Microsoft Dynamics SL and Project Net Profit: Improve Project Performance Analysis and Manager Visibility

If you are looking for a way to use Microsoft Dynamics SL to promptly get an accurate picture of how your projects are currently performing and how they will finish in relation to your estimate, then I recommend exploring the Project Controller module and the Project Net Profit screen. 

Many organizations that live and die by the success of their projects are looking for an alternative to a lengthy chart of accounts where segments are added for projects.  Part of the reason organizations do not want to track project profitability in the general ledger is because often projects last for only a few months, yet their addition to the chart of accounts is forever.  Organizations need a place to put project revenues and costs that is not general ledger-based; but this data is only useful if it can be easily viewed and drilled down into by both Dynamics SL users and other managers who need visibility into project performance.  That is what the Project Controller's Project Net Profit screen does for Dynamics SL users. 

The Project Net Profit screen provides net profit and budget analysis for a project or a group of projects, showing one line of information for each account category.  An account category to Dynamics SL is like a project manager's chart of accounts - just easier to read (not numbers). 

One of the key things that people want from their projects is to know that they are billing their clients responsibly-that it is not so much that they appear to have no idea what their estimate promised, or so little that they appear they don't understand their business enough to give a reasonably accurate estimate.

In the below Dynamics SL ...