As a Project Controls Consultant we need to be able to adapt to utilise any business system including scheduling packages. We are often asked why we prefer using P6 over Microsoft Project?

Both Primavera P6 and Microsoft Project are widely used for planning and scheduling projects, offering the same fundamental critical path scheduling method. While there are many similarities between the two, there is no denying that P6 was designed for enterprise level projects, whereas Microsoft Project way an adaptation of Microsoft Excel. This creates far and many differences between the two programs. The major differences are:

Work Breakdown Structure

Primavera P6 allows the user to create a WBS structure in an independent user friendly layout, separated from grouping formed in the activities layout. The skeletal hierarchical structure of the project can be created, giving the schedule a logical and easy to follow grouping, into which activities can later be added. MSP by default offers a less refined activity type for grouping activities. 

Unique Activity ID

P6 has robust numbering for unique activity ID, which can be anything the user allocated. Quite often this will be a work order in a larger project, followed by a number to identify the specific activity within the work order. MS Project automatically assigns the activity ID as the order of the activity in which it is placed in the project. This is fine so long as the order of activities is not moved around. In my experience, while building on the schedule and as additional activities were added, I have had to move these activities around. As soon as these activities are moved, their activity ID changes. This consequently caused issues in trying to reassign new successors or predecessors as the activities had to be found once again and then added, whereas with a unique ID this confusion is eliminated.

Steps

Sub-activities or steps can be created in P6 for a specified activity. This can be useful for activities with long durations as the activity can be tracked properly. Each sub-activity can have a percentage weighting added to keep track of how much of the activity has been completed aligned to a set of rules of credit.

Expenses

Expenses such as resource costs, planned, remaining and actual project expenses such as those associated with training, travel and material costs can be added into P6 to keep track of project expenditure. While labour costs can be added to resources in MS Project, these costs are not automatically calculated according to the resource hours allocated such as in P6 and no additional expenses can be tracked. 

Data Date

When it comes to the project data date, both P6 and MS Project can be used to update the data date to reflect the actual date. However, the data date and progress update of the schedule is more intuitive and allows the project team to understand the “line in the sand” with actuals in the past, and forecast in the future. This is because P6 has the feature to move the data date to the current date, which will reflect in all activities which have yet to be completed. This too can be achieved in MS Project, but requires a slightly longer process of manually adjusting data dates in remaining activities.

Multiple Activity Relationships

While MS Project only allows for one activity relationship type between activities, such as FF and SS between the same two activities, P6 allows for more than one relationship type. Intermediate milestones are required to ensure logic correctness in the above scenario.

Start and Finish Milestones

P6 allows the user to allocate “Start” and “Finish” milestones to a specific activity. MS Project’s milestones are not allocated to an activity but have an activity line in themselves which have 0 durations and are connected as successors or predecessors to other activities.

Custom Fields

Both P6 and MS Project allow the user to create custom fields. Where they differ is that in MS Project, complex formulas can be set, whereas P6 requires values to be manually entered into the field.

Both programs allow for “User Defined Field” which can be anything from project functional location, to baseline start and finish dates and any risks associated.

Activity codes can also be used to identify specific activities or resources and then allows the user to easily filter through and identify where all activities with the specified code are.

Activity Grouping & Sorting

Activities can be sorted in P6 in the way the user wishes to view them. These can be by activity ID, date or any other factor which simplifies the view for the user.

MS Project, on the other hand, allows the user to manipulate activities by dragging and moving them into the position the user wishes. This allows us to present information in a way that is more intuitive to clients and drives a better level of understanding and ownership of the schedule.

Multiple Users

P6 allows multiple users to work on a single project at the same time, while this feature is also offered in MS project if setup, one user will automatically be locked out while the other is working on the project. Therefore while both users are able to open the project, both are unable to work on the project at the same time. The level of access and features a particular user can have access to can also be set in P6.

Baselines

MS Project allows for 11 baselines to be creates, while P6 allows for an unlimited number of baselines to be created and any four baselines can be assigned to the project at the same time.

Multiple Projects

Multiple projects can be created an viewed simultaneously in both programs, however, P6 allows for additional features such as tracking multiple projects, WBS comparisons and unit and cost calculations at the same time. MS Project also offers the option to build a Master project, in which you are able to add and edit multiple projects. However, in my experience this often causes many errors among the projects and upon saving and exiting many changed areas can revert back to their original values.

Author: Milica Dobrijevic