Fixed units working time

[Markarina]

Based on what I have learnt from this forum I was hoping the following
would work:-

I have a resource that only works two days a week on a project (Monday/
Tuesday) so I've set max units to 40% (5-day working week) and set the
resources calendar so that working hours are 8 hours Monday and 8
hours Tuesday. What I was hoping was that when I assigned the resource
to a 16 hour (work) task the duration would be calculated to be 2
days. However the results given by MSP 2007 are somewhat strange.
Duration is calculated as 5 days and the actual period over which the
work is done is 15 days. It looks like project has made the assumption
that the resource can only work 40% of each day rather than 40% of
each week. Likewise a resource with 40% units but who works 5 days a
week will still have a duration of 5 days.

Trying to answer my own question it looks like project applies the max
units on a per day basis rather than a per week basis, so if you have
a resource that is only available to work on a project 2 days per week
but these days can vary their is no simple way for project to take
this into account given that it applies max units on a per day basis
and not a per week basis.

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi Markarina,

Welcome to this Microsoft Project newsgroup

You need to set the max units to 100% as you will want him to work 100% of
the time he is assigned. His calendar will take care of the two days per
week.

FAQs, companion products and other useful Project information can be seen at
this web address: http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm

Hope this helps - please let us know how you get on

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

 

[Markarina]

that works for when the days are fixed, but is it possible to achieve
if the days in the week that they work sometimes change, essentially
we have an engineer working on a number of different projects and the
days change depending on each projects schedule, unfortunately it is
not possible to link the various project plans together so we can't
get around it that way.

 

[Mike Glen]

Well, Markarina, if you're having difficulty arranging a schedule with ad
hoc assignments, how can you expect Project to do it! If you want to be
that precise, you could keep changing his calendar, but I suggest you use a
Usage view and enter the work where you want it to occur.

Mike Glen
Project MVP

 

[Markarina]

By the doing it exactly the same way I do, knowing that I have 40% of
a persons time in any one week, and that time can be used at any time
in one week and not restricted to having that person 40% of every day,
but rather 40% in one week, to me straight forward concept that does
not appear to be an option in project. I know you can level a project
on a week-by-week basis but it seems you can only allocate on a day by
day basis

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

To be precise: 40% availability means 24 seconds every minute. It even isn't
a day to day option.
Hope this helps,

 

[Mike Glen]

You can assign by the week if you wish by changing the timescale to weeks
(or any other period) in the Resource Usage view.

Mike Glen
Project MVP

 

[Steve House]

Adding to the others, it is a common misconception that a 40% availability
means you have the resource 40% of his work schedule. While it may average
out that way when you look at it from a distance, what 40% availability and
assignment level really means is that each unit of duration spent on the
task only results in 40% of a unit's worth of work being done. In other
words, assigning a resource 40% to a week-long task means that although the
physical activity of the task is effectively proceeding 8 hours per day over
the course of a full 5 days the work itself is going slower than normal.
For some reason, perhaps due to having other things on his plate at the same
time, the resource is only producing the amount of work over that time
period that would have normally taken him 2 8-hour days to accomplish if he
had been able to devote his full attention to the task at hand. For
whatever reasoin, the 2 days worth of full-time equivalent work is being
spread out over the 5 working days that will transpire between when the
task's work starts and when it ends.

If you really want him to work 2 days a week giving the task his full
attention, as others have said use a calendar that shows him only working
(on the project) two days a week and assign him to tasks 100%. If the
calendar says he works on the project Monday and Tuesday only, assigning him
100% to a two day task will result on it being scheduled for those two days.
If you assign him 100% to a 4 day task, it will result in it being scheduled
Mon/Tue this week and Mon/Tue next week. The fact that you can't predict
which two days a week his boss will let you have him is not Project's
fault - it's a political issue within your organization, a result of a
functional managment-driven organizational model rather than a project
managment-driven organization model. In a fully projectized organization,
he would be detached from his home department and temporarily assigned to
report to you (or the PMO) for the duration of the project, giving you the
ability to freely move him around between various projects and duties,
deploying him as you see fit, without having to accomodate his home
manager's priorities. Perhaps you can negotiate to get him on a predictable
calendar? Or better, you pick the two days out of each week to have him
that will best meet the needs of the project and then negotiate with his
boss on a week by week basis to let you have him those specific days. For
instance, if a predecessor task to one of his happens to end on a Tuesday,
it makes most sense to try to have Wednesday as one of the days you can have
him in that specific week. Next week Monday and Thursday might be the best
two from the project's perspective. See if you can set up communication with
his manager so you can get him when you need him and not when his boss wants
to let him go.