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Old 10-31-2014, 06:36 PM
Senor_Babs Senor_Babs is offline MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling Windows 7 64bit MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling Office 2010 64bit
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MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling
 
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Default MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling

Hi,



I have a query regarding MS Project’s ability to enable auto-resource levelling and in particular, allocation of a resource at over 100% capacity.

To be clear, I am using MS Project 2010 and not MS Project Server.

The background to my issue is:

1. I work on a large IT project and need to quickly illustrate how a change in our in-bound dependency dates will impact overall project delivery and my team’s ability to reach code cut-off.

2. In-bound dependencies are a series of requirement drop dates. These are setup as milestone dates. There are ~50 individual drop dates for requirements – these need to be represented individually and can’t be combined.

3. Each in-bound dependency (i.e.: requirements drop) is linked to the start of a design activity. In turn, each design activity is then linked to a build activity and each build activity is linked to a test activity.

4. Assigned to each of the design, build and test activities are multiple resources. The resource ramp-up is as per the below resource calendar.

For clarity, each TL (Technical Lead) is responsible for a design task, multiple Developers are assigned to the DEV tasks and multiple testers are assigned to each Test task.

Resource uplift required of PMO
Month
Month Days
TL
Developer
Tester
Apr-14
12.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
May-14
22.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Jun-14
20.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Jul-14
23.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
Aug-14
21.00
3.00
0.00
0.80
Sep-14
22.00
3.00
7.00
1.00
Oct-14
23.00
4.00
8.00
4.00
Nov-14
19.00
4.00
9.00
4.00
Dec-14
21.00
4.00
9.00
6.00
Jan-15
20.00
4.00
11.00
6.00
Feb-15
20.00
4.00
11.00
8.00
Mar-15
21.00
4.00
13.00
9.00
Apr-15
20.00
4.00
14.00
9.00
May-15
21.00
4.00
14.00
9.00
Jun-15
21.00
4.00
14.00
8.00



My issue for resolution is as follows:

1. Given the large number of resources that will be assigned to the project, I do not want to leverage manual levelling. I have tried this thus far and every time an inbound dependency shifts, it can take up to a day to re-align all tasks.

2. The solution that I was hoping to achieve, involves having a single resource to represent each work area (i.e.: Designer, Developer, Tester) and then leverage the resource availability to represent the increase in my work force (e.g.: if I have 3.5 developers available in a given month, then the resource capacity is increased to 350%). Note that in doing this, I have also modified the max. units for the resource to 1000%. Hopefully the attached screen grabs from project further explain how I have setup my resources.

3. Given the above, I would then expect that when I assigned the Developer (L2) resource to a task, it would recognise that for the relevant period, the resource had more than 100% capacity and consequently modify the duration of the task given that more work could be completed.

Note that my tasks are setup as Fixed Work.

4. Instead, MS Project only recognises the resource as having 100% capacity (as shown by the below screen shot). The only way I can alter the resource capacity is on a per task basis which does not consequently work in line with the idea of auto-levelling. This is because the resource capacity of 350% or 450%, etc. is then tied to the task as opposed to be tied exclusively to the resource for the period defined within the resource availability – as shown above.

Questions I’m seeking answers to:

1. Can anyone tell me how I can get MS Project to permit this type of effort driven scheduling ? To be clear, I’m not after suggestions of breaking my one ‘Developer (L2)’ resource into multiple resources as I have tried this already and it becomes incredibly labour intensive as well as prohibiting any ability to employ auto-levelling given that MS Project simply breaks the links between tasks.

Also, please note, that I cannot make the task entries in my project plan any more simple than they already area.

2. If MS Project cannot support what I’m after, I would be grateful if anyone could identify another project management software suite that definitely could provide this level of support.
3. I have attached my project plan for you to manipulate / play around with if you so wish.

I would/will be eternally grateful for any support that could be provide as I have worked on this for weeks and have really hit a brick wall.

Yours in frustration and the joys of planning

Derek
Attached Files
File Type: docx Ms Project - Forum issue.docx (17.8 KB, 6 views)
File Type: zip OFE Plan (through code cut-off) - 30 Oct 14.zip (163.5 KB, 7 views)
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  #2  
Old 10-31-2014, 06:38 PM
Senor_Babs Senor_Babs is offline MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling Windows 7 64bit MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling Office 2010 64bit
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MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling
 
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Default MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling

Hi,

Have realised that the resource table did not post in a very readable format. It is however, embedded in the previously attached MS Word file.

Thanks

Derek
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  #3  
Old 11-01-2014, 02:46 PM
JulieS JulieS is offline MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling Windows 7 64bit MS Project Resource Capacity and Auto-levelling Office 2013
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Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: New England
Posts: 1,693
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I've answered your question on the Tek-tips forum:

http://tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=1739994
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