Introduction
Projects consist of many activities that are to be completed on time before the project can officially be declared completed. Managing these activities and ensuring they finish on time is a skill known as project management. The last thing you would want is to miss the deadline or complete a task out of sequence, which could adversely affect your project. It could increase costs, cause problems with clients, and more. Project managers must therefore be able to keep an eye on every task or activity to be performed and also be able to prioritise activities accordingly.
This job is made more accessible with the help of Gantt charts, as they convey this information visually. Gantt charts outline every task that is a part of the project along with their order against a timescale. This allows a project manager to gain an instant overview of the project, the related tasks, and the deadlines for each task.
Gantt Charts
When you set up a Gantt chart, you need to consider every task that is a part of your project. You will also have to decide on the ideal person responsible for every task, the time limit for each task, and the potential risks your team may face. This comprehensive way of thinking helps you ensure that your schedule is ideal, you have the correct people assigned to every task, and that you possess the right remedies for potential risks you may encounter before you even begin.
Gantt charts also allow you to develop practical aspects of a project, such as the minimum time required to finish the project, what tasks are prerequisites for other tasks, and so on. Moreover, you can also use them to figure out the critical path or the series of tasks that have to be completed individually to ensure that you deliver the project on time.
To conclude, you can always also use Gantt charts to keep the stakeholders and team members involved in the project updated. All you are supposed to do is update the chart and display the schedule changes along with their implications or use it to share the key tasks that were successfully completed.
Gantt chart advantages
Gantt charts come with a wide range of benefits, but the five most significant reasons to use Gantt charts have been mentioned below:
1. Circumvent completion confusion: Gantt charts allow users to stay on track by granting a visual timeline displaying the start and finish for each task. Since the key dates and milestones are all noticeable on the visual overview of these charts, it becomes easier to maintain timescale-based tasks and deliverables as they can be tracked yearly, monthly, weekly or even daily. The diagram given below shows the benefit of visualisation offered by Gantt charts:
Zorkow [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)]
2. Keeping everyone on the same page: Whenever a visual framework for a certain project exists, the chances of misunderstanding and other related conflicts lower substantially. Thanks to Gantt charts, every shareholder receives the same information and can declare mutually understood expectations, allowing developers to carry out their tasks following the protocol.
3. Acknowledging task relationships: The charts improve transparency by clearly displaying the interrelation between various tasks and which tasks rely on the completion of another to achieve a certain objective. These task relationships can be hard to understand, as they require one to understand the accurate timing of each task and how one task impacts the other, along with their interdependence. With Gantt charts, one can ensure the best workflow as task relationships become easier to understand, improving productivity and success rates.
4. Effective resource allocation: With one glance at the Gantt chart, users can distinguish between resource locations and hence be able to allocate or share resources effectively, utilising the available resources to their fullest extent. The better one manages to study and follow the chart, the better the chances of them being able to keep project costs under the given budget and ensure on-time completion.
5. Get a handle on the future: Gantt charts not only allow one to focus on day-to-day progress. They allow project managers to look much further ahead to make decisions and ensure the project is heading in the right direction, i.e. in accordance with the company’s long-term strategic objectives.
Limitations of Gantt Charts
Even though Gantt charts help project managers and decision-makers with various issues and smooth the process, they fail to tend to several issues. Gantt charts fail to offer quick solutions to issues caused by unforeseen events, making it an inflexible project management system. Moreover, it may be a hassle to keep updating the chart consistently or even expect teammates to update their charts regularly. Finally, Gantt charts do not emphasise task expectations or purpose; they only display how far a project will get at a certain point.
However, the advantages of Gantt charts usually overshadow the limitations, which is why all types of companies prefer them. Gantt charts also help you to plan and schedule projects, aiding in the understanding of how much time a project requires before it is completed, figuring out what resources are needed and prioritising tasks in an orderly manner. Task dependencies can also be managed with their help.
Gantt charts also allow project managers and decision-makers to monitor the progress after a project is underway. It will enable them to figure out what should have been achieved by a specific date and what has been achieved. If you feel the project is lagging on the schedule, you can always perform the necessary actions to bring it back on track. This would not have been possible without the Gantt chart, and even if it were, it would have been a problematic manual task.
Tools for Gantt Charts
Microsoft Project
Microsoft Office stated, “The Gantt Chart view is the most commonly used view in Microsoft Office Project 2007”. This tool grants the users a Gantt chart wizard and allows project managers to make their charts. Microsoft Project is a durable program that may work for a company of any scale.
🔗 LINK
Gantter
Gantter is a cloud-based solution for project managers. It comes with various Google app integrations, such as Google Drive. However, it does not offer many unique features and is suggested to be solely used as a charting tool.
🔗 LINK
Merlin 2
Merlin 2 is known for its friendly and smooth user interface, offering great customizability while keeping the whole interface simple. It offers the needed features and avoids cluttering the interface with too many unneeded features. It runs only on Mac OS X version 10.4.9 or newer (10.6.4 or newer is recommended). Merlin 2 comes with powerful collaboration features and helps maintain effective Gantt charts, allowing all users to update their project statuses constantly. Merlin 2 has proven to be impactful for large teams facing complicated communication problems.
🔗 LINK
GanttProject
GanttProject is a free-of-cost, open-source project management software option and is robust. It has also been compared to Microsoft Project because it offers users similar features and complexity. As the name suggests, Gantt Project emphasises producing the right Gantt charts. However, for users attempting to work on larger projects, Gantt Project can get a bit confusing. It is hence recommended to use Gantt Project for small to medium-sized projects only.
🔗 LINK
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel can also be a simple but effective tool for creating Gantt Charts. You can quickly fill cells with colour to make a timeline for your chart. If you find the more sophisticated software options daunting, try using Excel.
Gantt charts do the job for most project managers by effectively providing a visual representation of a project’s start and end points. The team members can use Gantt charts to keep themselves updated on the progress achieved on a project, how long each task may take, and the overall minimum time required to finish the project.
Link: Microsoft Excel
External Resources: Gantt
🔗 LINK
📄 DOCUMENTATION
Gantt Docs: gantt.com.
Activity
💻 WATCH
Video: Learning Gantt Charts by Chris Croft (1h)
This video lesson will help you to better understand and learn how to use Gantt charts.
Lesson Task
Brief
You will be creating a Gantt chart that is your “day in the life”.
Level 1 Process
Create a Gantt chart of your daily schedule using your chosen software. Start from the time you wake up in the morning and to when you go to bed at night. Include tasks such as eating, getting ready for the day, studying, socialising, etc. Create your Gantt chart so your best friend can follow your daily schedule perfectly.