Adjust Resource Allocations

Quick reference

• 00:05 So far you have done a lot to set up your project schedule, and
• 00:09 for all intents and purposes, you’re ready to go.
• 00:12 You can always make changes as you need to, however, there is an important warning
• 00:18 that we should be looking at, and it looks like we have some overallocated resources.
• 00:23 These are represented by these red person icons in the indicator column.
• 00:30 I'm going to show you how to address resource overallocations in this lesson.
• 00:36 One way to address an overallocated resource is to let Microsoft Project
• 00:40 handle this for you.
• 00:42 So you can see here I have this Right Click for
• 00:46 Options menu item, and I can just choose Reschedule to Available Date.
• 00:52 And as I do this to resources, usually working from the bottom up,
• 00:59 you can see Project is rescheduling, and it's fixed those overallocations.
• 01:04 The red people are gone.
• 01:06 But let's look over here, at what it did to our project.
• 01:10 What it did is it said, well if here's this generic resources called
• 01:13 general contractor that was overallocated, and so it moved my tasks around.
• 01:19 Notice now, that my start-to-start
• 01:23 relationship that I created on these tasks, it's no longer being recognized.
• 01:29 Other tasks are moved out,
• 01:30 and I'm not seeing this nice waterfall style approach to completing our project.
• 01:36 So I do not recommend that you allow Microsoft Project
• 01:41 to automatically reschedule your project.
• 01:44 So I'm going to go ahead and undo all those changes, so
• 01:49 that it goes back to where the project was when I first opened it.
• 01:53 Just so you are aware, there is a Resource tab, and a Level All button.
• 01:59 If you click that, It does the same exact thing as right-clicking,
• 02:03 and asking Project to reschedule.
• 02:06 So I'm gonna click the Undo button, or press Control+Z,
• 02:10 to go back to our original schedule.
• 02:13 We do not want Microsoft Project to reschedule resources for
• 02:16 us, unless it makes absolute sense, and
• 02:19 you know exactly what's going to happen in your project when you do that.
• 02:25 So what is the right method for leveling your project?
• 02:30 There's no hard-and-fast rule, but I'm gonna show you a method that works for
• 02:33 most people.
• 02:35 Click the View tab, and click the Details checkbox.
• 02:40 If recall this brings up the split view.
• 02:43 Now in the drop-down pick list, next to the checkbox,
• 02:48 go ahead and choose Resource Graph.
• 02:51 Now what you can see, is a graph showing where we have resource allocations,
• 02:56 and overallocations.
• 02:58 Let's move this around a little bit.
• 03:02 I'm going to scroll down in the Gantt chart, and
• 03:06 go to some of the resources that are showing overallocations.
• 03:11 Now here's how I would handle this.
• 03:13 I would sit down with the general contractor, and say,
• 03:17 it looks like we're overallocated.
• 03:19 Is this going to be a problem or not?
• 03:23 And the general contractor might say, generally speaking,
• 03:27 I can provide you all the resources that you need, however,
• 03:31 with this install cabling, and install HVAC, it might be some of the same people.
• 03:37 So how about we change the linkage here a little bit, and
• 03:41 instead of linking to task 11, could you link it to task 12?
• 03:46 This way, after the people that are doing the cabling installation,
• 03:51 can then work with the HVAC people.
• 03:55 Now that we've done that, you can see the overallocation has been reduced, and
• 03:58 the general contractor is telling us that these red overallocations are okay,
• 04:04 because they have the resources to handle the work.
• 04:08 Given this is a fundamentals course,
• 04:10 I recommend you use this approach that I just taught you for leveling resources.
• 04:15 As you become more advanced in working with Microsoft Project, you'll find your
• 04:19 own methods, and there's certainly many methods that are listed online.
• 04:24 Now, up here at the top of the page with the View menu still selected, we wanna get
• 04:29 rid of this Resource Graph when we don't need it, so we just deselect Details.
• 04:35 Now something that you might notice when you click Details,
• 04:38 is that it goes back to your standard split view.
• 04:42 So remember when you wanna see the Resource Graph, you
• 04:44 have to choose the pick list, and choose Resource Graph, and you'll get that back.
• 04:50 I'm going to deselect Details
• 04:52 as we're going to set a baseline on our next lesson.

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