Dear all,
several PM tools (e.g. Primavera, MS Project, Spider) have possibility to have inter-project dependencies.
Whilst they differ in implementation, the idea is the same in all tools.
But the question is: what shall be the general approach to managing project portfolio with interdependent projects?
The idea is that every project has its own scheduler and there is someone who oversees the projects all together.
From one side one would want projects to have interdependencies and be able to influence each other.
From the other side one would want some stability in the whole system. So one would not want the situation that if a project B depends on a project A, then every time Project A scheduler updates his schedule in the system (may be in a draft format) this would alter the schedule B.
My current thinking is that inter-project dependencies shall be treated like external milestones with fixed dates. This shall allow an individual scheduler to have a flexibility to change his individual schedule with the assumption, that external dependencies he imports do not change and trying to maintain external dependencies, which his project exports.
And then once in a while the entire portfolio is assemled together, re-scheduled together and then new dependencies milestones are agreed.
So, can someone with practical experience provide some feedback here?