My question is about capacity vs. demand. I have about 20 projects that need resources from several functional areas. The resources are not dedicated to projects; they have regular duties in their own departments, but can be assigned as project requests arise. The trouble is that I don't know how many hours per month or week I can count on to schedule for these projects so that I can prioritize the projects based on resource availably. How do you gather the information from the functional areas? Is it as simple as asking for a number of commitment hours and then tracking that on some sort of software? Saving Changes...
I find it a lot more successful to provide a proposal and ask for their commitment rather than ask how much they think they can afford. You are more likely to meet your plan if you own the plan, even when you have to negotiate or get less than you asked for.
Think of it like sales. Go in with your own plan showing what you can do by an end date based on the expected work, and of course the value proposition. In the same way, rather than give my stakeholders 3 options for a solution and asking them to pick, I will provide (pitch) them my analysis (sales speech) why one is best.
Sometimes I can get that time commitment verbally from senior leaders when I present at whatever leadership review is involved for approval of my plan (or their boss commits on their behalf). Documenting it in a charter is a more formal way to have written formal authority from the necessary stakeholders. Saving Changes...
GORAKHANATH WANKHEDEProject Manager| Bharat Electronics LimitedBengaluru, Karnataka, India
It is always a challenge to get resources assigned/allotted from a functional organization setup, for simultaneous demand on multiple projects..
As you have about 20 projects, you should also be having list of major WBS elements for each one of them. In a Project Management Software Tool ( like MS Projects), list down each project header at say Level-1 and sub-tasks of each one at Level-2 of each of these Level-1 project headers.
Based on Project completion schedules, you have end date for each project. Now, you can prioritize for which project to demand which resource/skill at what time..Provide this demand to respective functional manager & let him/her fill in resource names.
There would be instances when same resource is listed against different projects with overlapping schedules..Then it would be discussion between you and functional manager, to re-plan the resource to meet schedule of most important project among 20 projects..
I understand that it is very easy to jot down steps but practical implementation will bring many challenges..All the best Saving Changes...
Depends on the estimation and planning approach used. If it is a bottom-up approach based on a detailed breakdown of the work, then you would approach each functional manager to have them or one of their team members estimate the required work effort for their activities and then roll that up by week, month or whatever level of granularity was needed to help the functional manager balance demands on their team.
If it is a top-down approach, then you'd need to give them an understanding of the lifecycle approach for the project and where their staff utilization is likely to be and the nature of the activities so they can provide a rough estimate (e.g. percentage by phase or by time period).
Ideally, each manager will have provided someone from their team to help in defining the scope of work and in sequencing the activities so they would have bought in to the project approach already.
It is a common challenge in OPM.
I think you should have an estimate of the required resources for each project as well as a time budget for each resource. Gathering this information and getting organizational managers to allocate a % of their resources to project tasks could be time-consuming and hectic. Saving Changes...
Latha Thamma reddiSr Product and Portfolio Management (Automation Innovation)| DXC TechnologyMckinney, Tx, United States
