This articles examines the reasons of the use of primavera viewer and explores the benefits of their adoption on large projects.
There’s something perplexing about Oracle Primavera P6 that makes our life easier as much as difficult.
For example, the complexity of Global Calendar registers. Have you ever had issues regarding the calendars?
Big and unorganized data can be frustrating and make your head spin.
That is the reason why the appropriate software for organizing various aspects of your project and project data is important, especially looking in the long term.
Even with its difficulties and problems, Primavera P6 is an amazing product that has worldwide use.
So know that we know we can’t work without it, how can we work better with it?
This is where Project Viewers offer help. They somehow manage to make us feel in control of the situation, assuring us the risks are minimized and everything is right where it should be. Sounds good, right?
Bellow, we have some of the main reasons why life is easier with Project and Primavera Viewers.
1) It will cut costs
We already praised Primavera P6 for being irreplaceable and invaluable when it comes to managing big projects.
We can argue that this is the reason why one perpetual license costs around $2,500, and why companies buy only a handful of licenses and use .pdf to distribute the information to the other members involved in the project.
But is this smart?
Are companies cutting costs this way?
I believe not.
Just think how much time and energy is spent on something that is static, chaotic, and risky.
Too much room for mistakes.
Investing in Viewers is smart.
Looking in the long term they will save the company a lot of money if we consider how much one misinformation can interfere with the project flow.
2) You won’t need training – no additional costs
The complexity of Oracle Primavera P6 software makes it inevitable for people who accouter it for the first time, to receive some kind of familiarizing with the program.
When a company buys this software almost always has to invest in training or other educational activities.
So the more employees need to go through training the more expensive for the company.
Related: 35 Online Primavera P6 Training Courses
And why would someone invest so much into training the team if only one person is responsible for making the schedules? We don’t see the need for that.
And, here is where we save more money. The good thing about the Viewers is that they are intuitive, easy to work with.
Most of them have an interactive and dynamic view of the activity details with easy visualization. No need for any additional training!
3) Simple set-up
Yes, when we hear software or program automatically we think about IT and how much time or effort it will be to set it up.
I have heard once how a company representative said: “This will be too complicated to set it up right now, we have ongoing projects…”
It is not!
That is one big plus for these little Viewers.
The whole process with Primavera P6 is really advanced and delicate, while Viewers are simple.
They are meant to serve one purpose: To present to the team members the information from Primavera the best way possible.
They are not meant to manage the project, and that makes them smaller and simpler.
4) Fast
The last paragraph leads us to another benefit that is connected with the Viewers’ simplicity. It makes them fast!
Depending on the scale of the schedules it might take up to 5-10 minutes just to load and open the P6 software.
And what if we just need to quickly check for information?
Waiting so much and losing valuable time can be frustrating. Trust me, I know.
Even though this is not the main reason why you would get Project Viewer, still it is another benefit to have in mind.
Especially for all of you spirited- full of energy people, like me who hate to wait.
5) More control, less responsibility, no mistakes
Because the companies have only a handful of Primavera P6 licenses, the most common problems typically relate to changes in the duration of work.
For example, activities might be left unclosed or dates might be calculated incorrectly – a simple mistake that costs a lot.
All of this can be attributed to the fact that most often the person who is responsible for changing the activities is not the one who is doing them.
Primavera Viewers for XER and XML schedules fix this issue.
All the team members can now update their activity accordingly.
The responsibility for this part is shared among the people involved in the project.
However, the scheduler is the one who approves all the changes taking place, giving him more control over the whole project.
The possibility of mistakes is greatly reduced.
We did some research and found the Project Viewers people had a positive experience with.
Here are some you can check out:
If you use one and think we should add it to the list, please leave a comment!
We would like to hear more opinions about the Viewers, should they be more popular?
Don’t forget! The choice of where to invest your time, money, and energy is in your hands.
For example, there are companies that still use .pdf formats as a way to communicate, and if that works for you then that is ok.
We are here to provide new solutions to help you all to manage your project with less stress and more success.
About the Author:
Vivien Goldstrong is a Consultant, Author, and Planning Manager with 22 years of experience and expertise in implementation and consultancy related to Oracle Primavera P6.