Why do Max Units Change After Resources Enter Time?

[Seann]

We are using project server to allow resources to apply time to their tasks.

We have everyone scheduled at 85% max units (6.8hrs per day).

As resources are entering time and completing tasks, their max units are
sometimes changing. I'm don't understand how Max Units is calculated after a
resource has worked on and or completed a task.

Here's one example.
- Resource was scheduled at 85% (6.8hrs) day 1 on a 2 hour task, plus 4.8hrs
on other tasks
- The resource applied a total of 6hrs worth of time against ALL tasks on
this day, 4 of which were against the 2 hour task above.
- In the Gantt view the Max Units next to the resources name now says [50%]
instead of 85% as originally scheduled for this 2 hour task that ended up
taking 4hrs.

Why does this change? How is max units calculated after a task has time
applied to it?

 

[John]

We are using project server to allow resources to apply time to their tasks.

We have everyone scheduled at 85% max units (6.8hrs per day).

As resources are entering time and completing tasks, their max units are
sometimes changing. I'm don't understand how Max Units is calculated after a
resource has worked on and or completed a task.

Here's one example.
- Resource was scheduled at 85% (6.8hrs) day 1 on a 2 hour task, plus 4.8hrs
on other tasks
- The resource applied a total of 6hrs worth of time against ALL tasks on
this day, 4 of which were against the 2 hour task above.
- In the Gantt view the Max Units next to the resources name now says [50%]
instead of 85% as originally scheduled for this 2 hour task that ended up
taking 4hrs.

Why does this change? How is max units calculated after a task has time
applied to it?

Seann,
First of all you are confusing Max Units with assignment units. Max
Units is the availability of a resource and is entered in the Max Units
field on the Resource Sheet. For example, a full time employee's Max
Units is normally "1". What you see in the Resource Names field on the
Gantt Chart view is the assignment units.

So what is the Max Units setting for that resource?

When you say a "2 hour task" are you referring to duration time or work
effort - they are very different. Duration time is simply the difference
in working time between the task start and finish. Work on the other
hand is the effort estimated to complete the task. If a single resource
is assigned full time to a task the duration and work will be the same.

Also, what task type are you using? The default is Fixed Units. You can
check this by displaying the Type field in the Gantt Chart view.
Depending on what task type you have, Project will calculate the work
equation (Duration = Work/Units) differently. You can read more about
this by going to the Project help file and searching for work equation.
Then click the topic, "about task types".

John
Project MVP

 

[Seann]

We are using project server to allow resources to apply time to their tasks.

We have everyone scheduled at 85% max units (6.8hrs per day).

As resources are entering time and completing tasks, their max units are
sometimes changing. I'm don't understand how Max Units is calculated after a
resource has worked on and or completed a task.

Here's one example.
- Resource was scheduled at 85% (6.8hrs) day 1 on a 2 hour task, plus 4.8hrs
on other tasks
- The resource applied a total of 6hrs worth of time against ALL tasks on
this day, 4 of which were against the 2 hour task above.
- In the Gantt view the Max Units next to the resources name now says [50%]
instead of 85% as originally scheduled for this 2 hour task that ended up
taking 4hrs.

Why does this change? How is max units calculated after a task has time
applied to it?

Seann,
First of all you are confusing Max Units with assignment units. Max
Units is the availability of a resource and is entered in the Max Units
field on the Resource Sheet. For example, a full time employee's Max
Units is normally "1". What you see in the Resource Names field on the
Gantt Chart view is the assignment units.

So what is the Max Units setting for that resource?

When you say a "2 hour task" are you referring to duration time or work
effort - they are very different. Duration time is simply the difference
in working time between the task start and finish. Work on the other
hand is the effort estimated to complete the task. If a single resource
is assigned full time to a task the duration and work will be the same.

Also, what task type are you using? The default is Fixed Units. You can
check this by displaying the Type field in the Gantt Chart view.
Depending on what task type you have, Project will calculate the work
equation (Duration = Work/Units) differently. You can read more about
this by going to the Project help file and searching for work equation.
Then click the topic, "about task types".

John
Project MVP

Hi John - Are Max units are 85% as set in the resource sheet page. I was not
aware the percentage you see next to the resource in the gantt view was
something different. At the very least it must have some relationship with
Max units, as they are equal when you initially assign a new task to a
resource.

All of our tasks are "work" driven, so when I say it's 2 hours, I mean it's
work value (not it's duration value) is 2hrs.

All of our subt tasks are "Fixed Units" .. our Header tasks are Fixed
Durations although I'm not sure why.

 

[Seann]

We are using project server to allow resources to apply time to their tasks.

We have everyone scheduled at 85% max units (6.8hrs per day).

As resources are entering time and completing tasks, their max units are
sometimes changing. I'm don't understand how Max Units is calculated after a
resource has worked on and or completed a task.

Here's one example.
- Resource was scheduled at 85% (6.8hrs) day 1 on a 2 hour task, plus 4.8hrs
on other tasks
- The resource applied a total of 6hrs worth of time against ALL tasks on
this day, 4 of which were against the 2 hour task above.
- In the Gantt view the Max Units next to the resources name now says [50%]
instead of 85% as originally scheduled for this 2 hour task that ended up
taking 4hrs.

Why does this change? How is max units calculated after a task has time
applied to it?

Seann,
First of all you are confusing Max Units with assignment units. Max
Units is the availability of a resource and is entered in the Max Units
field on the Resource Sheet. For example, a full time employee's Max
Units is normally "1". What you see in the Resource Names field on the
Gantt Chart view is the assignment units.

So what is the Max Units setting for that resource?

When you say a "2 hour task" are you referring to duration time or work
effort - they are very different. Duration time is simply the difference
in working time between the task start and finish. Work on the other
hand is the effort estimated to complete the task. If a single resource
is assigned full time to a task the duration and work will be the same.

Also, what task type are you using? The default is Fixed Units. You can
check this by displaying the Type field in the Gantt Chart view.
Depending on what task type you have, Project will calculate the work
equation (Duration = Work/Units) differently. You can read more about
this by going to the Project help file and searching for work equation.
Then click the topic, "about task types".

John
Project MVP

Our Max Units are 85% as set in our resource sheet page. It seems that max
units has some relationship with assignment units although it's not clear to
me how.

The 2 hr task I was referring to was Work, not duration. We enter ALL of our
estimates into the work column and let the duration adjust accordingly (since
we don't schedule a full 8hr day).

Our subtasks are fixed units, while the header tasks for those subtasks are
labeled as fixed duration although I'm not sure why/how they could be
different.

Any additional info is appreciated.

 

[John]

We are using project server to allow resources to apply time to their
tasks.

We have everyone scheduled at 85% max units (6.8hrs per day).

As resources are entering time and completing tasks, their max units are
sometimes changing. I'm don't understand how Max Units is calculated
after a
resource has worked on and or completed a task.

Here's one example.
- Resource was scheduled at 85% (6.8hrs) day 1 on a 2 hour task, plus
4.8hrs
on other tasks
- The resource applied a total of 6hrs worth of time against ALL tasks on
this day, 4 of which were against the 2 hour task above.
- In the Gantt view the Max Units next to the resources name now says
[50%]
instead of 85% as originally scheduled for this 2 hour task that ended up
taking 4hrs.

Why does this change? How is max units calculated after a task has time
applied to it?

Seann,
First of all you are confusing Max Units with assignment units. Max
Units is the availability of a resource and is entered in the Max Units
field on the Resource Sheet. For example, a full time employee's Max
Units is normally "1". What you see in the Resource Names field on the
Gantt Chart view is the assignment units.

So what is the Max Units setting for that resource?

When you say a "2 hour task" are you referring to duration time or work
effort - they are very different. Duration time is simply the difference
in working time between the task start and finish. Work on the other
hand is the effort estimated to complete the task. If a single resource
is assigned full time to a task the duration and work will be the same.

Also, what task type are you using? The default is Fixed Units. You can
check this by displaying the Type field in the Gantt Chart view.
Depending on what task type you have, Project will calculate the work
equation (Duration = Work/Units) differently. You can read more about
this by going to the Project help file and searching for work equation.
Then click the topic, "about task types".

John
Project MVP

Our Max Units are 85% as set in our resource sheet page. It seems that max
units has some relationship with assignment units although it's not clear to
me how.

The 2 hr task I was referring to was Work, not duration. We enter ALL of our
estimates into the work column and let the duration adjust accordingly (since
we don't schedule a full 8hr day).

Our subtasks are fixed units, while the header tasks for those subtasks are
labeled as fixed duration although I'm not sure why/how they could be
different.

Any additional info is appreciated.

Seann,
If you have your resources set for 85% Max Units, that effectively means
that you can only assign up to 6.8 hours per day before that resource
will become overallocated, even though your work day may still have 8
hours. Or did you also change the hours per day under
Tools/Options/Calendar tab to 6.8 hours and the shift hours under
Tools/Change Working Time?

When I take the scenario you described, an assignment level of .85
against a 2 hour task will result in a duration of .29 days given the
default fixed units type of task. If I change the hours per day to 6.8
then the duration will show .35 days. Then, depending on where the
resource enters the actual hours (i.e. into the Actual Work field or in
the timescale data on a Usage view), the duration will increase or the
assignment units will remain fixed until the timescale data exceeds the
duration period in the timescale data (it can get pretty weird looking
when you enter actual data into the timescaled part). But at no time
should the resource unit level change to 0.5 as you indicated. That just
doesn't make sense. You must be doing something else with the task.

Why exactly are you limiting your resources to 85%? Are you trying to
account for a 15% idle time or time spent on "routine" tasks (i.e. potty
breaks, coffee breaks, talking with co-workers, etc.)?

By the way, a summary line will be fixed duration by default because a
summary line is not a task and its duration IS fixed by the subtasks
under it.

OK, that's maybe more info than you wanted but hopefully it helps.

John
Project MVP

 

[Seann]

Seann,
If you have your resources set for 85% Max Units, that effectively means
that you can only assign up to 6.8 hours per day before that resource
will become overallocated, even though your work day may still have 8
hours. Or did you also change the hours per day under
Tools/Options/Calendar tab to 6.8 hours and the shift hours under
Tools/Change Working Time?

When I take the scenario you described, an assignment level of .85
against a 2 hour task will result in a duration of .29 days given the
default fixed units type of task. If I change the hours per day to 6.8
then the duration will show .35 days. Then, depending on where the
resource enters the actual hours (i.e. into the Actual Work field or in
the timescale data on a Usage view), the duration will increase or the
assignment units will remain fixed until the timescale data exceeds the
duration period in the timescale data (it can get pretty weird looking
when you enter actual data into the timescaled part). But at no time
should the resource unit level change to 0.5 as you indicated. That just
doesn't make sense. You must be doing something else with the task.

Why exactly are you limiting your resources to 85%? Are you trying to
account for a 15% idle time or time spent on "routine" tasks (i.e. potty
breaks, coffee breaks, talking with co-workers, etc.)?

By the way, a summary line will be fixed duration by default because a
summary line is not a task and its duration IS fixed by the subtasks
under it.

OK, that's maybe more info than you wanted but hopefully it helps.

John
Project MVP

John - In response to your follow-up questions:
We have set our hours per day in the tools/options/calendar at 6.8hrs, as
well as setting each resources max units (in the resource sheet on project
server) at 85%.
We know from experience that we do not get a full 8hrs of work per day out
of a resource becuase of the things you described plus other overheard types
of tasks. Therefore we capped our resources as at 6.8hrs of scheduled time
per day using the above methods.

Our resources enter their time in "Actual Work" via project server. We do
not use timescale data at all (at least not knowingly). So the thing that is
happening here is:
- Assignment units for the 2hr task are set to 85%
- The resource enters time against the task using the actual work feild on
project server
- In this case the 2hr task actually took 4hrs.
- After we accept the time submission from the user, the assignment units
are now set to 50% and the task is now complete

This is one of MANY examples like this in our project file. As resources are
entering time and completing tasks their assignment units are changing above
and below the original value of 85%.

One interesting side note to all of this. It seems that when actual work
ends up being less then baseline work the assignment units will go up. When
actual work ends up being more then baseline work the assignment units will
go down. If they are the same, the assignment units stay at 85%.

Thanks

 

[John]

Seann,
If you have your resources set for 85% Max Units, that effectively means
that you can only assign up to 6.8 hours per day before that resource
will become overallocated, even though your work day may still have 8
hours. Or did you also change the hours per day under
Tools/Options/Calendar tab to 6.8 hours and the shift hours under
Tools/Change Working Time?

When I take the scenario you described, an assignment level of .85
against a 2 hour task will result in a duration of .29 days given the
default fixed units type of task. If I change the hours per day to 6.8
then the duration will show .35 days. Then, depending on where the
resource enters the actual hours (i.e. into the Actual Work field or in
the timescale data on a Usage view), the duration will increase or the
assignment units will remain fixed until the timescale data exceeds the
duration period in the timescale data (it can get pretty weird looking
when you enter actual data into the timescaled part). But at no time
should the resource unit level change to 0.5 as you indicated. That just
doesn't make sense. You must be doing something else with the task.

Why exactly are you limiting your resources to 85%? Are you trying to
account for a 15% idle time or time spent on "routine" tasks (i.e. potty
breaks, coffee breaks, talking with co-workers, etc.)?

By the way, a summary line will be fixed duration by default because a
summary line is not a task and its duration IS fixed by the subtasks
under it.

OK, that's maybe more info than you wanted but hopefully it helps.

John
Project MVP

John - In response to your follow-up questions:
We have set our hours per day in the tools/options/calendar at 6.8hrs, as
well as setting each resources max units (in the resource sheet on project
server) at 85%.
We know from experience that we do not get a full 8hrs of work per day out
of a resource becuase of the things you described plus other overheard types
of tasks. Therefore we capped our resources as at 6.8hrs of scheduled time
per day using the above methods.

Our resources enter their time in "Actual Work" via project server. We do
not use timescale data at all (at least not knowingly). So the thing that is
happening here is:
- Assignment units for the 2hr task are set to 85%
- The resource enters time against the task using the actual work feild on
project server
- In this case the 2hr task actually took 4hrs.
- After we accept the time submission from the user, the assignment units
are now set to 50% and the task is now complete

This is one of MANY examples like this in our project file. As resources are
entering time and completing tasks their assignment units are changing above
and below the original value of 85%.

One interesting side note to all of this. It seems that when actual work
ends up being less then baseline work the assignment units will go up. When
actual work ends up being more then baseline work the assignment units will
go down. If they are the same, the assignment units stay at 85%.

Thanks[/QUOTE]

Seann,
I understand your desire to emulate real life but ask yourself this
question. Do our employees charge a different number when they are doing
the "routine" things? If so, then you are indeed tracking project and
non-project costs separately. However, I suspect that if Joe is working
on a project, he will only charge his time to charge numbers for that
project and not use a different charge number when he goes to the
bathroom or spends 30 minutes responding to non-project related e-mail,
etc. In other words, the project is getting hit with the cost for the
nondescript 15% effort, but that time is not being accounted for in the
total work, or if it is, it is probably skewed.

I don't do Project Server so there might be some differences in the way
actuals are handled. If you want to pursue this issue, I suggest you
post to our sister newsgroup, microsoft.public.project.server.

John
Project MVP

 

[Steve House]

There is a sort of relationship between Max Units and Assignment Units as
you asked but it only affects one area - the Max Units is used for the
default assignment units (up to 100%) when you assign a resource and do not
manually designate an assignment level. If you just say "Resource X is
assigned to Task A" by, say, dragging and dropping the resource name onto
the task name, Project will assign at either the Max Units or 100%,
whichever is LESS. (Resource names that represent groups of individuals
such as "Support Staff" can have Max Units over 100% - if there were 5
people in the Support Staff role and you cohse not to distinguish them by
name, the Support Staff resource would have a Max Units of 500%. In that
case, an assignment of 100% would represent 1 person assigned to the task in
question while 200% would represent 2 people, etc. Unless you state
otherwise, Project will assume you're only assigning one of them.)

Is it really necessary to micromanage the work hours as closely as it sounds
like you're trying to do? If Joe is working on Task X for 2 days, can't you
just say that Task X is worth 16 man-hours with the tacit understanding that
somewhere around 10% to 15% of that time is undifferentiated non-productive
time rather than saying this task is 13.6 man-hours? If the objective of
the exercise is to deliver the project on-time and in-budget, does worrying
about that level of detail help achieve that result? And also, does making
the distinction between 16 man-hours versus 13.6 man-hours help you to
better tell Bill assigned to follow-on Task Y whether he should plan on
starting on Wednesday or Tuesday (is it necessary to tell him to be ready to
start on Tuesday at 3pm versus to be ready to start Wednesday - for some
things it would be but not for 99% of work assignments, IMHO)? There's a
rule of thumb called the '8/80 Rule' you might keep in mind here - If you're
looking at work and duration increments of less than about 8 hours you're
probably missing the forest because of the trees while if you're looking at
durations over 80 hours you're probably not looking at fine enough detail to
manage the work effectively.

HTH