Activity center - Problem & trouble indicators

Overview

Monitoring problems and risks in projects is extremely important. Issues and risks are a normal part of any project. Birdview has a sophisticated system that keeps an eye on problems and warns you when your projects or activities might be in trouble. While the system operates quietly in the background, it has various tools to highlight potential or actual problems that your projects are dealing with.

Trouble indication column

Trouble indicators are shown in a separate column marked with the icon. The column may be resized, moved, hidden, or frozen as any other column.

To display the trouble indication column, follow these steps:

1. Click on the Activity center toolbar.
2. In the "General" category, turn the Trouble indication toggle on.

Problem & trouble counters

To indicate the number of problems or risks that threaten a project or parent activity, a special counter is used: or . The counter is only used when a project or parent activity in question is collapsed.

Problem & trouble indicators

Whenever an activity has a parameter, e.g. the end date, which is out-of-specs (for example, its end date is in the past, or End date < Today) this is reflected in the Activity center by color-coding its value. The illustration below shows an end date that is in the past, i.e. the activity is overdue.

Yellow color is used for deviations in parameters that indicate certain risks that may develop into graver problems in the future. Such activities need to be closely monitored and may need some adjustments as soon as possible.

To indicate that an individual activity has one or more risks or problems as it pursues its course, a problem indicator of yellow or red color is used. It serves as a flag for a manager, conveying an immediate visual message:

Trouble indicator  - for example, the budget value will be highlighted in yellow if Estimated at completion labor cost > Total budget. It means that we planned 11 estimated hours for assignees with a $20 hourly rate, so our cost is to be $220, but our actual budget is only $120, so it is out-of-specs making the activity "at risk".

Problem indicator  - means that some parameters have exceeded their planned values in such a way that threatens the profitability or schedule performance of the activity. For example, a Budget value will be red if Actual cost > Total budget (in other words, we have already spent more money than planned originally for our project).

Indicator explanation

While a trouble or problem indicator gives a warning, which is helpful, any manager will want to know what exactly is the matter. To get this information, all you have to do is to hover over the indicator to see a tooltip:

Parameters monitored

The table below lists the problem/trouble parameters being monitored for projects and tasks. It also indicates the conditions for which the indicator is considered as a problem or trouble. Parameters monitored for projects only are marked off (footnote ***).

Parameter	Problem scenario ()	Trouble scenario ()
Timeline indicators
End date	End date < Today*	Activity: Start Date < Parent's Start Date** Activity: End Date < Parent's End Date**
Estimated hours	Actual hours > Estimated hours	n/a
Health indicators
CPI	CPI < CPI threshold	n/a
SPI	SPI < SPI threshold	n/a
Budget indicators
Total budget	Actual cost > Total budget	Project: EAC cost > Total budget Activity: EAC labor cost > Total budget
Total target revenue***	n/a	EAC billable < Total target revenue
Budget variance	n/a	Budget variance < 0
Revenue variance***	n/a	Revenue variance < 0
Profit variance***	n/a	Profit variance < 0
Target profit***	n/a	Expected profit < Target profit
* For projects or activities with a treat-as-open or -hold status. ** For projects with disabled dates rollup. *** Parameter monitored for projects only.

Snooze indicators

Both a trouble indicator and a problem indicator  can be snoozed either forever or for a certain period of time. You can snooze the indicators of either an individual project or activity or those of a whole project or parent activity, thus affecting all trouble- or problem-labeled activities that belong to them. To snooze the indicator of a single project or activity:

1. Click the indicator.
2. Select a snoozing option.

To cancel snooze:

1. Click the indicator you want to deactivate the snooze for.
2. Select Cancel snooze on a dropdown menu.

There are some things to know and remember about snoozed indicators:  

• "Tomorrow" means 24 hours later.
• If "Custom" is selected, the indicator will be snoozed until the chosen date.
• If the user edits the snooze period by selecting a new one, the indicator will be snoozed until the new period is over.
• If the user cancels the snooze after the snooze period is over, the indicator turns back to its initial state -  or .
• An indicator is snoozed by every user individually, it is not possible to snooze an indicator for everyone.
• An indicator keeps being snoozed, even if:
  • new risks or problems appear,
  • new fields are added to the Activity center (with values highlighted as risks or problems).
• If the risks or problems are resolved, the indicator disappears.
• If the fields containing risk or problem values are hidden, the indicator disappears.

Bulk snooze

You can snooze all trouble- or problem-labeled activities belonging to a project or parent activity. 

To bulk snooze a project/parent activity:

1. Click a problem counter  of the project/parent activity.
2. Select a snooze option.