Sharing Resources across projects

[BAndrews]

We are a small company and are starting to use project 2003 and project
server for all projects.

Obviously we will have many projects that we are sharing our staff and
contractors on.

What i am trying to sort out, is the best (and proper) way to use these
resources and get utilization when working on a project.

Should we use Enterprise resources (which i am playing with now) or just a
shared resource pool?

Am i to expect to see resource utilization directly from project or do i
have to switch to the project server view for this? For example I am working
in a project and I want to add a resource to this project - will i be able
to see if the resource is over booked (in Resource Usage) from that project
or will i need to switch over to project server to look at this utilization?

Do i need to be aware of some sort of disconnects here that will not reflect
the resources actual utilization (with respect to all the projects they are
working on)?

Thanks for any info or pointers.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

BAndews --

I would recommend that you use the built-in capabilities of Project Server
for this purpose. To use the resource management capabilities of the tool
most effectively, you can do the following:

1. Determine available resources for a project using filtering in the Build
Team from Enterprise dialog
2. Determine available team members for possible assignment to a task using
filtering in the Assign Resources dialog
3. Determine resource utilization across the project portfolio by appling
the Resource Usage view in any enterprise project
4. Determine resource utilization and availability for any resource in the
Project Center view of Project Web Access

Hope this helps.

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

 

[BAndrews]

OK. But does this mean if i have resources working on several projects, and
I am managing several project files, that i must work in one project file
publish it, then go to web access to see resource availability and assign
resources to the other project file from within web access??

Here is how i would do it before Project Server:

I would create a resource pool project to pull from and insert my other
projects into this resource pool project and have them all available and see
resource utilization from this. This allows me to see while working in
project resource availability.

Is this kind of scenario possible? Or am I going to be bouncing back and
forth to Project Server to assign resources to tasks?

Also do i need to have the project files i am working on saved into project
server or can i keep it as a file and publish to project server. I also am
not running analysis services yet and do not have the portfolio manager
running.

Are there any links to overall strategy on project server or any books? It
would be very nice to have a better idea of the "right" way to do this.

Thanks for the replies.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

BAndrews --

If you want to assess resource utilization and availability for resources in
your organization, everyone project manager MUST save their projects in the
Project Server database. Projects stored in the Project Server DB are known
as "enterprise projects" and take advantage of all enterprise features of
the tool. When you open any enterprise project in Microsoft Project
Professional, options 1, 2, and 3 I have given you access resource
availability across all projects in the Project Server database. You do not
need to open multiple projects to use this feature. So, my advice is to get
everyone's projects in the system and to forbid the use of saving projects
as .mpp files.

If you are interested in a book that can help you to understand the
enterprise use of Project Server, I would shamelessly recommend our
company's book, available for download by clicking on the URL in my
signature block. Hope this helps.

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