Typically, after administrative tasks like group meetings, training, and general housekeeping, a full-time employee will dedicate 80% of their time to a project. If a typical work week is 40 hours, then one full-time employee will change approximately 32 hours to a project per week. That is how you calculate how many actual people it takes to complete tasks of an estimated duration. Saving Changes...
George FreemanThought Leader | Author | Architect| Florida, United States
Marcelo,
I’ll take this in a different direction than Keith to make sure we cover the bases.
Using FTE (full-time equivalent) numbers in project initiation documents, steering committee communications, etc., is a fantastic way to improve transparency as it communicates resource-based budgetary requirements in a common-sense fashion, allowing all parties to understand the estimated resource burden of a project in the context of a full-time employee/contractor working for a solid year on an effort.
Here’s an example of a simple resource plan using FTE numbers:
If you add up the FTE numbers, you will see that they total 1, providing management with a clear understanding that this 3-month project will burn the equivalent of one human resource over a given year.
In the resource plan, you would estimate resource cost by calculating an average salary (plus benefits) for the different roles and then factor out a cost. However, many organizations will apply a single average salary across all resource types as they do not want to expose those details.
FTE numbers are generalized estimates, so round them to your organization's preference.
