Resource Plan

Grid Columns

The grid in the resource plan enables an Excel-like experience for easy input of data.

The grid has four key columns which cover off resource data:

Availability (A)

Please review the Availability details here.

Scheduled (S)

For the project resource plan we can determine the hours scheduled for that project for each resource in the plan. By making this column visible it allows you to review these.

This Scheduled column is read-only as it allows the user to see the aggregated effort for each resource based on the Schedule assignment data.

Note

The Scheduled column shows automatically, if not explicitly hidden previously for the project, if there are any scheduled hours in the visible periods.

These Scheduled hours (or FTE or % capacity depending on the entry mode selected) are determined from the schedule if possible based on the scheduling tool used, otherwise for the Altus Tasks will be synthetically calculated for the period visible.

Note

External resources assigned to tasks in the schedule that supports this feature will be mapped to related internal resources when linked. External resources are not supported in Altus Resource Plan.

The totals, or the parent row of a group are not double counting the Scheduled amount. The total represents the total unique resource amount scheduled for the period to give you an indicator of how many efforts were scheduled in total for the resources in the plan.

Example of the Totals not double counting the resource “Alex”.

The scheduled value will be red if the proposed value does not cover the scheduled value (proposed value is below the scheduled value). This will indicate that in the given period you do not have coverage for the scheduled amount for the resource.

Note

• If you were to update your Schedule by allocating more tasks to a resource that is also already existing in your Resource Plan, the Scheduled values in the Resource Plan will be updating accordingly after a refresh.
• If you were to assign a task in your Schedule to a resource that is not in the Resource Plan, the resource will need to be added manually in the Resource Plan (i.e. the Schedule will not add resources to the Resource Plan).
• If you update manually the proposed values for a resource with scheduled amount, the values cascading down will follow the scheduled values only if the proposed value entered is equal to the scheduled value. Any other manual entry in the proposed cell with a value that differs from the the Scheduled value will follow the usual way described in Rule 1.

Proposed (P)

This column is editable on the Resource Plan to allow the user to request hours (or FTE, or %capacity) on specific resources to the Resource Manager.

More details about how to request resources in the next section below.

Committed (C)

This column is read-only in the Resource Plan. The committed values are entered by the Resource Manager in the Resource Demand based on the Resource Request you may have submit in previously (Proposed). This is more detailed here..

Note that we will show the column automatically, if not explicitly hidden previously for the project, if there are any committed hours in the visible periods.

Entry Mode

For more information on Entry Mode please see here.

Create Resource Plan from Schedule

The Create Plan from Schedule feature allows you to quickly create a Resource Plan for your project and is a great tool to help streamline your project planning.

The Create Plan from Schedule feature imports assignment information from Altus Tasks into the Resource Plan therefore creating a resource plan that mirrors the project schedule.

When you use the Create Plan from Schedule feature:

• As Altus Tasks do not contain time phased scheduling, the data displayed in your Resource Plan is synthetically time-phased, by taking the Start, Finish and Duration of the task and spreading the total effort within that period based on the resource's Units (%) assignment to the task.
• If multiple resources are assigned to a task their Units (%) assignment on the task determines how much of the total task effort gets assigned to the resource.
• The data from your Tasks are aggregated for each resource. So, if you have the one resource assigned to multiple tasks it will only create one row per resource on your Resource Plan, which displays a sum of the task’s efforts.
• As a resource’s calendar exceptions are not taken into consideration in the Tasks assignment data these are also not included as part of the synthetic time-phased data. Only weekends are excluded unless tasks have been specifically scheduled on the weekend.

The Create Plan from Schedule functionality is intended to be used as a once-off starting point for creating the Project’s Resource Plan, not as an ongoing process to keep your Tasks assignments and Resource Plan aligned. Each time you use this feature it will attempt to create new Resource Plan data.

• If there is existing Resource Plan data in a draft or proposed state, then the user will be prompted to confirm if they wish to overwrite that data.
• If there is existing Resource Plan data in a committed state, then the user will be required to manually delete that data first.
• If none of your Tasks have a resource assigned to them, when you click Create Plan from Schedule you will be prompted with a message that there is no data to build the resource plan from.

Note

This functionality will only work for Project Schedules that have the data within them to create the Resource Plan. The fields that are required to be filled in on a task are:

• Start Date
• End/Finish Date
• Effort
• Duration
• An Altus Resource Assigned to the task

If these fields are not available and Altus cannot create any Resource Plan data users will see the following message:

Note

If you are using Microsoft Project (Altus for Project), you may have a "No Resource Information" pop-up message when creating a Resource Plan from Schedule for the following reasons:

• The MPP file is stored in OneDrive and our API cannot access the file to retrieve the resources. If so, the solution is to save your MPP file on your local drive and Publish again from Altus for Project add-on.
• The resources in the MPP file haven't been mapped to Altus resources. If so, the solution is to use the "Build Team" function in Altus for Project add-on. More details on how to use Built Team feature here.

To use this feature:

1. Create your project schedule in Altus with tasks and Altus resource assignments. More information on this process can be found here for Altus Tasks or here for Microsoft Project (Altus for Project) schedules.
2. Navigate to the Project’s Resource Plan.
3. From the Data menu, select Create Plan from Schedule. This will populate the Resource Plan for each Resource identified with task assignment data for that Project, at the Day level.

If you want to make changes to the data that has been imported into the Resource Plan due to a resource’s availability, etc, you should go back to the Project’s Tasks and update the data there and then use the Create Plan from Schedule feature again to keep both your task assignments and resource requests aligned.
You can also, update only your Resource Plan if needed you do not need to keep using the Create Plan from Schedule feature once you use it initially.

Note

If you are using Microsoft Project (Altus for Project) the data that will be copied to your Resource Plan will look exactly like your Resource Assignments in Microsoft Project. As Altus Tasks does not contain the same level of resource assignment details, your assignments within your Altus Tasks may look a little different.

Videos

Resource Plan Scheduled Column Explained

Resource Plan Creation

Resource Plan Creation when there are no Resource Assignments

Resource Plan Creation when Plan contains Committed Values

Resource Plan Creation from An Altus project linked to a Microsoft Project schedule

Requesting a Resource

Any proposed hours entered on the resource plan will be stored as “draft” until the request is submitted. Only submitted values will be visible to the Resource Manager in the Resource Demand.

Entering a value in Proposed cell will follow specific rules on how it cascades down to the periods below. For instance, entering a value at the month level, will follow a specific rule on how it will enter it at each day level (and so weeks). Please read through Rule 1 and Rule 6 to understand how the values cascade down depending on the data available in the grid.

Click to copy

• Availability to Proposed: clicking on the Availability value cell where proposed is editable, will copy the Availability value to the proposed cell.
• Scheduled to Proposed: clicking on the scheduled value where proposed is editable will copy the scheduled value to the proposed cell.
• Committed to Proposed: clicking on the committed value where proposed is editable will copy the committed value to the proposed cell.