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Kenneth Steiness, PMP, PMI-SP
Kenneth Steiness, PMP, PMI-SP
Founder & CEO, Author, PMO & PPM geek
Published Dec 13, 2023
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By Chad Olson & Kenneth Steiness, Sensei Project Solutions
Microsoft Planner is getting a major upgrade to its existing Collaborative Work Management (CWM) capabilities and adds support for Enterprise Work Management (EWM) through the addition of Microsoft Project for the web as Premium features, all while enabling customers and partners to build on top of the platform to support more advanced Project & Portfolio Management (PPM) scenarios.
Microsoft announced at the Ignite Conference on November 15, 2023, that their work management tool, Planner, will be getting some changes and new features soon. Microsoft released a blog post on this announcement that can be found here. We at Sensei would like to summarize these changes and talk about how it impacts organizations seeking Modern Work and Project & Portfolio Management solutions in the Microsoft 365.
Changes coming for the new Planner
First, here is a summary of the changes announced for the new Planner:
NOTE: Microsoft also announced that Project Online, Project Desktop, and Project Server will continue to be available and supported.
Rollout timeline for the new Planner:
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It’s good to see that Microsoft is simplifying their work management experience into a single solution that pulls together personal tasks and assigned work from schedules and meetings. We believe more people will adopt the Premium experiences of Planner with it being the same product, rather than separated as it is today with Project for the web. With Planner being part of Office 365 Enterprise plans, many more users will have access to Planner and a seamless transition to Premium experiences.
It's also worth noting that existing Project for the web users will NOT see any changes to their licenses or decrease in functionality. On the contrary, Microsoft will be adding new Planner Premium features in 2024.
Work Management as the foundation for Project & Portfolio Management
A solid Work Management foundation is key to deploying full-blown Project & Portfolio Management (PPM) capabilities in organizations. With the new Planner, Microsoft provides that foundation with CWM/EWM. Microsoft then enables customers and partners to build on top of that foundation with the Power Platform, which unlocks more advanced PPM scenarios, additional reporting capabilities, and advanced AI.
Sensei IQ sits on top of the CWM/EWM foundation and provides a turn-key PPM managed solution built on the Power Platform that works inside of Microsoft Teams and lives entirely inside of your own M365 tenant. That means no data ever leaves your tenant and authentication uses Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure Active Directory).
Conclusion
Aside from some short-term pain around getting used to another name change, this is the consolidation we’ve been waiting for. Microsoft customers now legitimately have a work management grow-up story. Let information workers manage the daily grind in Planner for M365 (CWM), and enable teams to build dynamic schedules and manage work in a consistent manner with visibility across the organization through Planner Premium features (EWM). Then empower the PMO to manage projects, programs, portfolios, and resources effectively and connect strategy to execution on the Power Platform with Sensei IQ (PPM).
These changes will no doubt improve the marketing story for Microsoft with a scalable solution to Modern Work and Project and Portfolio Management in Microsoft 365.
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Mohammed Lokhandwala
Boosting Startups with Custom Software & Funding assistance | Founder Investor TrustTalk, Mechatron, Chemistcraft ++ | AI & ML | Enterprise Software | Inventor holding patents | Pro Bono help to deserving
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Kenneth, Nice!
Oleg Vishnevetski, MBA, PMP, CSM
Leading project portfolio optimization and driving technical innovation at the PMO in Eli Lilly and Company.
7mo
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Thank you!
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Tomasz Boinski
GenAI Evangelist, Mentor, Tech-Savvy IT Professional, I Deliver, Consistently 📈
7mo
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Will take a look...
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Nate Auchter
Director of Products and Solutions at Sensei Project Solutions
9mo
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Great summary of the upcoming changes Kenneth and Chad!
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