Accept or reject levelling

[susiew32]

I have a small project with about 20 tasks and 5 resources, mostly for seeing
what Project can do for the project managers in our firm. I did levelling to
resolve conflicts ( which i put in on purpose to see what happens). It
worked nicely. Some of the suggestions I'd like to keep, some I don't. Is
there a way to accept a conflct resolution for one task and reject for
another task, then integrate the changes into my intial plan, without
maintaining levelling delay days?

Thanks in advance.

 

[susiew32]

Now I understand that you need to keep the levelling delay for a resource -
there's no other way to delay the task other than to make it dependent on a
previous one( which is not true) or put a start date on it (bad idea).

I assume if I put another resource on my task and re-level, it'll move back
to it's original time.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Susie32 --

The approach I like to use with leveling resource overallocations is to do
the leveling in the Resource Usage view, one overallocated resource at a
time, and to immediately view the leveling results in the Leveling Gantt
view. Click View - More Views, select the Leveling Gantt view, and then
click the Apply button. In the Leveling Gantt view, the green Gantt bars
indicate the pre-leveled state of any task to which the leveled
overallocated resource is assigned, and the blue Gantt bars indicate the
post-leveling result. If you do not like the results, you can select
improperly leveled tasks, click Tools - Level Resources, and then click the
Clear Leveling button and select the Selected Tasks option. After clearing
leveling on one or more tasks, you must level using some other manual
method, such as substituting an available resource for the overallocated
resource. Hope these additional thoughts help.

 

[susiew32]

Dale,

Thanks for your quick response.

Do you even bother to do the Leveling process or do you just go to the
Resource Allocation and fix them all yourself by changing the Leveling Delay
value?

Also, what makes the Leveling process split a resource's hours into two days
to share the work on two tasks, rather than do one task, then the next. I
see if you put a priority on one it will let the resource finish that before
it starts the next.

Interesting stuff.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

susiew32 --

Yes, I do level using the built-in leveling tool, but I also use manual
methods as well. When I use the tool, I level one resource at a time in the
Resource Usage view, beginning with the most important or scarcest resource.
Sometimes I level a group of resources if everyone in the group is equally
important or scarce. I never level the entire project in the Gantt Chart
view because I lose control over the leveling process when it levels
everyone simultaneously. To level one resource at a time, you must deselect
the "Clear leveling values before leveling" option in the Resource Leveling
dialog, by the way. Using the Leveling Gantt view to see the result is very
important if you use the built-in leveling tool.

The beauty of leveling one resource at a time is that you can change the
options in the Resource Leveling dialog for each resource, depending on your
needs. For example, you have found that leveling can split a task. This is
because you have the "Leveling can create splits in remaining work" option
selected. If you don't want task splits, deselect that option before you
level the next time.

Hope this helps.

 

[susiew32]

Dale,

One more question: Is there any advantage of leveling by the resource over
leveling by the task? Does the result come out the same?

I appreciate your help.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

susiew32 --

There is a HUGE diference. If you level in a task View, such as the Gantt
Chart view, Microsoft Project levels ALL resource overallocations on all
tasks to which the overallocated resources are assigned. In a sense, you
lose control over the process. Leveling in a resource View, such as
Resource Usage, allows you to level only as many resources as you wish, and
only those whom you select before leveling. You can apply different
leveling options to the leveling of each resource, in fact. You can only
clear leveling in a task View, such as the Leveling Gantt view.

Also, when you level overallocated resources, remember that Microsoft
Project can only do two things to resolve the overallocations:

1. Delay tasks or assignments.
2. Split tasks or assignments.

You, the project manager, can do at least a dozen other things to manually
resolve overallocations, such as substituting an available resource for an
overallocated resource on a task. Between the built-in leveling tool, and
the manual methods you can use, you should be able to create a fairly
reasonable project schedule without overallocations. Hope this helps.

 

[susiew32]

Thanks so much, you are very helpful.

susiew32 --

There is a HUGE diference. If you level in a task View, such as the Gantt
Chart view, Microsoft Project levels ALL resource overallocations on all
tasks to which the overallocated resources are assigned. In a sense, you
lose control over the process. Leveling in a resource View, such as
Resource Usage, allows you to level only as many resources as you wish, and
only those whom you select before leveling. You can apply different
leveling options to the leveling of each resource, in fact. You can only
clear leveling in a task View, such as the Leveling Gantt view.

Also, when you level overallocated resources, remember that Microsoft
Project can only do two things to resolve the overallocations:

1. Delay tasks or assignments.
2. Split tasks or assignments.

You, the project manager, can do at least a dozen other things to manually
resolve overallocations, such as substituting an available resource for an
overallocated resource on a task. Between the built-in leveling tool, and
the manual methods you can use, you should be able to create a fairly
reasonable project schedule without overallocations. Hope this helps.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

susiew32 --

You are more than welcome for the help, my friend!

 

[susiew32]

Obviously, that would not be my last question -

Why does the leveling delay column show edays instead of days?

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

susiew32 --

An eday is an elapsed day, representing a 24-hour calendar day rather than a
working day. I think the software is trying to show you the full impact of
the day on the task's schedule. Hope this helps.

 

[Dave]

I have a small project with about 20 tasks and 5 resources, mostly for seeing
what Project can do for the project managers in our firm. I did levelling to
resolve conflicts ( which i put in on purpose to see what happens). It
worked nicely. Some of the suggestions I'd like to keep, some I don't. Is
there a way to accept a conflct resolution for one task and reject for
another task, then integrate the changes into my intial plan, without
maintaining levelling delay days?

Thanks in advance.

If you use priority based levelling, you can set the priority of those
changes that you wish to keep and then level again after having made the
necessary changes. I like to iterate towards a solution this way.
Other good approaches have been outlined in this thread.