Available Units of an individual resource

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

I am preparing the schedule for a project where multiple resources are going
to work.
The project has a custom project calendar with a 7-hour working day. This
calendar was prepared from here:
Tools > Changing Working Time > Exceptions, Work Weeks > Details.
Then tasks were created and resources were added.
But one of the resources, Tom, will not be able to work 7hrs every day for
the whole duration of the project.
On certain days he can work 8hrs (this is happening on 2 days, 10/19 and
10/20) while on other days he can work 5hrs a day (on 10/26, 10/27).
To account for this situation, I went to Resource Sheet view, double clicked
Tom to bring up the Resource Information dialog box and from the General tab
entered his Resource Availability as below:
Available From: 10/12/09 … Available To: 10/18/09 … Units: 100%
Available From: 10/19/09 … Available To: 10/18/20 … Units: 114% (8/7*100)
Available From: 10/21/09 … Available To: 10/25/09 … Units: 100%
Available From: 10/26/09 … Available To: 10/27/09 … Units: 71% (5/7*100)
Available From: 10/28/09 … Available To: 10/18/10 … Units: 100%
(One isolated question: is it necessary to enter the information as in row
1, 3 & 5? Or is there any easier alternative?)
But problems arise when a task may last for several days. For example, if a
task starts on 10/26 and lasts 4 days, the task is scheduled as if Tom is
working 5hrs for the whole duration of the task although he can provide 5hrs
on the first two days only, the remaining 2 days he can work 7hrs every day.
So, my questions are:
1. How do I get around this error so that Tom is scheduled to work 5hrs only
on 10/26 and 10/27 while he is scheduled 7hrs of work on 10/28 and 10/29 as
is the default working hours for the project?
2. Is there a better more accurate/appropriate way to account for situations
such as described above? Please provide some details.

 

[Steve House]

Resource availability percentage is fundamentally a measure of the rate at
which the resource converts time into work. As such it is impossible for
an individual resource to ever be more than 100% available. 114% - your
second time block, would mean that for each hour he is physically present,
he does 1.14 hours worth of work, an obvious impossibility. Likewise, time
block five, 71%, does NOT mean he's there for five of the seven hours of his
day - it means he's actually there all 7 hours but only gets 5 hours worth
of work accomplished over that time period. The correct way to do it is to
make working time exceptions on the specfici days affected in his calendar,
showing normal workdays of 7 hours perhaps but exceptions of 8 hours on
18/10 and 19/10 and 5 hours on 26/10 and 27/10. Accomodating such
exceptions is why a resource calendar is created automatically when you
enter the resource into the project's resource list. Let's say normal
Project calendar is 7 hours per day, with most resources working 8am to 12
noon and 1pm to 4 pm. Joe, however, works 9am to 1pm and 2pm to 5pm.
Further, Joe gets his birthday, 18 Oct, as a special day off and he also
only works a half-day on the 19th. When you enter his information into the
resource sheet, a calendar called "Joe" is automatically created. It
initially shows him working 8 to 4. But now you modify the hours per work
in his calendar to reflect that he comes in at 9 and stays until 5, also has
18/10 as a non-working day, and 10/19 he doesn't work in the morning by
showing just the afternoon as hours of work on that day.

Using this approach the issues you raise when a task starts, say, the 15th
and runs to the 25th disappear as the resource calendar governs the actual
hours work will be scheduled on the intermediate days.

 

[JulieS]

Hello Shahriar Nour Khondokar,

I know there have been some troubles with posts not appearing but
all of your posts have been answered. See the link below for a list
of all of your identical questions as well as all of the responses.
If you do not understand a response, please do not re-post the same
question again. Reply to the response with more specific questions.

Link to all your questions and responses:
http://groups.google.com/group/micr...ts+of+an+individual+resource#894d8738ba19e05c

I hope this helps. Let us know how you get along.

Julie
Project MVP

Visit http://project.mvps.org/ for the FAQs and additional
information about Microsoft Project

"Shahriar Nour Khondokar"

 

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

Yes, Julie you are right that I was having problems finding my posts; seems
like Firefox behaves a little differently from IE when posting on the
Microsoft Online discussion group. But thanks very much for providing me the
link to my previous posts and all the replies. And certainly thank you to all
those who have replied.

I have read all the posts/replies so far and have some follow-up questions:

I have come to the conclusion that changing the resource calendar for the
particular resource is the best way to accomplish my objective.
So, it would be very helpful if someone can detail the steps required to
setup the scenario described below in MS Project 2007:
Scenario:
The project calendar has a 7-hour working day. But one of the resources,
Tom, will not be able to work 7hrs every day for the whole duration of the
project.
On certain days he can work 8hrs, this is happening on 2 days, 11/09/09 and
11/10/09 (but what if this anomaly spans 1 week? 2 weeks?). How do I enter
this information in MS Project?
Solution:
To answer my own question, I know that I will have to undergo the following
steps:
Go to:
1. View > Resource Sheet
2. Double click on resource ‘Tom’
3. In the dialog box that appears, click on ‘Change Working Time…’
From here I am doubtful about what I should do to show that Tom works
different hours on two days during the lifetime of the project, as described
above. Also, what options do I have if the exception in Tom’s work days last
for a long time, again as mentioned above.
One additional question:
Since it is impossible to do more than 1hour’s work in 1hour, what reasons
could MSProject have to allow entering ‘Resource Availability Units’ greater
than 100%?

 

[Steve House]

Project allows for percentages over 100 in order to give you the option of
having a single resource name that covers multiple individuals. If you had
5 carpenters who were essentially interchangeable with each other, you have
the option of entering a single name Carpenters with a max availability of
500% into the resource sheet rather than listing them all individually. A
task then that required one carpenter would have Carpenter 100% assigned but
one that required 3 carpenters would have Carpenter 300% assigned.

You can either go to Tools, ChangeWorkingTime and oepn Tom's calendar or go
to the resource sheet and open his Resource Information Form, then choose
Working Time. For a time period that differs from his usual 7 hours day,
enter an exception for the specific date or date ranges involved. Click the
"detail" button and enter the revised working hours for those dates.

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi Shahriar ,

I would create the resource calendar, as you suggest, to cover his 7 hour
days as a "normal" calendar for him. Then, in the Resources Usage view you
can then adjust his working hours on particular days. However, consider
this: are you not in danger of micro-managing? Does the odd hour on a
resource over the length of the project really matter? Can't he just get on
with it and enter the Actual Hours when they're done?

FAQs, companion products and other useful Project information can be seen at
this web address: http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm

Hope this helps - please let us know how you get on

Mike Glen
MS Project MVP
See http://tinyurl.com/2xbhc for my free Project Tutorials