1. Using Project Execution Management
  2. Project Milestones

Project Milestones

Milestones are single point-in-time events in a project plan with zero duration and effort. Billable milestones can be associated with a contract line for billing and revenue recognition purposes.

Here are some points about milestones:

  • They can represent a contractual obligation with a client.
  • They can be used in project plans for scheduling purposes.
  • They can have associated deliverables.
  • They can be used in project plans for invoicing and revenue recognition.
  • They can't incur costs directly.
  • They have statuses which track the completion progress.
  • They can require a review and approval before completion.

Project managers use milestones to track events such as completion of project stages, major project deliverables, key decision points, and approvals. Milestones are used to monitor progress and determine if a project is on schedule.

User Responsibilities

The following table lists the user responsibilities for milestones:

User

Responsibilities

Project Manager

  • Creates the milestone in the project plan.

  • Assigns dependencies to the milestone.

  • Marks a milestone as completed.

  • Views milestones in various statuses.

Team member

Marks a milestone as completed.

Statuses

The following are the various statuses for milestones.

  • Not Started

  • In Progress

  • Complete: nonbillable milestones that are finished

  • Submitted for Completion Approval

    This status is for billable milestones when a user updates the percent complete to 100 or selects a contextual action to mark the milestone complete. The milestone follows the Milestone Completion Approval workflow (MilestoneApprovalHumanTask) for approval. The workflow is followed whether or not the billable milestone is associated with a contract line. The default approver is the primary project manager. If the primary project manager submits the milestone for completion approval, the milestone is automatically changed to the Complete status. If you don't require manual approvals for billable milestones, configure an auto-approval rule in the workflow.

Actions on Milestones

The following table lists the various actions, users who can perform the actions, and the location where you perform the actions.

Action

User Role

Location

Create Milestone

Project Manager

Manage Project Plan page
Create Financial Milestone Project Manager Manage Project Plan page

Assign finish date to a milestone

Project Manager

Note: The task creator can assign a finish date to a milestone task. However, a team member can't edit the start date or finish date for milestones. If the task creator enters a finish date for a milestone task, the start date is automatically updated with the same date.

Manage Project Plan page

Mark a billable or nonbillable milestone as complete

Project Manager

  • Enter 100 percent complete in the Manage Project Plan page

  • In Manage Project Plan use the contextual action to mark Complete

  • Enter the date in the Actual Finish column in Manage Project Plan

  • Project Milestones page

Mark a nonbillable milestone as complete

Team Member (Team members can't update billable milestones.)

  • Manage Tasks page of My Work work area

  • Quick Progress and New Activity regions of the Team Member Dashboard

Filter milestones by statuses

Project Manager

Project Milestones page

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