Converting Your Schedule From .MPP To .XER
You know your project is on track and that you have the skills in the team to do the work, but the schedule admin? That’s a headache.
One of the biggest issues with project scheduling is simply creating the schedule in a format that everyone can agree to. From clients who have specific guidelines on how schedules should be created, to your on-the-ground team who need to be able to work with the dates and timelines on a day-to-day basis, everyone needs one common version of the truth in a format they can use.
That’s where schedule conversion comes in. It’s a service whereby your project schedule in Microsoft Project format is converted into a Primavera P6 Professional schedule, and all the tasks, resources, dependencies and other data fields are maintained. Here are five benefits of converting your schedule so you can spend more time on the tasks you are good at and less on schedule maintenance.
1. Meet contractual requirements
One of the main reasons clients come to us for converting MSP to P6 is because there is a contractual obligation on them to provide data in Primavera P6 format. In other words, they need the .xer file to provide to their clients.
This often happens when they are part of a larger team, each providing specialist sub-contracting services to a main contractor. The prime contractor is using Primavera P6 Professional to manage and control the schedule, and they expect all their partners to be able to provide data in a compatible format. That ensures the integrity of the master schedule and keeps project performance data all in one format.
But what if your team doesn’t use Primavera? Then the easiest option is to continue to manage your project schedule in your tool of choice, such as Microsoft Project, and do a straightforward conversion if you have to provide that information to your client for contractual reasons. It’s the best of both worlds: you meet your obligations while not having to set up and learn a new product!
2. Submit bid data
Another common benefit of being able to convert your Project files to Oracle Primavera P6 is that you can bid for more work when you are no longer limited by your scheduling tools. If you’ve been limited in the past by not bidding for work because you can’t provide a project schedule in the format required, that’s no longer an issue!
Schedule conversion services like ours make it easy and cost-effective for you to quickly put together your bid submission, including your schedule in the format required. You’ll be able to bid for more work because you can meet the requirements with a simple conversion.
Normally file conversions can be done in less than 24 hours so it’s easy to build that timeline into your submission approach to make sure everything is in order before the deadline.
3. Reduce licensing costs
Let’s be honest: Primavera P6 EPPM is not cheap software to install, set up and maintain. It requires a skilled, trained team who know how to use it, and a platform to run it on. That can be difficult if you don’t have a dedicated Project Management Office team sitting around waiting to learn new skills (and who does?).
If your business has considered implementing Primavera project scheduling as a way of being able to meet contractual requirements, you might have already looked at the licensing costs and overheads of installing that enterprise management tool. It’s a powerful solution that is worth every penny if you know how to use it, but many smaller contractors simply don’t need all the features.
As a result, you can reduce your operating costs by decommissioning Primavera if you don’t use it, and avoid the cost of installing it if you were considering it. If all you use it for is file conversions, but your team prefer to schedule in another product, then rely on scheduling conversion services instead!
4. Reduce schedule maintenance overhead
As well as the cost of maintaining a separate system just so you can say you can produce schedules in .xer format, there is also the resource overhead of having to maintain the system. Schedule maintenance is tricky enough as it is, without your team having to do double the work, in two separate systems.
Instead, remove that overhead and take advantage of the fact that you can schedule in a tool that suits the working practices of your team, and then simply convert your MSP files into a format that your clients’ needs.
5. Ensure stakeholders have access to data they can use
Finally, the major benefit of converting your schedule into various formats is that stakeholders have access to data they can use. It’s human nature to want data in the way that makes it easiest for you to do your job, so we can provide that for people, smoothing the communication and project management processes.
When stakeholders can access data in a friction-less way, they can get on with their roles more easily, which reduces conflict and speeds up the whole project life cycle.
We provide guidelines to convert from Microsoft Project to Primavera P6 so no data is lost. You get the confidence that your schedule integrity is maintained, and a PDF version so you can see exactly what the client sees, even if you don’t have a way to open the .xer file.
There are so many benefits to converting your schedule using professional schedule conversion services and transferring data you can work with into a format that meets your customer’s expectations. Everyone wins, and it’s a fast, simple service for you with guaranteed results.