Updating a Project Baseline in Project/Project Online/PPM

A project schedule is baselined to lock in the original plan. However, projects don’t always track to the baseline and it becomes necessary to re-baseline the schedule. Any further changes to a baselined schedule have to be approved from senior managers and stakeholders.

A baselined schedule is generally re-baselined when the project undergoes major changes. Microsoft Project allows users to maintain up to 11 baselines or versions of a project schedule; this enables users to compare up to 11 different versions of the project schedule.

Now let us look at the steps to update a baseline.

Step 1: Open the previously baselined project. Assume that the initial project baseline is stored in ‘Baseline’.

Note: Below, you can see the ‘Baseline Finish” date which shows the initial baseline finish dates.

Step 2: Make the necessary changes to the schedule.

For example, let us increase the duration of Task ‘c’ to 8 days. This changes the finish date of the task from Jan 12 to Jan 21.

Step 3: Now let us try to save these changes and create a new baseline. Click on the ‘Set baseline’ in the ‘schedule’ section under ‘Project’ tab.

Step 4: In the ‘Set Baseline’ window choose if you want to overwrite the current baseline (Baseline) or if you would want to save the project as a new baseline (Say for example Baseline2). Here, I want to create a new baseline so I choose ‘Baseline2’ and the click OK.

Step 5: Now you can compare the Initial baseline (Baseline) and the current baseline version (Baseline2).