New Task Requests Not Resource Leveling Properly

[Jim Sipe]

We are running Project Server 2007 and Project Profesional 2007 with the
latest server packs.
A user requests a "New Task" from their "My Tasks" PWA page. The Project
Manager accepts this NewTask and it gets added to the Project Schedule. If
the Project Manager then Resource Levels the schedule, that "New Task" gets
moved out in time for no apparent reason. It is as if extra delay has been
added without the knowledge of the Project Manager.
Any clues or reasons on why this is happening?

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

Answered same post yesterday:

Is the new task linked to other tasks? My first thought is that the leveling
engine is just following the heuristics to define priority. If so, and if
that task isn't linked, it will kick it out to the end of the project most
likely.

Try toggling the different leveling calculations to test the results.

From the MPP help screen (referring to the leveling calculation options):

ID Only Project delays tasks as needed with the higher ID numbers before
considering other criteria.

Standard Project looks at predecessor (predecessor: A task that must start
or finish before another task can start or finish.) relationships, slack
(slack: The amount of time that a task can slip before it affects another
task or the project's finish date. Free slack is how much a task can slip
before it delays another task. Total slack is how much a task can slip before
it delays the project.) (a task with more total slack time is delayed first),
dates (a task with a later start date is delayed first), priorities, and
constraints (constraint: A restriction set on the start or finish date of
a task. You can specify that a task must start on or finish no later than
a particular date. Constraints can be flexible [not tied to a specific date]
or inflexible [tied to a specific date].) to determine whether and how tasks
should be leveled. This is the default.

Priority, Standard Project looks first at priorities and then at predecessor
relationships (task dependencies: A relationship between two linked tasks;
linked by a dependency between their finish and start dates. There are four
kinds of task dependencies: Finish-to-start [FS], Start-to-start [SS], Finish-to-finish
[FF], and Start-to-finish [SF].), slack, dates, and constraints to determine
whether and how tasks should be leveled.

- Andrew Lavinsky
Blog: http://blogs.catapultsystems.com/epm

 

[Wharton Computer Consulting]

Hello Jim,

That is what leveling does. Project will move tasks out so that a rsource
is not over allocated.

Use the view "Resource Usage" and see what the resource load is and it may
indicate why it is being pushed out.