Excel Tool for Milestone Trend Analysis

This Excel-based milestone trend analysis is an efficient graphical tool for tracking project milestones. It visualizes the trend of milestones and offers the possibility to identify resulting effects on the project completion date, so that countermeasures can be taken in time, if necessary. Due to its high information density and clarity, it is suitable for reports to the higher decision-making level. Since it records the development of milestones, it can provide reference points for extensive detailed analyses at the end of the project (lessons learned).

An essential prerequisite is the careful definition of appropriate project milestones with goals, target dates, and responsibilities at the beginning of the project. In this template, up to 20 milestones can be recorded and tracked.

During the project, the milestones are periodically evaluated (usually in project meetings) and a forecast is made for their completion dates. These forecasted dates or, when the milestones are completed, the actual dates are recorded. The template is set up for up to 60 reporting dates.

Simultaneously with the data input, the tool automatically generates an MTA chart and a short report optimized for printing in A4 format. You can copy the automatically generated MTA diagram into reports you have created yourself (Excel, Word, Power Point, etc.) as a graphic.

The user interface is multilingual. English and German languages are pre-installed. Three more languages can be added by the user by editing the built-in translation table.

On a separate sheet, the template contains a detailed explanation of how to interpret MTA charts.

Features:

• Up to 20 milestones can be recorded
• A maximum of 60 reporting periods for tracking are available
• Intuitive to use and largely robust against input errors (error messages for typical input errors)
• Subsequent addition of originally unplanned milestones is possible
• Focusing on the essentials by showing and hiding individual milestones is possible
• Magnifying glass function for highlighting details
• Multilingual user interface: German and English installed, the user can define three others

The template was created for Microsoft 365 and does not contain VBA (macro code). It may not be compatible with Mac.