D365 for Project Operations
Project Operations, released October 1st, 2020, was the next evolutionary step for the original Project Services Automation.
Project Service Automation could import an MS Project schedule. It would spin up a Project schedule for you to outline the work deliverables (work packages) and keep that associated with a customer engagement or proposal.
The goal of Microsoft’s Dynamics suite is to provide end-to-end coverage of a customer relationship. From proposal to mapping and modeling work, scheduling, delivering, and then billing for the services rendered, Dynamics can do it all.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Project Operations functionality boasts some great connected systems and processes together:
Project sales management
Project accounting
Inventory-based projects
Price list management
Microsoft Project integration
Billing
Project contracts management
Requirements management
Resource planning
Schedule table
Offer management
Lead management
Time and expense management
Client management
Teams’ collaboration
Comprehensive project operations
This “one-stop-shop” has many advantages since keeping the data under one umbrella allows you to build, scale, report, and automate without having to move data from system to system or between toolsets.
MICROSOFT DYNAMICS 365 PROJECT OPERATIONS INCLUDES
Opportunity management: Keep track of potential sales opportunities, associated costs, and expected profitability. This helps you be prepared for new deals in advance and to react quickly.
Team collaboration: Project members can exchange information with partners and customers having additional licenses in a shared and secure workspace throughout the project. This increases the transparency of the project flow and enhances process efficiency.
Project planning: A dashboard shows the cost, duration, and value offered to the prospect or customer. The integrated Microsoft Project workspace provides helpful scheduling and management features.
Time and expense management: Easily record times and expenses for a project so they are properly billed or costed. All team members can accurately track their project time and expenses related to specific tasks and deliverables and create inter-organizational and Resource Unit depending billing.
Resource management: Dynamics 365 Project Operations provides visibility of all resources to ensure that the best potential staffing (in terms of skills, cost, availability, etc.) can be assigned to the project in each case. In addition, resource requirements can be predicted and project execution can be optimized
Customer billing: Project Operations allows project managers to track, update, and approve all project-related costs for final invoicing to the customer. Project costs are calculated and billed based on the role assigned to the resource.