Managing Projects › Set Up a CA Clarity PPM Project › Create the Project › Create the Project from a Template

Create the Project from a Template

As a project manager, you can create the project from a template. Templates help enforce consistency and improve efficiency when creating projects.

You can create a project and save it as a template. Others can use this template to create a project.

When you create a project from a template, the following information is copied from the template to the new project:

• General project attributes and custom fields.
• Staff, participants, and participant groups.
• Work breakdown structure.
• Task assignments.
• Organizational Breakdown Structures (OBS) unit associations.
• Resource % Allocation and Allocation field values, so that the ETC lines up with these amounts.
• Cost and benefit plans.

Note: Start and finish dates, baseline information, and financial properties are not copied from templates to new projects. If hard-booked resources are defined in the project template, the resources are copied as soft-booked.

Follow these steps:

1. Open Home, and from Portfolio Management, click Projects.
2. Click New from Template.
3. Filter to select a template and click Next.
4. Complete the fields in the General section. The following fields require explanation:

   % Complete Calculation Method

   Specifies the method to calculate the % Complete value for the project and tasks.

   Values:

   • Manual. Use this method to enter the % Complete for the project, summary, and detail tasks manually. Also, select this calculation method if you are using CA Clarity PPM with Microsoft Project, or if you are using an external job to calculate % Complete. The % Complete field appears on the task properties page. When using the manual method, the status of a task does not change automatically. The task status changes only when you manually update the % Complete value or the status.
   • Duration. Use this method to track the % Complete based on the duration. The duration is a measure of the total span of active working time for a task: from the start date to the finish date of a task. The % Complete for summary tasks is automatically calculated based on the following formula:

     Summary Task % Complete = Total Detail Task Duration Complete / Total Detail Task Duration
     

   • Effort. Use this method to calculate the % Complete for summary and detail tasks, automatically, based on the work units that are completed by resource assignments. If you assign a nonlabor resource to a task, the effort and actuals for that resource are ignored in the calculation. The calculations are based on the following formulas.

     Summary Task % Complete = Sum of Detail Task resource assignment Actuals / Sum of Detail Task resource assignment Effort
     Detail Task % Complete = Sum of resource assignment Actuals / Sum of resource assignment Effort
     

   Default: Manual

   Note: Set the % Complete Calculation Method at the beginning of your project and do not change this value.

   Assignment Pool

   Specifies the pool of resources that is allowed when assigning resources to tasks.

   Values:

   • Team Only. Allow only staff members.
   • Resource Pool. Allow team staff members and resources for whom you have access rights to book to a project. With this option, when you assign a resource to a task, the resource is also added as a team staff member.

   Default: Resource Pool

   Set Planned Cost Dates

   Specifies if the planned cost dates are synchronized with the investment dates. Selecting the option for a detailed financial plan does not affect the planned cost dates.

   Default: Selected

5. Complete the fields in the Organizational Breakdown Structures section. This information defines the OBS to associate with the project for security, organizational, or reporting purposes.
6. Complete the fields in the Copy Template Project Options section. The following fields require explanation:

   Scale Work By

   Defines the percentage by which the work estimate on each task is required to be increased or decreased for the new project. The scaling is relative to the template.

   Values: 0-100 (where zero means no change)

   Default: Zero

   Scale Budget By

   Defines the percentage (positive or negative) as the scaling factor for the dollar amounts defined in the project cost plans and benefit plans.

   Values: 0-100 (where zero means no change)

   Default: Zero

   Example: The template project from 1/1/2012 to 12/31/2012 allocates $10,000 for planned cost and $20,000 for planned benefit for the project duration. If a Scale Budget By value of 20 percent is defined, the plans copy over to the new project as follows. Assume that the project duration is same as the template project:

   • The planned cost shows $12,000 (scaled up by an extra 20 percent of the original value).
   • The planned benefit shows $24,000 (scaled up by an extra 20 percent of the original value).

   Convert resources to roles

   Specifies to replace the resources in the new project with the primary roles, or team roles of the named resources on the project template. If a named resource has no primary role or team role, the named resource is retained on the new project. This setting overrides the default project management setting on the settings page.

   For example, a cost plan uses a resource as a grouping attribute. When you select this check box, the cost plan from the template is copied. However, the resource values are not converted to roles. The resource value can be the only value that differentiates one line item detail row from another. In the absence of the value, duplicate detail rows can result in the cost plan.

   Default: Cleared

7. Save your changes.