Chapter 7: Resource Manager – Staffing for Success!

In the previous chapter, we learned the foundational concepts of resourcing through the experience of the practice manager.

In this chapter, we are going to bring these foundational concepts to a centralized model and identify how a resource manager (and the Resource Management Offices) (RMOs) can create a schedule more effectively. As a result, you will be able to work with the Schedule board to optimize scheduling.

Therefore, in this chapter, you will learn about the following concepts:

• Staffing projects for success
• Generating bookings
• Maximizing the Schedule board
• Resource utilization management

By the end of this chapter, you will be able to lead the RMO and its function to improve the overall staffing and efficiency of a project's execution.

Technical requirements

To perform the tasks in this chapter, you will need the following:

• An Microsoft 365 account and an Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) login
• A Microsoft Dynamics 365 Project Operations Customer Relationship Management (CRM) license
• A Microsoft Project Plan license
• A Resource Manager security role

Please visit the following link to check the CiA videos: https://bit.ly/3abRHw7

Staffing projects for success

As a resource manager or a member of the RMO, it is your priority to match the right team members to the right projects and tasks. You are responsible for forming project teams with the proper skills to meet project demands. In this section, we will learn to build a team to take us on a path to success. We will begin with generic resources.

Generic resources

To perform this function, you will generally begin with a project that has been constructed with generic resources, representing the roles needed in a project.

Our work breakdown structure (WBS) has tasks assigned to the generic resources that represent the types of roles we want on our project. These also show up in the Teams tab on the Project form in Project Operations.

For example, in our project, we are implementing Project Operations at 123 Architects, and therefore we need to have Dynamics 365-qualified team members working on the project. In addition, we need to have an admin available...

Generating bookings

Generating bookings is an efficient way of assigning work to team members to benefit the time entry of these team members.

Bookings relate to the core assignment of a team member to a project, a task, and a timeline. Bookings have a variety of booking statuses and allocation methods that drive bookings for a team member.

Bookings are important since they are most likely going to be the basis of many management decisions. Some of the decisions may include the following:

• What is our forecasted utilization?
• Do we have enough team members to meet the demand of our clients?
• Do we have team members who are underutilized?
• What is our finance forecast based on bookings?
• What other constraints do we have in our business?
• How are our team members performing against their bookings?
• Are team members working the assigned number of hours?

There is also the potential to book directly from the Bookings screen. Let's take a look...

Maximizing the Schedule board

As we begin talking about the Schedule board, let's first understand what the Schedule board is and what it does. The Unified Schedule Board, as it is sometimes called, is a resource that is used extensively across both the Field Service and Project Operations solutions. The Schedule board has these dual functions, but for the purposes of this chapter and book, we will focus only on the scheduling of resources to projects.

To begin with, we will look at the Schedule board and its various elements. A key thing to know about the Schedule board is that it is configurable, meaning that you can make it look the way you want through the settings. It is also customizable, meaning that you can extend it through additional fields. It also has a variety of areas that we will point out in the following overview.

The following screenshot shows the Schedule board with the Weekly view default setting:

Figure 7.10 – The Schedule...

Resource utilization management

As is the case with many services companies, team members are sometimes overbooked. The following screenshot shows how Louisa Hernandez has been overbooked for the first 3 weeks of the month of March:

Figure 7.14 – Schedule board showing an overbooking for Louisa

There are options here that resource managers know they can take advantage of, including moving the work to Ruvika Marisamy, who has some availability during the required timeframe. Furthermore, this work can be pushed out to the month of May to enable Louisa Hernandez to be the assigned team member, as shown in the following screenshot (with the Schedule board, this is a drag and drop of the booking to the new date):

Figure 7.15 – Schedule board showing the booking reassigned for May

From a 30,000-foot view, a resource manager can see the overall usage of their resources, open requirements, and team availability in one screen&...

Summary

In this chapter, we built upon the preceding knowledge of finding the right team members to staff our projects. This is important since this will drive the success of projects, productivity of the team, and profitability of the company.

When staffing projects, we learned how important roles are to the overall staffing model. We built upon that by identifying specific patterns of scheduling and adding specifics to each requirement. The value of this is to improve communication for the people responsible for scheduling.

We then were able to generate requirements and submit requests to be processed through the Schedule board. This provides a company with the management tools to keep team members assigned to the right tasks.

Building upon the concepts of booking types, statuses, and allocation methods, we reviewed how to maximize the Schedule board and improve the overall productivity of a company.

As we enter into Chapter 8, Managing a Project to Success, we will see...

Questions

1. A generic resource is a role that provides which function in the Project Operations system?
2. Generic resources are utilized in the WBS or ____________ _____________ __________ to define the required hours per team member type.
3. What is the function that allows you to outline the specific hours per week or day a team member role is needed?
4. True or False: Generating requirements shows the requirement on the Schedule board.
5. What is the purpose of resource requests?
6. True or False: Resource Requirement—additional details do not filter through to the resource requirement.
7. True or False: From the Team tab on a project, using the Book button you can book a resource directly.
8. Hard and soft bookings drive which function within the resourcing of team members?
9. Which three allocation methods may result in overbookings?
10. Where can a resource manager view a 30,000-foot view of resource utilization?