In the first year of the Innovation programme, we secured some funds to look at the future of the Projects Website.  We narrowed our focus to the project and programme management tool Microsoft Project Online for two reasons.  Firstly, licensing for this product is included in the O365 agreement, therefore it is accessible to all staff and students.  Secondly, other staff in the University have started to look at it for managing their projects, and we thought it important to provide leadership to reduce the risk of fragmented project management practices.

In order to exploit the software effectively, some consultancy is required. Therefore under the first project we explored the capabilities of the software and completed a procurement exercise to select a company to work with to develop a proof of concept – the aim of our innovation bid this year is to deliver the proof of concept.  

The project aims to deliver:

• A basic quick start configuration to enable us to compare Project Online with the Projects Website
• An understanding of how some of our must have functionality could be delivered in Project Online
• Requirements for key areas including resourcing, time recording, and reporting 
• Stakeholder engagement with project communities in the University, providing them with access to the proof of concept and taking their feedback
• A decision on whether MS Project Online should be used as a project tool at the University 

The consultancy has been agreed and paid for, the costs of this proposal are focused on the time required from Apps to manage the project, participate in workshops, support configuration, trial proof of concept, and engage with a wide group of stakeholders.