Work units getting messed up

[Bill Cole]

I'm using Project 2003 and Project Server.
I plug resources in at some percent less than 100% to account for support
time.

For example, a resource has a 10 day task which works out to 80 hours of
work.
When I plug the resource in at 90% on this task, Project shows 11.11 days
duration to complete the 80 hours of work. That much is fine.

The problem occurs when the resource updates his hours. When I accept the
hours he has submitted, I noticed the working units for many
of the tasks are messed up. I entered him for all tasks at 90% so I know
what the original percent of working units was. Now he is listed
fo rmany tasks at 100%, some at 125%, some at 150%, one at 83%.

The duration on one task no longer matches the total work. 16 hours of
total work. At 90% should take 2.2 days duration and this was
correct in the original published project. Project now shows 7 days
duration for this task. If I change the duration back to 2.22 days, it
shows the resource scheduled at 14%. It seems there is another variable in
the work/duration/working unit formula, and Project is changing
that other variable without me knowing about it. I cannot get back to the
original task values of 2.22 days duration & 16 hours work.
I have to delete the tasks and recreate it from scratch to fix it.

Has anyone seen similar problems with working units and duration values
getting changed when they shouldn't be? Is this a known problem.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Bill --

The Units field to whic you refer is actually the Peak Units field. When
you assign a resource to a task and set the Units value, this represents
your original estimated Units value. When a resource enters Actual Work for
a task, the Units value now becomes the Peak Units value, which represents
the largest amount of time entered or remaining on the task in any time
period. Thus, if I assign a resource at 50% Units to a task (4 hours of
work each day), and the resource enters Actual Work of 6 hours on any one
day, the Units value will now be 75% to account for the 6 hours entered in a
single time period. I know this is probabably a bit confusing, but hat's
how the software works. Hope this helps.

 

[Bill Cole]

Thanks for your reply.
Perhaps you can suggest a better way to accomplish what I am trying to do.

I have a resource that works 90% on development and 10% on support. I'm
trying to use Project to schedule and estimate
his development assignments. If he has a task that has 80 hours of work,
and he works on it 90% of his time, the duration
should be 11.11 days. However, once he enters his actual work, it screws
up the resource's units for the reasons you indicated and then
Project does not use the 90% estimated load for that person. I've seen the
units get changed from 90% to 100% or higher than
100% or much lower. Then Project uses that new unit value to estimate the
Finish date for that task, which is not correct. I want
Project to continue to estimate 90% going forward, no matter what the
resource entered for actual work in the past.

I've created all tasks as 'fixed unit' tasks, under the assumption that the
units values wouldn't change as users entered Actual Work.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Bill

 

[Gary L. Chefetz \(MVP\)]

Bill:

On what are you basing this statement?. The software may display peak usage,
but the assignment of future work doesn't change. You can see this in the
resource usage view to prove it to yourself. Your duration will change, but
not the way the work is assigned into the future.

--

Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
"We wrote the books on Project Server"
http://www.msprojectexperts.com

-

 

[Bill Cole]

I am looking at the units associated with each resource on the project.
Initially the units for each resource for each task was 90%.
After the users entere their actual work the units get changed to various
values.
Sometimes 100%, 83%, 14%, 125%, 133%.

The calculation of duration then changes to something I dont expect.

For example, one resource has a task which has 14 hours of remaining work as
of 1/18.
At 8 hours per day this should take 2 days of duration, perhaps 3 since he
is scheduled
at 90%. But Project lists the Finish date as 1/28. There are no holidays
or vacation
days between now and then. I would expect the finish date for this task to
be 1/20 or 1/21.

Again, when the schedule was constructed all task durations were as expected
given work, resource units
and constraints. After hours are entered by the users they are not what I
expect.

Bill

 

[Gary L. Chefetz \(MVP\)]

Bill:

You're not considering all the variables we'd need to know to explain the
behavior. Task Type, history of updates and anything else constraining the
task or the resources on the task. What does the resource usage view show
you?

--

Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
"We wrote the books on Project Server"
http://www.msprojectexperts.com

-

 

[Bill Cole]

OK,
here is all the details on one task in question

Initial Schedule

baseline work = 80 hours
task type = fixed units
contstraint type = start no earlier than 12/22/04
resource plugged in at units = 90%.
Duration= 11.11 days
Finish Date = 1/13/05

First period the resource applied 44 actual hours to this task
At this point the task was screwed up and I deleted the task and recreated
it. I (admin) applied the 44 hours so the
task was at the point where it was before I deleted it.

Second period the resource applied 30 actual hours
work remaining = 14 hours (Total work now 88 hours)

WIth 14 hours remaining, I would think the Finish date would be projected as
1/20/05 (today is 1/18).

But Project is showing a Finish Date of 1/27/07.

The resource usage does show the resource working on this task for 7.2 hours
a day (90%) for 8 days.
So it still does think he is working on this at 90% (even though the Gantt
chart view - Resource Name field no longer shows the 90% for this task).
But it thinks he has about 56 hours remaining.
Is the calculation of Duration coming from Actual Work and Work Remaining?
Or Actual Work Protected?

Bill

 

[Gary L. Chefetz \(MVP\)]

Bill:

Again, not enough information:

Calendars?
Working times?
Non working days?

Plus, here's a case where you dropped and recreated the task, and you're
working with a system with protected actuals. You don't give us the exact
procedure you used to recreate the tasks, how you accounted for actual start
date, etc. All of this affects how the system makes it calculations. Frankly
you've thrown too many variables in to the mix to make any easy sense of
what you're seeing. The software algorithm works very predictably and
ultimately this can be explained, but is it worth it?

--

Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
"We wrote the books on Project Server"
http://www.msprojectexperts.com

-

 

[Bill Cole]

Gary,

Calendar: Using the standard calendar. 8 hours of work per day.
Working M-F each week, Sat. and Sun. are non-working days.
No holidays or vacation days exist in Jan., Feb. or March, so each week has
5 working days.

Task type = fixed units, effort driven
work=88 hours
actual work = 74 hours
actual work protected = 30 hours
remaining work = 14 hours
Resource plugged in at units = 90%. (Available to work on this task 7.2
hours a day)
last resource update made Mon. 1/17/05.
With remaining hours = 14, I would expect it would take this resource 2
working days to
finish, so project should report a Finish date of 1/18 or 1/19/05.

Instead, Project reports a Finish date of 1/27/05.

Resource Usage view shows the resource has to work 8 days (7.2 hours per
day) to get this task done.
Apparently it is calculating the Remaining Work as (Work - Actual Work
Protected).
Yes, this is a residue of this task having been deleted and recreated, that
is why Actual Work does not equal
Actual Work Protected.
But how do I get Project to make its duration calculations off of Remaing
Work (and Actual Work), not Actual Work Protected?
The project is set up to track using the "Actual Work / Work Remaining"
method.

EXAMPLE TWO

New task entered by resource using Project Web Access.
Work = 24 hours. Actual hours applied = 4 hours. Remaining work = 20
hours
(this is in the email to the Project Leader).

After approving the request, the project is updated.
Task type = Fixed Units, standard calendar.
However, the Work shown in project for this task is 40 hours instead of 24.
Actual work is 4 hours (correct).
Remaining work is 36 hours instead of 20 hours.

Looking at the Resource Usage view for this task,
It correctly shows 24 hours of work for this item, and shows 20 additional
hours of work have to be
performed to complete it.

So there is a discrepency between the Resource Usage view and the Gantt
Chart View.


- Bill