Assigning Resources to Tasks! Some Tips and Tricks!

 

Hi,

Today I will show how can you add and assign a Resource at the same time in MS PROJECT 2010, how can you find a right Resource from a very long list of resource, and finally, how can you pick a resource by their availability

If you are assigning Resource to the Task, and you don’t have that Resource in your Resource sheet, you can do it during assigning. Remember that Let’s say that we have two resources, Ann Smith and John Dow. We are assigning resources to the Read the article Task, and we found out that we need Ann Smith, and John Wayne, and the pair of Glasses, as Material Resources. Firs I will assign Ann Smith:

Now In the First blank row I will type John Wayne and press TAB key and I will get:

Since I can not fill in this form all necessary details I will double click on John Wayne (or any other field in this row), and I will get:

On the General Tab I can fill information shown on the picture above. In the Costs Tab I can fill Standard and Overtime Rate:

and finally, on the Notes Tab I can put some notes:

Now I will assign John Wayne to the Task, and I will get:

For the Glasses, the procedure is the same, and the only difference is that I have to mark it as a Material Resource:

 

Now suppose that you have a long list of Resources (hundreds of it). It will be very difficult and complicated to choose the right one, and it will be very easy to make a mistake. Suppose that this is list of your resources:

If I need, for example, only Material Resources for my Read the article Task, I will apply the filter:

and I will get:

As you can see, I get only the Material Resources. That was easy. But, what If I want to choose only Resources from Marketing department. And this is written in the Group field.

I will also apply a filter, but it is not on my list:

Whenever you see tree dots (like Group…), you will have to enter the selection criteria. So, after I applied the Group filter I will get:

and after that I will get:

I’ve got all the Resources fro Marketing department. Do not forget to turn of the filter in your assignment if you want to see all resources, or apply All Resource filter:

Now suppose that I have those resource for the project:

I will assign Ann Smith with 25%, and John Dow with 75% to the Read the article Task:

If I assign them to the Paint the wall Task with their max units (Ann has 50%, and John 100%) they will become over allocated. Now suppose that for the Paint the wall I need a resource who is available 3 days. Of course, I can first apply filter (with, for example, PAINTERS code), and then find resource by their availability. But for this example, let’s say that I want to find out who is available for 3 days from all of my resources:

I will put 3d in that field, and I will get:

As you already know, only John Wayne is available for 3 days.

 

Until my next post,

 

Best Regards!