Options for maintaining What-if Scenarios?

Mark Lappegaard

OK, it looks like we don't currently have an option to maintain multiple What-if scenarios. (Which I define as putting in some worst or best case durations in a linked project to see what the impact will be.) 

Any practical workarounds for maintaining one project (with all the same predecessors) for different durations?

My ideal end state would be two lists of finish dates or gantt charts, one for best case and one for worst case, side by side. I could then play around with durations in the worst case in order to see the impact. 

Thanks in advance for your ideas!  I am stumped.

Paul Newcome

Set up your first project sheet (worst case for this example). Include a column that replicates the row number. The formula for this is

 

=COUNTIFS([Primary Column]$1:[Primary Column]@row, OR(NOT(ISBLANK(@cell)), ISBLANK(@cell)))

.

You would then "Save as New" to create a copy. From there you can change your dates to best case.

.

Once both sheets are built, you would create a report that would look at both sheets and pull whatever pertinent data you need. Sorting by the row number column will ensure that each task is displayed with the same task from the other sheet, so it would look something like this.

 

Best Case Task 1

Worst Case Task 1

Best Case Task 2

Worst Case Task 2

Best Case Task 3

Worst Case Task 3

.

Is that something like what you are looking for?

Mark Lappegaard

Thanks for your idea, Paul!

Sorry for my delayed response. My customer changed their mind and I dropped it.

Yes, your idea would work. Very clever with the row sorting! :)