of the respective entry in the external system. Similar scenarios can be quickly and easily displayed for projects, activities, quotes, resources, etc. Functions for Project Management The home page for the project manager is the dashboard, which with its graphically displayed information, facilitates a first view of the project status and the project landscape. First, however, the project has to be created. Some of the work is done for the project manager by Blue Ant using the electronic master data sheet : by selecting the project type from a given list such as an organisation project or development project the associated templates for these kinds of project are loaded. Appropriate features can be enabled in the project types Classic or Agile, e.g., create freelyselectable fixed periods as sprints or document the completed and uncompleted tasks in Burndown-Charts. The determination of whether the project should be settled based on fixed or actual costs affects different masks and functions, which are important for the financial planning. The Project Information Sheet Activator for Procedures and Functions in the Project By entering the project status pre-phase, project application or realisation into the project infor- 3
mation sheet, the user activates different workflows (often dependent on pre-defined project types). In practice such workflows are often used for a completeness check in Blue Ant in a phase release: so the activation of the project phase Project application often triggers an approval workflow. The next phase, here realisation, cannot begin until all necessary defined conditions are met, e.g. the approval by management and finance. The project costs can be allocated to a cost centre in this main information; the company can also select individual settings, such as program budgets. What is decided and set here leads to the corresponding allocation in the project reporting. For example, the costs from Project X, which are allocated to Cost Centre 1234 and Program A also appear in the evaluation of Cost Centre 1234 and Program A. Checklists can be imported from a central pool or can be created by the project management using a template. According to the company s technical philosophy, you can set in the Documents field whether the project documents are to be stored in a local database or via a central file-server, as URLs in various locations. Proventis aim of guaranteeing the users a constantly up-to-date overview of the project costs has also led to optimisations in this area in the latest releases. The customers options to adapt the program according to the individual company structures have been extended. For example, since version 9.0 companies can define cost structures however they wish. Cost trees are also possible. Validation sizes can be installed to ensure that specific costs, such as accommodation costs or the total costs of an item do not exceed a predetermined limit. The cost planning has also been augmented for the Employee resource type. It has been possible for some time to work with two different cost rates for the calculation of expenses: one for the actually incurred costs and one which is billed to the customer. Up to now, the cost rates have been linked to roles. Now it is possible to define these separately for each employee, making many cost calculations even more precise, as this function not only determines the function or role, but also the employee s experience, his/her salary and therefore the cost rate to be billed. Such differences in hourly and daily rates were not previously shown in the project calculation. Changes within the project period, for example, the inclusion of the results of pay talks are possible at any time. More Flexibility in Cost Planning, Recording and Controlling For companies in which a lot of employees work on several projects simultaneously, the following development will be helpful: from version 8.3 working hours mistakenly booked to a particular project can be transferred to another. For the overall budget planning there are basically two options in Blue Ant: either you enter a total 4
budget and divide it up into individual budgets (top-down) or the other way round; plan the individual work packets, assign resources and display the resulting costs (bottom up). Defaults and Quotes In customer quotes, payment terms are often agreed which are linked to deadlines or the reaching of certain milestones. In Blue Ant workflows can be defined, so that the program automatically issues a reminder of the due settlement and if necessary, begins an approval workflow, once such a deadline or milestone is reached. With regular billing at the end of the month the software automatically books and calculates the work performed to date working hours or days performed or (partial) results, for example, foundation cemented, or concept user permissions removed. The items suggested by the system can, but don t have to be adopted. Manual changes and additions to items are possible. These functions are used, according to proventis experience, not only in billed customer projects, but also for the internal cost allocation and cost control. Scheduling employees Employees are an important resource and are sought after for projects. In order to be able to optimally use the available skills pool and to constantly enable an up-to-date overview of employee utilisation, Blue Ant offers different functionalities such as activity planning, a ticket system, checklists and a calendar function. To assign a newly-planned project resource, there are various approaches: the planners can plan with virtual employees with defined know-how and at the same time make skills requests to the resource manager responsible. Soft booking triggers a rough reservation of a real employee: employees are usually requested for an approximate period such as month, quarter or the whole project and released in principle by the responsible resource manager. Resulting planning conflicts are shown but tolerated. If you would like to include particular people in your planning, but do not want to trigger any reservations, Information or workflows, choose the Simulated resource feature. The Perspective of the Controller or Manager Using Quicklinks and filters managers can quickly put together an overview of the portfolios which are relevant for them. In the manufacturer s experience, the BIRT report generator integrated since version 8.2 of Blue Ant has been well-received by the users: the integrated add-on provides the option to quickly create reports in the appropriate layout,which are tailored exactly to the respective issues. Users use BIRT not only for issuing status reports, financial reports or to graphically present management overviews, but also to evaluate quotes, invoices, risk charts, analyses and to graphically enhance many other documents. The basis of the progress report is a frozen planning status which serves as a reference until a new baseline is stored for example after the approved expansion of the project scope or after agreed date changes. Several default report forms are already included with Blue Ant, which customers can add to or change, according to their requirements. Earned-value-analyses (since version 9.1) or milestone trend analyses can be easily integrated as can so-called plan-true-graphics : here, projects are displayed as coloured circles on a scale of how critical they are, measured by user-defined default values (revenue, resource commitment, costs, planned expenses, risk etc.). The diameter of the circles correlates to the size of the project. Interfaces Blue Ant has interfaces to all common business programs. External systems can be integrated via web services and added to the menu bar. Since Service Pack 9.2 a function for exporting working hours into other systems is included as standard a request from customers who create invoices from SAP. System Requirements and Licences For the Standard Edition with extensive customisation options, administrative access and rights administration, license costs are around 4,000 Euro. The simpler Blue Ant Express ver- 5
sion, without any customising options has been withdrawn from the market. The Blue Ant Cloud Edition costs from 2,000 Euro per annum. The prices for the Enterprise Edition are based on the requirements of the customer. Blue Ant runs on all major operating systems, such as Windows, Unix, Linus, Aix or Sun-Solaris. If the program is to be installed on a company server, a common database and an Apache/Tomcat webserver in conjunction with a Java run-time environment is required. Users just need a computer with internet access. Conclusion Blue Ant is a solution for small to medium-sized companies, but also for divisions, for whom projects are a part of their everyday business, because the strengths of the software lie in the safeguarding and provision of project documentation and processes, the support of quick and precise project planning and sound cost control supported by simple, stringent workflows and functions. Also, stakeholders outside the actual project team such as principal or subcontractors, management or business controlling can use smaller system components, that incorporate interfaces or the built-in reporting functions. Well-developed, yet easily manageable resource planning helps manage a project landscape efficiently and above all schedule the staff well in view of their line responsibilities. proventis GmbH Neue Grünstraße 25-26 D-10179 Berlin Tel. +49 (0) 30 2936399-0 Fax +49 (0) 30 2936399-50 www.proventis.net www.blue-ant.de contact@proventis.net 6