Free
€0
After trial · 1 project · no time limit
- Backward planning on 1 project
- Phases, milestones, items
- MoSCoW Kanban per phase
Backward Planning: Build a Clear Schedule from Your End Date
Deadline already set? Lay out your phases up to that date, prioritize work phase by phase, and track execution—without a frozen spreadsheet.
30-day trial • No credit card
Backward planning in Excel quickly hits its limits
A frozen spreadsheet
Every date or scope change forces you to edit cells, copy formulas, and realign the team. The document ages poorly as soon as the project moves.
Disconnected from execution
The backward plan lives in a file; priorities and tracking live elsewhere. You lose the thread between what was planned and what's actually done.
No visibility on workload
On a single file, it's hard to know if the deadline is achievable with available people, especially when multiple projects overlap.
Orchesia's backward planning
In Orchesia's simplified project management mode, you manually place phases between two dates, starting from your deadline. No automatic generation: you keep control of the breakdown, like in Excel, with a tool that stays alive behind it.
Place your phases up to your deadline
Your end date is known: place your phases on the calendar (date A → date B) working back to the deadline. That's the core of visual backward planning—the same gesture as an Excel template, in a tool built for projects.
Create and prioritize items in each phase
In each project phase, define and create items to complete during the phase, then prioritize them with a decision-support board (Must, Should, Could, Won't).
Manage multiple projects
As soon as you coordinate multiple projects in the same workspace, cycles let you plan cross-project work: assign people and their hours per week, organize project items by drag-and-drop, and see at a glance whether workload stays compatible with team capacity. You can then compose as many custom charts as needed to track workspace activity against your metrics.
Date set?
Build your backward plan now.
Start free trialQuestions fréquentes
It's a schedule built in reverse from a fixed end date: you break work into phases and milestones to meet the deadline, rather than starting from day one and moving forward.
A classic schedule starts at the beginning and chains steps forward. Backward planning starts from the end date and organizes the path to get there—useful when the deadline is imposed (launch, delivery, event).
Set the deadline, break the project into phases up to that date, place control milestones, then detail items to handle in each phase. In Orchesia, you place phases manually on the calendar then prioritize with the MoSCoW Kanban.
Yes, on one project: the free plan includes phases, milestones, MoSCoW Kanban, and items (up to 15 phases and 150 items). Managing multiple projects requires paid plans.
Excel works for a first draft, but the spreadsheet stays frozen and disconnected from tracking. Orchesia keeps the same reflex (placing phases manually) while connecting backward planning to execution: priorities, items, adjustments without redoing everything.
You move or re-break down phases: the backward plan stays consistent with the new deadline. Items and priorities in each phase follow, without copy-pasting between files.
Then it's not backward planning: the date must be calculated from project content. Explore Orchesia's project planning (structured mode, WBS, dependencies, critical path) to establish a reliable date before planning.
Do your backward planning for free
30-day free trial to get the full Orchesia experience · No credit card
After the trial, continue backward planning free on 1 project, or choose a paid plan to manage multiple projects in the same workspace.
Paid plans
From€15/month
To manage multiple projects
- Cycles
- Workload vs capacity
- Multi-project dashboards
Your deadline is set. Your backward plan can be too.
Place your phases, prioritize, and track progress on one project, free. Upgrade to paid plans when you manage multiple projects in the same workspace.