increasing the unit doesn't reduce duration!

[Nikou]

Hi,

In the project schedule, I have mostly 2 or 3 resources assigned to each
task.I increased the percentage unit of a resource to 60% instead of 50%.
But, the Project doesn’t recalculate task durations or Project duration. Do
you know what could be the problem?

Thanks for your help,
Nikou

 

[JulieS]

Hello Nikou,

Is the task a fixed duration task? If so, changing assignment units
will not change duration, it will change work. Also, just to check --
did you change assignment units or resource maximum units? Changing a
resource's max. units does not change assignment units.

I hope this helps. Let us know how you get along.

Julie
Project MVP

Visit http://project.mvps.org/ for the FAQs and additional information
about Microsoft Project

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

On top of Julie's advice... look at Task Usage view (Never look at Gantt
Chart when you have several resoruces on a task, you cananot really
interpret it) and chech the start/finish of ech of the assignments. Chances
are that Project has shortened the duration of one assignment (the one you
changed units for) but not of the other ones.

Hope this helps,

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
+32 495 300 620
For availability check:
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/Calendar.pdf

 

[Nikou]

Hi,

Thank you for replying to my question. The tasks are fixed unit and effort
driven. I have some fixed duration tasks in my schedule though, but all the
resources assigned to them are 100% allocated since they are mostly trainings
and meetings. For those tsks that are fixed unit and effort driven, the only
approach that seems working is that in the task form(the upper window that
opens after spliting the page), I go task by task and remove the resource
that I want to increase allocation unit and then click OK. So the Project
calculates the duration of the task with other resources allocated to it. and
then addd the resource with the new unit and click OK again. This works! but
it is really time consuming since it is task by task and plus my boss wants
to know how we can reduce the project duration with increasing the unit of
one of our resources. so I need to go over this practice several times!!
Any suggestion will be appreciated! Thanks again!
Nikou

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

Well, it confirms my suspicion that duration was reduced for the modified
assignment only.
Sorry but that's how it works.
And yes, if you want Project to redivide the work by resoruce, what you do
is right (deleting then adding with effort driven on).
If the change you make is identical to many tasks the following is faster:

Show the assign resources window
select teh tasks affected by the change
in teh assign resoruces window select teh resource ad hoc, click remove
Now for this resource insert the new assignment percent, click assign.

Hope this helps,

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
+32 495 300 620
For availability check:
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/Calendar.pdf

 

[Nikou]

Thanks Jan. I tried the steps you recommended in the Gantt chart view but it
didn't work. It just changed the unit of the resource on the last selected
task, not on all of them. I am not quite sure though if I understood what you
mean by assign resources window.
Thanks again

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

Well, The assign resources window.
There is an icon on the Standard toolbar to open it.
If you fail to find it, Alt+F10
HTH

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
+32 495 300 620
For availability check:
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/Calendar.pdf

 

[Steve House]

When you have or more resources on a task and they all start together but do
different amounts of work, the duration of the task becomes the duration of
the longest working resource. If the resources don't always work together,
the duration of the task runs from when the first starting resource begins
until the latest finishing resource ends.

It's clearer if you think of the resource assignment percentage as
representing the rate at which he converts hours of time into useful
man-hours of work. 100% means you get an hour's worth of work for every
hour he puts in. 50% means that for some reason you're only getting 1/2
hours worth of full-time-equivalent work for each hour he puts in, perhaps
he's trying to do two things at once and because of the distractions he
can't work at full efficiency on either one of them so they each take longer
than they would if he could focus on just one thing.

You have two resources, Joe and Bill, each assigned 50% to 5 day Task X
starting next Monday. Joe and Bill are each doing 20 man-hours of work.
You increase only Bill to 60%. When you increase the units on a fixed units
task, Project treats it as if it was fixed work so Bill's share of the work
is still 20 man-hours. Bill's rate of 60% means he's completing his 20
man-hour share of the work faster than Joe does. At 50% Joe has to work 40
hours to do 20 man-hours of work. At 60% Bill has to work 33 hours to
complete 20 man-hours of work. They both start to work Monday, Bill
finishes his 20 man-hours roughly Thursday afternoon while Joe finishes his
20 on Friday afternoon. The overall task duration remains at 5 days since
duration is defined as the time between when work first happens and when the
last bit of it ends.

HTH