Milestones help you set goals and manage associated Tasks. Think of a Milestone as a point in time by which any associated Tasks need to be done.
It’s important to understand the purpose of Milestones and how they are meant to be used in Beeswax.
Milestones do not have a duration. They are simply a target point in time (hence the target icon) that you are aiming to hit for a particular goal. Milestones are set to be due at the end of that day. And I know this might be stating the obvious but if it’s due in the morning then you should set the due for the day before.
Mostly these are fixed deliverable times set by Clients but they could also be internal deadlines that you set in order to keep things moving forward.
Milestones are not meant to be used for things like meetings or appointments. We assume you have plenty of options for managing these sorts of Calendar events and we don’t think it’s worth duplicating that functionality here.
Beeswax allows you to attach Tasks to Milestones. Given that each Task has an estimated time, you get to see at a glance if the total time allocated to all the associated Tasks is more than the amount time available between now and the Milestone due date. Based on your normal working hours.
The Upcoming Milestones dashboard widget is not meant to be Gantt chart. Gantt charts tend to be way too complicated for most non technical users and are generally overkill for many businesses who run relatively simple projects.
You spend most of your time setting up and managing the Gantt chart rather than actually getting any work done and small service businesses just doesn’t work that way in the real world.
People like lists and doing things in the order they are listed. The Milestones simply give you a visual representation showing you where you might have problems meeting deadlines given any associated Tasks attached to the Milestone. And often it’s just about being aware early on so that you can anticipate any issues and let your clients know that you might not meet a deadline. That’s far better than telling when the deadline has already arrived.
What happens when you can’t meet a Milestone?
The short answer: You move it.
Sometimes you may have genuine deadlines, such as a Live Event or the on air time for a Television Commercial. However the reality is in our experience where there are real deadlines everyone simply has to put in extra time. And that might be working weekends or overtime. Welcome to the real world.
Beeswax takes a much simpler approach to project management by simplifying certain concepts and limiting the range of options that often get in the way of managing a project. At the end of the day a humans still need to be involved and make judgement calls each and every day as new challenges are thrown at them. From clients changing their mind at the last minute to unforeseen events that can alter the direction of any project. That’s just the way it works and Beeswax has been built to reflect this reality.
Michael Gerber provides some words of wisdom when he says “Don’t let people run the people let the system run the people”.
Beeswax provides a system for doing things. It provides some structure for a business to adhere to. When everyone works in same system then things run much smoother than when everyone is off running different systems.
Beeswax assumes all the associated Tasks are completed in a linear fashion. In other words, we assume each Task that is associated with a Milestone has to be done one after the other. It is possible to have certain Tasks done by two different people within your business (“Divide and Conquer”), effectively splitting up the work and therefore reducing the absolute amount of time required for all the associated Tasks to be completed. Regardless, Beeswax assumes the worst case scenario which is generally the case. Or you should just remember that this is how it works in order to plan your Milestones and Tasks accordingly.
We assume Tasks will be worked on during your normal working (“business”) hours (These working hours are managed under Settings > Preferences). Of course you can have your staff working 16 hour days but in reality they won’t stick around for long. Sure, there will be time when over time is just simply going to be needed and the Milestones will help you identify this need but hopefully Milestones used correctly will help you plan deadlines and resources more efficiently allowing more realistic deadlines.
Milestones are assumed to be completed by the end of the day for which they are scheduled. We just figure most deadlines should be scheduled for the end of the day. In other words, it means you have the entire day to get through any associated Tasks. Otherwise…plan on moving the Milestone.
Lastly, weekends are not taken into account. Sometimes it’s necessary to work on the weekend to get things done. So this needs to be considered when viewing the Milestone bar view. Remember, it’s just a guide showing the worst case scenario
