PPM Express allows creating Resource plans for your Projects.
Using the Resource Plan Project section you can allocate your Projects to both Work and Material Resources. Resource planning allows you to maximize Resource efficiency and get an overview of Resources' availability and capacity. Also, it is possible to set the Actual hours for Resources.
The Resource Plan section helps Project managers to organize their teams, manage Resource utilization, and track Resource capacity.
When Resources are added to the Resource plan, this information appears on the Resources page as well, which makes it easy for Resource managers and Resources to know exactly what Projects they're working on.
In this article, we describe the Resource dashboard sections for Project-level Resource Planning. If a Program or Portfolio level is selected on your tenant instead of Projects, all the settings and Resource Planning logic will be the same.
Adding Resources
You can add and allocate active Resources from several pages in PPM Express. We will review how to add and allocate Resources from the Project dashboard => Resource Plan section. However, you can add the Resources and allocate them to your Projects from the Resource dashboard page and Resource Utilization page.
Two statuses are available for Resources: Active and Inactive.
Inactive Resources do not appear in the list of available Resources when assigned. However, if an active Resource is assigned for tasks, as an example, all assignments will be preserved for this Resource if it becomes inactive (the time allocated for this Resource in the Project Plan section will also be preserved).
To add and allocate Resources to your Project (Program or Portfolio depending on the Resource Planning level selected for the tenant) perform the following:
1. Open the required Project and navigate to the Resource Plan section. If you do not have this section added, open the Views menu and add this section to the Project dashboard.
2. Click the Add Resources button.
If you need to add a new Resource, click the Create Resource button. The newly created Resource will be added to the Resources page as well.
3. In the window that appears, start typing the Resource name, email, or role to quickly find the required Resource. Or click on the search window to load the list of all Resources available (10 first Resources from the Resources list will be loaded). Also, you can use tags and Resource skills (Resource filed) to search.
If you did not find the Resource in the list using the search option, try to narrow the search by typing more letters from the Resource name, email, or role.
4. Select the required Resource by clicking on it. You can add several Resources at once.
5. Click the Add Resources button.
Resources will be added to the Resource Plan section in the Proposed state.
Allocating Resources
If you have added Resources to the Resource plan section, the next step is to allocate them to your Project.
To allocate Resource(s) for Project dates or any other certain time period, use the ‘Allocate’ button from the ellipsis or from the panel.
On the ‘Allocate Resource’ panel, you can see the Project dates, current allocation period of the selected Resource(s), and type of allocation.
The Project dates will be set per default, but you can also set a custom period instead.
The Current Allocation Range shows if the Resource(s) is allocated for this Project already and if yes, the allocation time frame will be displayed.
From the Allocate Resource panel the Total hours for period allocation type is available. If you provide the value in this field, hours will be distributed evenly between working days for selected period. If several Resources are selected, hours will be split between these Resources.
The same panel is available for the ‘Set Actual’ option to allow a user to quickly specify actual hours for the whole Project or specific time period.
You can set the work week or calendar exceptions on the Resource dashboard page for the specific Resource. If a Resource has calendar exceptions, this information will be taken into account and the Resource availability and capacity will be displayed according to these settings.
If a Resource is engaged for some kind of non-project work, this can be defined in a specific field: "Non-project work". In this case, the capacity for this Resource will be recalculated accordingly on the Projects.
If you need to allocate the Resource(s) for a day, week, month, quarter, or year, use the ‘Allocate’ button from the grid.
Set the time frame by selecting the required cells (select one cell, then press shift button and click on the other ones to quickly select the required period, or just hold the cursor and drag). When the period is set, click the Allocate button from the pop-up.
Allocation is available in Hours, Percent, and FTE.
When you automatically allocate the Resource to your Project, Resource Max Units and Resource calendar are taken into account to calculate the Resource capacity. Max Units for all newly created Resources is set to 100% (8h per day). You can change this value on the Resource dashboard page => Details section => Max Units.
It is also possible to define the Max Units for Resources as >100% to allow planning of work on a Resource level as a team. This may be useful for cases when in the Project planning stage there is a need to assign generic Resources for tasks. For example, you can set Max Units to 300% for Marketing generic Resources. When it comes to the step of assigning users, you can set the required value for each Resource out of the planned 300 % for a generic Resource.
Also, you can set Billing code for each Resource. The value is not shared between Projects, and set for each Project individually.
To commit the Resources to the Project, click on the ellipsis button and select the Commit option. The Uncommit option allows setting the state back to Proposed.
You can use the Time Type toggles to add the Planned Hours, Actual Hours, Availability, and Capacity for the Resource. The Planned option is set by default, but you can change it as required.
If you navigate to the Resource, you can review the information for the current Resource on the Resource card.
If you set more hours than Resource capacity the Resource will be overallocated and this time period will be displayed in red color.
It is possible to replace the Resource with another one. To do so, click the ellipsis button next to the required Resource and select the Replace Resource option.
If you replace the Resource, the allocation will automatically apply to the new Resource. However, if the Resource is committed and you replace it with another one, the new Resource will be in the proposed state until you select to commit it. You can decide to keep Planned and/or Actual hours as required.
When allocating a Resource, it is possible to review the Resource Estimated Cost and Estimated Revenue by adding these fields using the Configure Columns menu on the right. Also, it is possible to set a Charge rate value for a specific Resource on a specific Project. For more information please refer to this article.
The 'Shift Allocation' option allows moving the hours planned for a Resource(s) if the Resource starts working on the Project earlier or later than planned initially.
Select the Resource that you need to shift the allocation for, and select the days and the shift date when the allocation should start. The 'Use Calendar' option allows taking into account the calendar settings (weekends, exceptions, etc). If this option is disabled, the weekends will not be taken into account and the Resource may be allocated for the weekends when the dates are shifted.
If the Resource is planned for 4 hours per day instead of 8 hours (according to the calendar exception for example), when shifting the allocation for the new days, the Resource will be planned for 4 hours accordingly.
It is possible to select a certain period of time and review the Resource assignments from the Resource Plan project section for the selected dates. To do so, select the required time frame, navigate to the Resource in question, and click on the View Assignments button.
The Resource page will be opened and the workload for the selected period will be available in the Assignments section.
You can review the Resources timeline by day, week, month, quarter, or year.
