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Categories: resources
“Far too often we see highly skilled team members deployed to the wrong projects,” said Dan Lefsky at PMI Global Congress EMEA in Barcelona. He gave an interesting presentation about resource management and here are my takeaways.
Uncover the Unspoken Calendar
The resource calendar on your project management tool probably has all the national holidays built in, but what about the unspoken dates? Lefsky explained that events like the World Cup (in any sport), the concept of siesta and other cultural events can totally throw out your work schedule. I’ve seen this first hand in a company that installed additional TVs so that workers could keep one eye on the football when they were in the office.
He also gave the example of August in France as a time when most things close down. You’d be hard pressed to get project team members to do additional hours (or any hours) when the country goes on holiday. I’ve seen that first hand too, as has he, as he currently lives in Paris where I used to live.
Manage Resource Risk
Not all resources work out. Lefsky explained that you should know the failure rates of your resources.
Another resource risk is that of availability. Have you really scheduled them at 100%? Don’t make that error. Even scheduling at 80% can be optimistic if they have day jobs and it gets even worse if their daily responsibilities change during the life of a project. Suddenly a key resource is being pulled on to other tasks and there’s nothing you can do about it. So plan for that risk if you can.
He also suggested taking into account strikes and other labour events, or at least being aware that they could present a risk to your project. They have certainly affected me when in worked in France and affected colleagues in other countries.
Finally, the weather can present a resource risk. In these days of virtual working you might be surprised that projects and businesses can grind to a halt when there’s a bit of snow, but often work does involve someone or some equipment travelling somewhere at some time. If that coincides with a weather event then you can quickly fall behind your baselined schedule.
Manage Demand
Lefsky said that it’s important to start looking at demand management. Look at what is coming into the project pipeline and what is likely to be approved, alongside what has been currently approved and what has been approved but is not yet started.
Putting this in your model can help you longer term. You are building out solid teams who want to come to work, and you can do that more effectively if you know what projects are coming up. “Ultimately,” he said, “you are building teams who need to deliver.”
Demand management is all about looking at the strategic alignment between resource acquisition and getting them into the right place at the right time.
He talked about having an enterprise resource pool with both named and generic resources to help identify the skills available and match them to upcoming demand.
Be Best In Class
Or at least understand what best in class looks like. Lefsky explained that best in class resource management functions have these features:
- Notifications and alerts
- Staffing algorithms
- Diversified data collection
- Real-time metrics.
With all of this information you can start to build economic models based on variables that help you identify what your resource needs will be in an economy with weak growth, strong growth or somewhere in between.
“A big piece of this is trying to move the process along more quickly without being able to change the structure of the organisation,” he said.
That’s an understatement! It’s fine to start with some of his simpler ideas, but getting to the economic models part is going to take some organisational commitment at a senior level.
Either way, it was an interesting and useful presentation that explained how teams can be more effective at managing their resources and the resource demand.
What are your current challenges with resources? Does anything here help you start to address them? Let us know in the blog comments.
Posted on: June 03, 2016 12:00 AM |
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