How To Set Non-Working Days In Microsoft Project 2013 Calendar

Calendars are the primary means by which you can control when each task and resource is scheduled for work in a project.

Project Calendar defines the general working and non-working days and time for tasks. Project includes multiple "base calendars", any of which can serve as the project calendar for a plan. You select the base calendar that will be used as the project calendar in the project information popup box.

Purpose

Think of project calendar as your organization’s normal working hours. Let’s say, we all have office from Monday-Friday, 8:00 A.M to 5:00 P.M, with a one-hour lunch break.

We manage calendars through the "Change Working Time" popup box.

Steps

Now, we shall review the available base calendars and then create a working-time exception in project calendar.

Click on Project tab >> the properties group >> Project Information.
In the Calendar field, click on the dropdown option, as shown below.

The list that appears contains three base calendars included with Project.

24 Hours

Has no working time.

Night Shift

Covers a “graveyard” shift schedule of Monday night to Saturday morning 11:00 P.M to 8:00 A.M. with one hour break each day.

Standard

The traditional working day and week, Monday to Friday from 8A.M to 5.P.M with one hour break each day.

Only one of the base calendars serves as the project calendar. For our demo, we will be using standard base calendar as project calendar, so leave it as selected.

Click "Cancel" to close the Project Information dialog box without making any changes.
On the Project Tab, in the Properties group, click "Change Working Time".
"Change Working Time" dialog box appears.
On the Exceptions tab, there is a table. In the Name column, type some random word.
In the Start column, type 1/1/2015 and then click the Finish column..
We can also select the date we want in the calendar above the Exceptions tab or form the dropdown calendar in the Start field.
Below, we can see the standard base calendar is designated as the Project Calendar.
Click OK to close the CWT dialog box.

In this article, I have shown you how to make a specific day a non-working day for the entire plan. Hope you understood and liked it. Thanks for reading my article.

4 Comments

Join the conversation! Your thoughts help the community grow.

Former member9y ago
Anyone can tell me which product is best for software product ALM like Microsoft Project 2013 or VSTS ?
- Mahesh Chand9y ago
  MS Project is usually also for non-technical people, usually project managers. You don't need to be technical or use Visual Studio. VTSS is more for technical team who is using Visual Studio. You can't compare the two. Both are different. For some projects, I use both because the team uses VSTS and managers and executives like to see Project and Excel timelines and resource planning.
Humayun Kabir Mamun9y ago
Thanks for this nice article...
- Rathrola Prem Kumar9y ago
  No mention Humayun :)