Managing Sub-projects within a Master Project

You can link another project, that is run in PPM or an agile development system, as a sub-project to a task of your PPM project. Project Management allows you to manage multiple sub-projects within a master project.

This section describes how to link another PPM project as sub-project to a task. For details on linking an agile project, see the Solution Integrations Guide.

Setting Master Project as Hybrid Project

You should set a project as hybrid project before you can link other projects to its tasks.

  1. Open the project settings page.
  2. In the Hybrid Project policy, select the option Set the current project as a hybrid project.
  3. Click Done.

Important: If you set a project as a hybrid project, you can still use time management to track actuals against the project but time can only be tracked at the task level.

You cannot use time sheets to track time against the imported tasks.

Back to top

Tasks That Can Be Linked to Sub-projects

Make sure that the task meets the following criteria:

  • The task is a leaf task.

  • The task is neither a milestone nor a summary task.

  • The task has no actuals.

    For example, if you set a task status to In Process, then it would have actual start date, so it cannot be linked to any project.

  • The task is not linked to any PPM project or agile project.

  • Microsoft Project-related tasks

    When a project is already integrated with Microsoft Project, the work plan should be fully controlled by PPM (under PPM-controlled mode) if you want to link a task with another PPM project.

    When you already set a project as a hybrid project, the work plan can only be under PPM-controlled mode if you want to integrate the project with Microsoft Project. The other two modes are disabled.

  • RFC tasks

    If a task is already mapped to an RFC in Service Manager, it is not available for mapping to a project.

Back to top

Linking a Sub-project to a Task

  1. Open the master project work plan.
  2. Open the task that is to be linked with another PPM project.
  3. In the Hybrid Project tab, click Start Mapping.
  1. From the Select Instance drop-down list, select Local PPM Instance, and click Next.

  2. In the User Configuration step, provide the following information.

    Field Description
    Project

    Select the sub-project to be linked with the task.

    Available projects are:

    • Not the master project itself.
    • The projects whose status is not Canceled or Completed.
    • The projects that are not already linked to any other task.
    • The projects whose timelines fall between the start date and finish date of the master project.

    • The projects to which you have the view or edit access.
    Work Plan Hierarchy Level to Display

    Select the work plan hierarchy level of the sub-project to be imported to the task.

    If this field is not specified, the sub-project work plan is imported to the task at the depth of level 2.
    Include Project Summary Task Select this if you want the sub-project's top-level summary task to be imported.

  3. Click Next.

  4. Click Submit.

    The one-one mapping relationship is established, with the mapping information displayed right away.

    The linked task has the PPM logo in the front of its name, indicating it is linked to another PPM project.

Back to top

Viewing Sub-project from within Master Project

After a sub-project is linked to a task of the master project,

  • You wait for the background service External Work Plan Sync to import the sub-project's tasks to the master project work plan. These imported tasks are listed under the linked task as leaf tasks.

  • You cannot edit the imported tasks in the master project. However, their changes are synchronized from the sub-project to the master project every time when the External Work Plan Sync service runs.

Note: When External Work Plan Sync Service runs, it removes previous synchronized tasks and re-adds them.

If a task is indented or outdented to become the leaf task of an imported task, the task is deleted after synchronization. We recommend that you do not indent or outdent master project's unlinked tasks to be under the imported tasks.

To view in the master project work plan only the imported tasks from sub-projects, use the Filter Hybrid Tasks filter. For details, see Filter hybrid tasks in Quick View

  • Scheduled information, including Scheduled Start Date, Scheduled Finish Date, Scheduled Duration, and Scheduled Effort
  • Assigned resources
  • Actual information, including Actual Effort, % Complete, Actual Start, and Actual Finish
  • Schedule constraints
  • Predecessors
  • Non-labor cost (both planned and actual)
  • Notifications settings
  • Notes
  • References

Back to top

Unlinking Sub-project from Master Project

When you no longer want to manage sub-projects from within the master project, you can unlink them.

  1. Open the task that Back to top is linked to the sub-project.
  2. In the Hybrid Project tab, click the Unlink link.
  3. Click OK in the Warning window. All the imported tasks from the sub-project are removed from the master project work plan.