Question

Resource Loading and Leveling

Concept 1) The typical resource managed in most projects is people’s time. Additional resources that may need to be considered are:

• Machine time/capacity – Does the project require time on a specific machine, particularly one that is a scarce resource?
• Facility availability – Are facilities physically large enough to serve the needs of the project? In labor-intensive projects this could be the facility of office space including desks, chairs, phones, and computers.
• Transportation – Some projects, such as a major demolition or a large convention, may put unusual strains on the transportation capacity of an area.

Concept 2 )   Resource loading is the level of demand placed upon individual resources during a specific time interval in a project schedule.

Concept 3)  Resource leveling seeks to minimize fluctuations in the resource demand created by a project.

Concept 4) The activity slope, associated with “crashing” a project, identifies the trade-off between time and money when duration is reduced to expedite a project. Generally, the cost to perform an activity goes up as its duration is reduced.

Why is it important for a project manager to resource load their project schedule? What problems may arise if a project manager does not resource load their project schedule?

Your comments should be supported by research that you reference at the bottom of your post

Answer 1

Resource loading generally states the amount of individual resource that is required by existing schedule in a particular time.

It is important for a project manager to resource load their project schedule for following reasons:

• It ensures that someone is directly responsible for assigned responsibility on the project schedule.
• It also holds importance in workload management for determining how many activities a team member can individually work on.
• Resource load information loaded into project schedule allows project manager to perform several types of analysis.
• It enables manager to load specific types of equipment and labor by discipline.
• It helps project manager to identify and eliminate many unwanted factors during the planning stages.
• By executing it properly project manager can reduce the overall project schedule without increasing resources

Problems that may arise if a project manager does not resource load their project schedule are as follows:

• Unexpected issues may arise if resource load is not done.
• Over allocation can occur if project managers fail to resource load their project.
• Under allocation of resource can occur.

Reference:

• William Bow, PMP & Bruce Taylor; 2008; Project Management Communications; Wiley Publishing Inc.; Indiana.
• Kathy Schwalbe; 2007; Introduction to Project Management, Second Edition; Course Technology Cengage Learning, Boston, USA.