For high-level, future project planning or when a project doesn't require resource assignments at the activity level, use the Resource Planning spreadsheet on the Plan Resources page to allocate and manage resources at the project and WBS levels. You can also use the spreadsheet to allocate roles at the project and WBS levels; assigning roles is useful during the early planning stages of a project when resource availability is not well known and you want to assign a temporary placeholder for a future resource assignment.
Note: To access the Plan Resources page, you must have appropriate module access, and the page must be included in your assigned user interface view. To add, modify, or delete resource or role assignments
in the Resource Planning spreadsheet, you must have the required project-level privileges.
Because the security privileges can be applied down to the WBS level, it is
possible for you to have the capability to assign resources and roles to some,
but not all, WBS elements within a project.
- From the Resources action menu in the global navigation bar, choose Plan Resources.
- In the Filter by field, click
to select a single project or to filter the project display by portfolio, project, project code value, resource, resource team, resource code, role, or role team.
- When you choose a portfolio or project code value, all projects you have access to within the portfolio or project code value are displayed in the Resource Planning spreadsheet.
- When you choose a resource, all projects the resource is assigned to, and that you have access to, are displayed.
- when you choose a resource team, all projects that all resources on the team are assigned to, and that you have access to, are displayed.
- When you choose a resource code, all projects that all resources on the resource code are assigned to, and that you have access to, are displayed.
- If you choose a role, all projects that the selected role is assigned to and that you have access to, are displayed. When you choose a role team, all projects that have all roles on the team are assigned to and that you have access to, are displayed.
Tip: When you filter, a Primavera Administration Application setting determines the maximum number of projects that are available in the spreadsheet. If you filter by a group that includes more projects than the maximum defined, you will not see all projects in the group. If you require a higher maximum, contact your P6 administrator.
- To choose the start date for the spreadsheet and the time units and timescale increments, click Customize. You can also hide the Availability row to improve performance and hide the WBS rows to facilitate easier viewing when you want to plan allocation only at the project level. If you choose to filter by resource, resource team, role, or role team, you can additionally hide any assignments that are not specific to the selected team. Additionally, you can customize columns that you want to display in the spreadsheet. Click the Columns tab in the Customize spreadsheet window, then choose columns you want to display in the spreadsheet.
Tips:
If financial periods are defined in the Project Management module, you can adjust the timescale to display the range of defined financial periods. However, if financial periods are not properly configured, you will receive an error message when you attempt to display the Financial Period timescale; as a result, the Financial Period timescale will not be displayed. Contact your administrator to correct the problem.
When you display the Financial Period timescale and select a spreadsheet start date, the spreadsheet displays Financial Period intervals beginning with the first financial period that begins after the start date you enter.After making your choices, click Save.
- To assign a resource to a project or WBS element, click in the corresponding
row. You must expand a project or WBS row before you can assign
resources.
- To select from the resource pool, click
.
- To search for resources, click
. This option enables you to search for resources who meet specific requirements. For example, you can search for resources that are assigned a specific role or resource code.
When you assign a resource using the Assign By Search functionality, the search criteria you specify is saved; a 'Yes' link appears in the Search Criteria column beside the assignment, indicating search criteria is specified. This saved search criteria can be useful at a later time if you ever need to modify the resource assignment and want to reuse the same criteria.
- To select from the resource pool, click
- To assign a role to a project or WBS, click the corresponding row. Note
that you must expand a project or WBS row before you can assign resources.
To select from the list of roles, clickt.
Once a role is assigned, you can then define search criteria for the assignment to assist with future staffing of the role. Defining search criteria enables you to more accurately identify the type of resource required to staff the role.
To define search criteria, click the 'Yes' or 'No' link in the Search Criteria field. The 'Yes' or 'No' link indicates whether or not saved search criteria exists for the assignment.
- Edit the assignment Start and Finish dates or, to assign the resource
or role for the full project duration, mark the Life of Project checkbox.
To edit a date, double-click in the column.
- Edit the total allocated Units, or allocated units in individual time
period intervals as required.
- To identify soft resource or role assignments, that is, assignments that are not definitely committed to the project, clear the Committed checkbox.
Tip: The list of resources you can select from the resource
pool and the list of resources returned as search results include only the
resources you have access to, based on resource security, and current project
resources. Also, you cannot assign nonlabor or material resources. When
searching, you have an option to filter nonlabor resources from the results.
Note: The timeline of a Life of Project (LOP) assignment
corresponds to the project start (Planned Start) and finish (Schedule Finish)
dates. When you mark this checkbox for an assignment, if the project has
a scheduled finish, the total allocated units are redistributed across the
timescale based on these new dates and the assignment start and finish dates
are disabled for editing. Spreadsheet cells that fall outside the life-of-project
date range are also disabled. If the project does not have a scheduled finish,
the assignment dates and spread of allocated units remain as they are.
Note: The Resource Planning spreadsheet uses summary data to
calculate availability, so it reflects values as of the last date the summarizer
was run for a project. Assignment changes within a project after that date
will not be reflected until the project is again summarized from the Projects > Tools page. For more detail about summarized resource data, see Resource data and summarization.
Note: When calculating resource availability, Primavera considers only committed assignments.
- When you are finished making changes, click Save.
Ensuring assignment dates are accurate
If a project is rescheduled after you have designated LOP assignments, or if you change a project's forecast dates, assignment start and finish dates may no longer be accurate.
To ensure that assignment dates match the current project timeline
- Filter the Resource Planning spreadsheet to display only the project that has been rescheduled or that has new forecast dates.
- Click Synchronize Resource Dates.
- To match LOP assignment's to the current project dates, choose Life of Project assignments to Project dates. For each LOP resource assignment, this feature matches the assignment dates to the current project Planned Start and Schedule Finish and redistributes the total allocated units across the new project timeline.
To match all assignments to the project forecast dates, choose All resource planning assignments to Forecast dates. For all assignments, this feature matches the project Start Date and Forecast Start Date and moves all assignments accordingly.