How to Create Task Dependencies in Microsoft Project 2016

Today we are going to look at dependencies while adding some more detail to the Wedding Project we began in our previous article.

What is dependency?

A dependency in Project 2016 reflects a task that is dependent on another task, or something else that should happen. This can be complex, but in the most straightforward type of dependency, we would designate that another task cannot start until something else is finished or completed.

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Creating Dependencies

Let’s take a straightforward dependency, Task 6 and 7: Select Wedding Dress and Order Wedding Dress.

It is clear that you will not order a wedding dress until you have spent some time selecting it. Once you have selected the dress you will want to order it

The very simplest way to record in the schedule that that one task (Task 7 Order Wedding Dress) is dependent on another (Task 6 Select Wedding Dress): First select Task 6 Hold the Control key and select Task 7.

Now take a look at the Task Tab Schedule Group and look for the Chain Link that says “link the selected task”. Here we can link tasks so that one is not started until another is finished. This establishes the simplest type of dependency.

On the right in our Gantt Chart, we can see an arrow next to the task indicating the dependency.

When the dress has been Selected and Ordered, we can move onto the Measurements and Fittings task can start. We could select each task and create the dependency just as we did before. However, if we right-click on the selection, you will see a Chain Link button in the mini toolbar with the same function.

Let’s move onto to Task 9 Select and Order Bridesmaids Dresses. Now this is not a task that is completely dependent on the Wedding Dress. Although in many cases, one might not start choosing the selecting the Bridesmaid Dresses until they were certain about the Wedding Dress.

Therefore we may want to set the dependency as such that the Wedding Dress must be selected before the Bridesmaid Dresses. Select the two tasks and set the dependency.

You will notice that our Wedding Dress task now has a number of tasks that are dependent on it.

Note that any task may not depend on other several tasks, but several other tasks may also be dependent on it.

Adjusting Dependencies

Let’s look at the dependencies in a little more detail. If you hover over the arrow that represents the dependencies we just set up, there is a screen tick that appears that gives us the summary of our dependency. It is an FS or Finish-to-Start Dependency. The FS designation means that first task in the dependency (Wedding Dresses) must Finish before the (Select and Order Bridesmaid Dresses) task can Start.

In fact if you double-click on that line, we get a task dependency dialogue where we could change that dependency.

Here lists the To and From of the dependency with a “Finish-to-Start” designation and a lag of 0 days. If for some reason you needed a gap of time between the two tasks, let’s say 5, we can set that here.

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Simon Calder

Chris “Simon” Calder was working as a Project Manager in IT for one of Los Angeles’ most prestigious cultural institutions, LACMA. He taught himself to use Microsoft Project from a giant textbook and hated every moment of it. Online learning was in its infancy then, but he spotted an opportunity and made an online MS Project course - the rest, as they say, is history!