This reference describes task resourcing within a project. A budget estimate, a staff assignment, a scheduled allocation and a time entry are separate records of the work.
Views
View | Contents |
Work Breakdown | Deliverables, tasks and their resource entries. A resource entry identifies a role and, when assigned, a person. |
Staff Timeline | Work shown against staff members over time. Weeks and Days change the timeline scale. |
Work tab | The project’s task list, assignments, status and resource information. |
Resource terms
Term | Definition |
Resource requirement | The type and amount of resource needed for a task. A role can be specified before a particular person is assigned. |
Staff assignment | The person associated with the task or resource requirement. Assignment alone does not reserve hours in a particular week. |
Budgeted hours | The estimated hours in the task’s resource budget. They may come from a converted proposal or be entered in the project budget. |
Planned or allocated hours | Hours scheduled for the work over particular dates or weeks. |
Actual hours | Time logged against the task. Actual time can exist even when no scheduled allocation was created. |
Unallocated requirement | Required work that still needs scheduling or staff allocation. Interpret it alongside the task’s estimates, existing plan and actual work. |
Reading differences
Budgeted, planned and actual hours can differ. A difference can represent work that has not yet been scheduled, a revised plan or time recorded outside the original estimate. It is not automatically spare capacity or a budget saving.
A resource entry can show actual time with no original budgeted hours. This makes unbudgeted work visible rather than silently adding it to the original estimate.
Scheduling and capacity
Staff Timeline displays when work is planned. Naming someone on a task is not the same as scheduling them. Capacity also depends on their work schedule and other commitments.
Requirements can be spread across more than one week. A task called “Meeting” is still a task; its name does not create a separate resource type or guarantee an even weekly schedule.