P6 EPPM contains many data structures to support your project management needs and business processes. Well-defined structures make entering data faster and easier; they enable you to organize and summarize data more effectively. Review the following definitions to help you better understand the data structures in P6 EPPM.
Enterprise project structure (EPS)
The EPS is a hierarchy that represents the breakdown of projects in a company. Nodes at the highest, or root, level might represent divisions within your company, phases of projects, or other major groupings that meet the needs of your organization, while projects always represent the lowest level of the hierarchy. Every project in the organization must be included in the EPS.
Resource hierarchy
The resource hierarchy represents the people, materials, and/or equipment used to perform work on activities. The resource hierarchy includes the resources across all projects in the organization. Resources are assigned to activities in P6 EPPM and can be set up to report actual work hours.
Role hierarchy
The role hierarchy represents the roles, or job titles, that exist in your organization and have some responsibility to complete project requirements. You can associate resources with roles. In the planning stages of a project, you can assign roles to activities to establish an initial project plan without committing individual resources to activities; then, before work on an activity begins, you can assign a resource that meets the defined role requirements. You are not required to define a role hierarchy.
Work breakdown structure (WBS)
The WBS is a hierarchical arrangement of the products and services produced during and by a project. In P6 EPPM, the project is the highest level of the WBS, while an individual activity required to create a product or service is the lowest level. Each project in the EPS has its own WBS.
Organizational breakdown structure (OBS)
The OBS is an outline of managers responsible for the projects in your company. There is one OBS for the entire organization. It is used to control access to projects and data.
Project, activity, and resource codes
In addition to the EPS, WBS, and resource hierarchy, you can also create coding structures. Codes allow you to categorize projects, activities, and resources that have similar attributes; you can group, sort, filter, and aggregate data based on these codes.
Calendars
Calendars define standard workdays and the available number of hours in each day, along with holidays, vacations, and other nonworktime. You can create global, project-specific, and resource-specific calendars. Calendars are assigned to activities and/or resources; they determine start and end dates during scheduling and resource leveling.