Resource Management Using Project Server

[Project Server Resource Management - KT]

I'm looking for best way to accomplish the following.

1. Have all departmental resources tracked in one spot
2. Break it out into project and non-project activity. for example we want
to be able to Forecast what somebody will have as non-project activity and
have it reflected when we try to book the person for a project.
3. Give the resource managers control over their employees either by
approval of time away or by populating the data for the employee.
4. Clearly we'd like to report off the information
5. We also want it to roll up so the VP can see our utilization and
availability for capacity planning purposes.

If we can do this in an intuitive way within Project server and somebody can
tell me how to do it then you'll be a true hero because we're struggling this
this one.

thanks a bunch
Kevin

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Kevin --

Here are some general answers to your questions:

1. The Resource Center and View resource assignments sections of Project
Web Access will fulfill this requirement. In addition, the same information
can be viewed in the Resource Usage view of any project in Microsoft Project
Professional.

2. One way to approach this would be to set up a custom enterprise Project
outline code field to distinguish between project work and non-project work.
You might set two values in the field, Project Work and Non-Project Work,
and then select a value from this field in every project. Regular projects
would have the Project Work value. Projects that track all other type of
work would carry the Non-Project Work value. When you are ready to build a
project team on a new project, the filtering capabilities of Project Server
will help you to locate available resources across both types of projects in
the system.

3. Project Server 2003 provides a timesheet approval system when you use
managed time periods. I would warn you, however, that the use of managed
time periods creates a very rigid and sometimes frustrating Project Server
environment. There is no default method to allow resource managers to enter
actuals for their resources in Project Web Access. This would need to be
done in the actual Microsoft Project plan, but could not be done there if
you are using managed time periods.

4. Your Project Server administrator could create custom Portfolio Analyzer
views based on the reporting needs of your organization. That would
probably satisfy some of the reporting requirements.

5. A custom Portfolio Analyzer view would satisfy this reporting/planning
need.

Given your last comment, I want to stress to you that there is no "easy" or
intuitive way to perform the above actions. That is why Microsoft strongly
encourages the use of a Project Partner when implementing Project Server.
Hope this helps.

--
Dale A. Howard [MVP]
Enterprise Project Trainer/Consultant
Denver, Colorado
http://www.msprojectexperts.com
"We wrote the book on Project Server"


"Project Server Resource Management - KT" <Project Server Resource
Management - (e-mail address removed)> wrote in message

 

[Kevin T]

What about having a bunch of admin projects that the resource managers
maintain for their employees?
Could we then just put in the forecast of "day to day" and other non-project
work which will block them off?
Would there be a way to ensure that a PM can't book them on that day?
Is it still possible to set the day as non-working time?

kevin

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Kevin T --

Yes, you could certainly use admin projects as you propose to track
non-project work. You could schedule work in those admin projects based on
historical actuals, such as knowing that a DBA might spend an average of 25%
of his/her time performing non-project work.

There is no way to prevent a PM from booking a resource during any
particular time. Therefore, this is pretty much a training issue in which
PM's must be taught how to determine a resource's availability before
assigning the resource to a task.

You can set non-working time, such as vacation and sick leave, on each
resoure's personal calendar in the Enterprise Resource Pool. Doing so will
cause Project Server to automatically reschedule project work for that
resource during the nonworking time for each project to which he/she is
assigned. Hope this helps.

 

[Kevin T]

That's great Dale. Thanks for your help. I knew there had to be an easy way
to get to the other side of the road.

kevin

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Kevin T --

You are welcome, my friend!

--
Dale A. Howard [MVP]
Enterprise Project Trainer/Consultant
Denver, Colorado
http://www.msprojectexperts.com
"We wrote the book on Project Server"