Workforce and Resource Allocation Planning Made Easier with WorkPAK

Workforce and resource allocation planning for events and projects ensures the workforce aligns with the goals of your events and projects for optimal performance.

Project managers and their teams develop key activities and execution plans for the contractor workforce to engage and complete their projects on time and within budget. Using software like WorkPAK helps managers meet their project and event timelines and budgets with the most optimum resources. In this comprehensive guide, we will cover essential aspects of workforce and resource planning, including crew size, duration, resource planning, dashboards, timesheets, and activity tracking with resource allocation methodology.

What is workforce and resource allocation planning in project management?

Workforce and resource allocation planning aligns workforce resources with its business project and event goals. Here are the key steps involved:

1. Analyze Past and Current Workforce Capabilities: Look back at past events and review the current event plans, assessing the team’s skills, strengths, and weaknesses to prepare for the resource evaluation process. With WorkPAK, your historical event details, such as past cost and job plans, provide a more in-depth view to prepare for your upcoming events.
2. Forecast Future Requirements: Predict the workforce needed to achieve your strategic objectives using the WorkPAK planning framework to gauge the type of resources and how many are needed.
3. Conduct Gap Analysis: Identify gaps between current and future workforce needs and apply the risk mitigation indicator (RMI). Communicate your mitigation plans, align with the project and event plans, and reduce risks to the execution plans in our all-in-one platform.
4. Formalize and Monitor the Resource Allocation Plan: Build and execute your resource allocation plans in WorkPAK and track their effectiveness using WorkPAK’s built-in business intelligence (BI) dashboards.

The Value of Workforce and Resource Allocation planning = Flexibility and Adaptability

As you plan your events, your resource allocation strategy must be flexible enough to adapt to changing scopes when projects evolve and requirements shift. Be prepared to adjust allocations when unforeseen events impact resource availability when unexpected resource availability issues arise.

Portfolio Management for Strategic vs. Operational Workforce Planning using WorkPAK

How does WorkPAK help you plan the workforce strategically and operationally?

For strategic workforce planning, focus on long-term goals (e.g., 3-5 years) and align workforce needs with the business strategy. Add longer term projects and events in WorkPAK to monitor and build the plan for the resources required to be in place.

For operational workforce planning, addresses short-term needs (e.g., quarterly, or annually) and ensure day-to-day efficiency through planning the current events and projects in our all-in-one platform.

Resource Allocation Methods:

Here are ways to prioritize and manage resources to support your events and projects using WorkPAK plans with scheduling software like Primavera P6.

• Critical Path Method (CPM): Prioritizes tasks based on their impact on project timelines. It helps optimize schedules by focusing on critical activities.
• Critical Chain Method (CCM): Considers resource limitations and multitasking. It aims to balance resource allocation while maintaining project efficiency.
• Resource Leveling: Adjusts schedules based on resource availability. It ensures that resources are allocated evenly over time.
• Resource Smoothing: Modifies resource allocation while adhering to time constraints. It prevents resource peaks and valleys.

Apply these methods above by aligning the activities planned in WorkPAK with the schedule, viewing and optimizing the resources required for execution to ensure resources meet your project requirements.

Metrics for Workforce and Resource Allocation Planning in WorkPAK:

How do you get the most out of the workforce? WorkPAK helps monitor key metrics to measure performance:

1. Crew Size: Assess the optimal team size for efficient operations. With WorkPAK, planners determine the crew sizes required to complete the tasks and then monitor daily completed the tasks with WorkPAK’s timesheet module.
2. Duration: Add estimated durations for short-term and long-term workforce needs in WorkPAK.
3. Resource Planning: Allocate resources effectively based on demand and monitor utilization and adjust as needed in WorkPAK integrated with scheduling tools like Primavera P6.
4. Dashboards: Visualize workforce data for informed decision-making using WorkPAK’s built-in and interactive business intelligence dashboards.
5. Timesheets: Accurately track employee hours and productivity daily in WorkPAK’s timesheet module.
6. Activity Tracking: Monitor tasks, projects, and performance against the current project and event plans, ensuring tasks are completed on-time.
7. Bidding Process – Preemptive view of risk avoidance due to employee turnover rate and Tenure Rate: During the bidding process, monitor the responses of your potential contractors during your procurement contractor evaluation meetings. Review how they monitor and the drivers of the percentage of employees who leave voluntarily or involuntarily over a specific period, and for tenure rate – how do they measure the average time employees stay with your organization. High tenure indicates positive retention efforts and engagement.

Here is a sample dashboard that combines some of the key metrics above into one report. The interactive and customizable WorkPAK sample dashboard below helps track resources utilized and costs expended for your portfolio year over year:

WorkPAK integrates workforce data with real-time timesheet management alongside key project and event activities, automating processes, and providing interactive insights with our built-in dashboards. Find out how WorkPAK accomplishes these tasks for your next events and projects by requesting a demo.