Viewing likelihood and distribution reports

You use the Likelihood and Distribution Reports dialog to view a number of reports that identify:

  • The number of times each potential project finish date, cost amount, income amount or margin amount was achieved across the iterations that were carried out during the last risk analysis operation.
  • The likelihood in percentage terms of a particular finish date, cost amount, income amount or margin amount being accurate.

These reports can help you to identify an iteration that you are most happy to apply to the live project schedule. For example, you may decide that you are happy with an iteration with a project finish date that is shown to have an 80% likelihood of being accurate.

The following likelihood and distribution reports are available, each on a different tab:

To access the Likelihood and Distribution Reports dialog, click the Reports control on the Results tab of the Risk Analysis dialog and select Likelihood and Distribution.

Button Description
Print Click this button to print the report. The Print dialog appears for you to select a printer and configure the way in which to print the report.
Copy to Clipboard Click this button to copy the information in the report to the Windows® Clipboard. You can then paste the information into an external application.
Export to Excel Click this button to export the information in the report to a Microsoft Excel® format file.
Options

Click this button to access the Options dialog, which you can use to configure the report that is currently displayed. You can specify:

  • Whether to display the likelihood graph, the distribution graph, or both likelihood and distribution graphs.
  • The value that the width of each bar represents.
  • The colours with which to display information.
  • Whether to display vertical lines indicating the mean and the standard deviation.
  • Whether to highlight the current value in the live data.

Note that you can configure a different set of options for each of the likelihood and distribution reports, so the options that you choose apply only to the report on the tab that is currently displayed.

How do I...

Click the tab that relates to the report that you want to view. For example, click the Cost tab to view the Cost Likelihood and Distribution report.

  1. Click Print. The Print dialog appears.
  2. Select the printer to which you want to send the report in the field to the right of the Printer check box.
  3. Use the other fields on the dialog to configure the way in which to print the report. For example, you could choose to print the report in landscape or portrait format and you could choose to print a border around the report.

Click Copy to Clipboard. You can then paste the information into an external application.

  1. Click Export to Excel. The Save As dialog appears.
  2. Select the folder in which to save the report.
  3. Enter a name to apply to the Microsoft Excel file that will be created.
  4. Click Save. You can then open the file that you have created in Microsoft Excel.

Click Options. A dialog appears which you can use to configure the report that is currently displayed.

Related Topics:

Finish Date Likelihood and Distribution report

Cost Likelihood and Distribution report

Income Likelihood and Distribution report

Margin Likelihood and Distribution report

Configuring likelihood and distribution report options