I've heard people state that MS Excel is the number 1 competitor to MS Project as a Project Management tool... but I'm not so sure that I agree with that statement. I think that we're forgetting about perhaps the most commonly-used business tool in our toolboxes... Email. It's used for nearly everything... including task scheduling, status updating, issue tracking and resolution, and document storage.
Don't deny it... we ALL do it!
I say that if MS Excel is the number 1 competitor to MS Project, then Email is the number 1 competitor to MS Project Server.
James McGee writes about the 10-to-1 rule of Email, and how it applies to Project Management:
9 people read the email
8 people file the email (in their private folders, thereby duplicating effort)
7 people are interrupted in their work or thoughts when the email arrives
6 people will never be able to find the email again
5 people didn't actually need to know about the change
4 people joining the project in the next phase wouldn't have received the email
3 people will be able to find the email again, should they need to
2 people will check back to the email at a later date when they need the information
1 of them will understand the email in context, be able to find it at a later date and act on it