Specifying assignment increments

[johnvmc]

Is it possible to set the minimum increment that an assignment will be
divided into? My problem is that when I have multiple line items on the
same day each items gets spread over the entire 8 hours and when a
value changes or I need to add or remove an item I'm frequently getting
over-allocations even though there are still only 8 hours assigned.

From previous posts here I've realized that I may need to drill down to

see if there is an over-allocation on a smaller portion of the day but
I am almost always getting over-allocations on increments of 0.25
hours. As you might imagine, having to drill down to look at quarter
hour increments on a project plan that spans more than 8 months gets
somewhat maddening. Is there a way to force assignments to fill up each
quarter hour increment completely before assigning time to the next
available one?

Thanks,
John

p.s. - Leveling does not help, even if I set it to level minute by
minute for all resources for the entire timeframe.

 

[John]

Is it possible to set the minimum increment that an assignment will be
divided into? My problem is that when I have multiple line items on the
same day each items gets spread over the entire 8 hours and when a
value changes or I need to add or remove an item I'm frequently getting
over-allocations even though there are still only 8 hours assigned.

see if there is an over-allocation on a smaller portion of the day but
I am almost always getting over-allocations on increments of 0.25
hours. As you might imagine, having to drill down to look at quarter
hour increments on a project plan that spans more than 8 months gets
somewhat maddening. Is there a way to force assignments to fill up each
quarter hour increment completely before assigning time to the next
available one?

Thanks,
John

p.s. - Leveling does not help, even if I set it to level minute by
minute for all resources for the entire timeframe.

John,
Just an observation. If you are working with an 8 month plan then
worrying about resource assignments of less than a day is overkill. You
are going to get caught up in the minutiae and not see the big picture.
Not a good plan in my opinion.

John
Project MVP

 

[Gustavo Horacio]

Fair enogh John, but still the question stand and an answer wuld help us all

 

[JackD]

Change the way you look at over allocation. Other than that, there is not
much you can do.
Have you really explored all the leveling options?

-Jack Dahlgren

 

[John]

Fair enogh John, but still the question stand and an answer wuld help us all

Gustavo,
I think Jack provided the best answer given the circumstances. In other
words, there just isn't any easy way to do what the poster wants.

John

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi John,

Have you tried levelling on a minute to minute basis?

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

 

[Steve House]

The allocation percentage is not the portion of the resource's workday that
is assigned to the task. It is the portion of the time spent on the task
that gets converted into full-time equivalent work output. Overallocations
occur whenever the instantaneous work level exceeds the defined maximum work
level the resource is capable of and are usually caused by booking people
onto overlapping tasks. An example - we have Joe who works an 8-hour day
and is available a maximum of 100%. He's assigned to two task on Monday, a
1-hour staff meeting and 4-hours polishing widgets. He's assigned 100% to
each task, a total of 5 man-hours of work. He's assigned to 5 hours, he's
allowed to work 8 hours, and yet he's overallocated at 200%. Why? The
staff meeting is 8-9 while the widget polishing is 8-12. From 8am to 9am
he's booked to be in two places at once, somehow magically turning 1 hour of
time into 2 hours of work. Resource leveling on an hour-by-hour basis, then,
should reschedule the widget polishing to run from 9am to 2pm (using the
task priority setting to make sure the staff meeting isn't delayed instead).

Note - never ever assign someone to a task at a higher percentage than their
maximum allowed. Don't assign someone 100%, then reduce their maximum to
80%, and expect Project to fix the resulting overallocations. It won't
happen and leveling won't touch that situation.

When someone is doing a task that should run for 2 hours, you basically have
two ways to do it unless you adjust their working time calendar. You can
make the task 1 day duration and assign the resource 25%, letting him figure
out just where in the day he wants to do it, or if it is time critical,
making it a true 2-hour duration task and assigning him 100%. 1 day
duration does not just mean it starts and ends in the same day, it means it
lasts 1 working day's number of hours (as defined by the hours-per-day
setting) in time from start to finish.

HTH

 

[johnvmc]

Thanks, Steve.

I appreciate what you're saying in your post but my problem is that I'm
usually scheduling on a much broader scope and am seeing project
overallocate tasks because it's not intelligently spliiting up the day.
As an example; if I have two tasks that Joe is schedule on, one which
ends on the 10th with 4 hours remaining on it and another that starts
on the 10th for which I would expect Joe to work another 4 hours he may
still become overallocated. If I were scheduling these tasks on an hour
by hour basis I could certainly drill down on the day and rectify the
situation but I would have expected Project to see two 4 hour tasks and
schedule them in such a manner that that they wouldn't overallocate the
resource while still leaving hours during his work day free. I'd like
to find a way that two four-hour tasks have Joe working 8-12 and then
1-5 not from 8-12 at 200%.

-John

The allocation percentage is not the portion of the resource's workday that
is assigned to the task. It is the portion of the time spent on the task
that gets converted into full-time equivalent work output. Overallocations
occur whenever the instantaneous work level exceeds the defined maximum work
level the resource is capable of and are usually caused by booking people
onto overlapping tasks. An example - we have Joe who works an 8-hour day
and is available a maximum of 100%. He's assigned to two task on Monday, a
1-hour staff meeting and 4-hours polishing widgets. He's assigned 100% to
each task, a total of 5 man-hours of work. He's assigned to 5 hours, he's
allowed to work 8 hours, and yet he's overallocated at 200%. Why? The
staff meeting is 8-9 while the widget polishing is 8-12. From 8am to 9am
he's booked to be in two places at once, somehow magically turning 1 hour of
time into 2 hours of work. Resource leveling on an hour-by-hour basis, then,
should reschedule the widget polishing to run from 9am to 2pm (using the
task priority setting to make sure the staff meeting isn't delayed instead).

Note - never ever assign someone to a task at a higher percentage than their
maximum allowed. Don't assign someone 100%, then reduce their maximum to
80%, and expect Project to fix the resulting overallocations. It won't
happen and leveling won't touch that situation.

When someone is doing a task that should run for 2 hours, you basically have
two ways to do it unless you adjust their working time calendar. You can
make the task 1 day duration and assign the resource 25%, letting him figure
out just where in the day he wants to do it, or if it is time critical,
making it a true 2-hour duration task and assigning him 100%. 1 day
duration does not just mean it starts and ends in the same day, it means it
lasts 1 working day's number of hours (as defined by the hours-per-day
setting) in time from start to finish.

HTH


--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs

Is it possible to set the minimum increment that an assignment will be
divided into? My problem is that when I have multiple line items on the
same day each items gets spread over the entire 8 hours and when a
value changes or I need to add or remove an item I'm frequently getting
over-allocations even though there are still only 8 hours assigned.

see if there is an over-allocation on a smaller portion of the day but
I am almost always getting over-allocations on increments of 0.25
hours. As you might imagine, having to drill down to look at quarter
hour increments on a project plan that spans more than 8 months gets
somewhat maddening. Is there a way to force assignments to fill up each
quarter hour increment completely before assigning time to the next
available one?

Thanks,
John

p.s. - Leveling does not help, even if I set it to level minute by
minute for all resources for the entire timeframe.

 

[Steve House]

That's what resource leveling does - but first I need to ask how the 2nd
task got to be in the plan before the 1st task ended in the first place?
Project starts Mon. Task A is a day and a half, 12 hours, in duration
starting Mon at 8am and ending Tues at noon. But before considering
resources, how did Task B come to be starting on Tuesday at 8am? If it was
linked as a FS successor to Task A, the link would drive it to start at 1 pm
of Tues and there wouldn't be any overlap. If there's no link, and before
resource assignments, Task B would start Mon at 8am and go in parallel to A.
So how did it end up starting Tuesday at 8 instead of either Mon at 8 or
Tues at 1?

You are correct about Project not intelligently splitting up the day. In
fact, it doesn't intelligently do anything. It's up to us to supply the
intelligence and then tell it the right thing to do <grin>. In your
example, resource leveling can certainly schedule out the overlap by moving
Task B to start 4 hours later. But on its own, it can't know if that sort
of leveling is the best option. You might have someone else presently idle
who also has the skills to do task B and it might be a better business
decision to take Resource 1 off of task B altogether so he can finish A
without a conflict and substitute Resource 2 for him on B. Or have Resource
2 cover Task B while Resource 1 finishes A, then Resource 1 comes over to B
and relieves Resource 2. Or if there's no predecessor link saying that A
has to finish before B can start, it might be better for Resource 1 to knock
off Task A on Tuesday morning even before it's done, do Task B, and then
come back to wrap up the last 4 hours of A afterwards. It all depends on
priorities. The software can't know which option is better, but you can.
That's why Project doesn't just take off and do it on its own, leaving it up
to you to determine which approach to take and when in the planning process
to trigger it.
--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs

Thanks, Steve.

I appreciate what you're saying in your post but my problem is that I'm
usually scheduling on a much broader scope and am seeing project
overallocate tasks because it's not intelligently spliiting up the day.
As an example; if I have two tasks that Joe is schedule on, one which
ends on the 10th with 4 hours remaining on it and another that starts
on the 10th for which I would expect Joe to work another 4 hours he may
still become overallocated. If I were scheduling these tasks on an hour
by hour basis I could certainly drill down on the day and rectify the
situation but I would have expected Project to see two 4 hour tasks and
schedule them in such a manner that that they wouldn't overallocate the
resource while still leaving hours during his work day free. I'd like
to find a way that two four-hour tasks have Joe working 8-12 and then
1-5 not from 8-12 at 200%.

-John

The allocation percentage is not the portion of the resource's workday
that
is assigned to the task. It is the portion of the time spent on the task
that gets converted into full-time equivalent work output.
Overallocations
occur whenever the instantaneous work level exceeds the defined maximum
work
level the resource is capable of and are usually caused by booking people
onto overlapping tasks. An example - we have Joe who works an 8-hour day
and is available a maximum of 100%. He's assigned to two task on Monday,
a
1-hour staff meeting and 4-hours polishing widgets. He's assigned 100%
to
each task, a total of 5 man-hours of work. He's assigned to 5 hours,
he's
allowed to work 8 hours, and yet he's overallocated at 200%. Why? The
staff meeting is 8-9 while the widget polishing is 8-12. From 8am to 9am
he's booked to be in two places at once, somehow magically turning 1 hour
of
time into 2 hours of work. Resource leveling on an hour-by-hour basis,
then,
should reschedule the widget polishing to run from 9am to 2pm (using the
task priority setting to make sure the staff meeting isn't delayed
instead).

Note - never ever assign someone to a task at a higher percentage than
their
maximum allowed. Don't assign someone 100%, then reduce their maximum to
80%, and expect Project to fix the resulting overallocations. It won't
happen and leveling won't touch that situation.

When someone is doing a task that should run for 2 hours, you basically
have
two ways to do it unless you adjust their working time calendar. You can
make the task 1 day duration and assign the resource 25%, letting him
figure
out just where in the day he wants to do it, or if it is time critical,
making it a true 2-hour duration task and assigning him 100%. 1 day
duration does not just mean it starts and ends in the same day, it means
it
lasts 1 working day's number of hours (as defined by the hours-per-day
setting) in time from start to finish.

HTH


--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs

Is it possible to set the minimum increment that an assignment will be
divided into? My problem is that when I have multiple line items on the
same day each items gets spread over the entire 8 hours and when a
value changes or I need to add or remove an item I'm frequently getting
over-allocations even though there are still only 8 hours assigned.

From previous posts here I've realized that I may need to drill down to
see if there is an over-allocation on a smaller portion of the day but
I am almost always getting over-allocations on increments of 0.25
hours. As you might imagine, having to drill down to look at quarter
hour increments on a project plan that spans more than 8 months gets
somewhat maddening. Is there a way to force assignments to fill up each
quarter hour increment completely before assigning time to the next
available one?

Thanks,
John

p.s. - Leveling does not help, even if I set it to level minute by
minute for all resources for the entire timeframe.