Re: Keeping track of employees' projects & progress

Sharepoint is good possibility, with a lot of flexibility. I've managed a Sharepoint site, and some of the issues if you are using Active Directory for internal users and non active directory login for outside consultants make setup a bit more problematic, but it still is a great tool. It seems to be a bit less elegant for Mac users, since it takes advantage of Windows integration. But I have used it with a Mac, and it does work. The person managing Sharepoint should be on Windows (and preferably on Windows 7). I recommend Sharepoint to most people, when I do IT consulting, which is a sideline business I do, given my background.

Basecamp is an 'cloud' based solution you might look at.

A sophisticated Excel spreadsheet or Access database might also do the job just fine, if you lock input to various cells. Or you could create a 'rollup' spreadsheet to track just what users need to see, and hide the underlying data from prying eyes. Also, Microsoft Project or other project management tool can create Timeline and Gannt charts that people like to see, as can Powerpoint, albeit it in a less sophisticated way. I've worked in large corporations doing project tracking, and often they use very simple methods. Trying to create something too complex, can lead to frustration. Look at MS Project's web site to see the various ways to track projects, and it does connect to Sharepoint, but the higher end version does require a great deal of focus on someone's part. It is likely to be overkill, and I have encountered companies that have abandoned server based Project attempts because of the complexity of the application.

You didn't mention how many users the solution needs to support, how many tasks, the kind of security you need for the various phases ( a management call) and the kind of security for the various users, the kind of tasks you are tracking (timeline vs. budget vs. phase) That could seriously guide your choice, but given that you are only using a whiteboard now, it seems like the assumption is you are a small team! What are the specific goals you are needing to track? i.e. Are we ontime? Are we on budget? What % of completion are we at? What are the next tasks we need to address? etc. You also didn't mention whether your teams are using Mac, Windows, a mix, or simply all online (cloud) based.

Alf