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CHAPTER THREE

Project Management: Resource Scheduling

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Introduction
The resources used in a project are subject to varying demands and loadings as the project proceeds. Management needs to know what activities and what resources are critical to the project duration. They also wish to have constant work rates to eliminate paying overtime at one stage and having short time working at another. The end product of network calculations is the time chart. This chart can be converted easily into a calendar schedule for the project. Here, we will consider the Resource Scheduling Chart. Basically, there are two types of resources, manpower (or equipments) and costs (or materials). The size of manpower allocated for an activity remains the same over the activitys duration, whereas the cost for an activity should be allocated evenly over the duration, and it is assumed that the costs accrue at a constant rate over the activitys duration. It is also assumed that once an activity has been started it is worked on continuously until it is completed.
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Resource Scheduling Chart

Resource-scheduling chart is similar to the traditional Gantt chart but has the advantages of depicting sequencing restrictions (theist vertical bars) and total floats (slack times) on activities (dashed horizontal lines). First consider the scheduling of the critical activities. Next, the non-critical activities are considered by indicating their EST & LFT limits on the chart. The critical activities are shown with solid lines. The time ranges for the non-critical activities and the slack times are shown by normal lines & dashed lines, respectively, indicating that such activities may be scheduled within those ranges provided that the precedence relationships are not violated. The numbers shown underneath the activities represent their durations. The resource allocation for each time unit, with the assumption that all activities start at their earliest, is shown in the lower half of the chart.

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Example
Consider the project management problem in Example 5.2. The manpower requirement for each activity is given.

Activity A B C D E F G H I J K L

Precedence C C B B D, F A I E G, H, J

Duration (weeks) 2 2 1 3 2 1 2 2 2 4 2 2

Manpower 2 2 2 2 1 3 2 4 3 2 2 4
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Example
Network Diagram

(1, 3) 4

E D 2
5 (4, 6)

(3, 8) 7

C
(0, 0) 1 Begin

3 1
(2, 5) F

K
(8, 8) 8

B 2 A 2

H G 2 2

2 L 2

(10, 10) 9 Finish

(2, 2) 2

J
(4, 4)

I 2

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Example
Resource Scheduling Chart The accumulation for manpower is shown in the lower half. The upper half shows a graphical construction of the network on a time scale. The maximum number of men is 11 (week 3), same as using Earliest Time Gantt Chart.
E (1) C (2) D (2) F (3) B (2) G (2) I (3) J (2) L (4) K (2) H (4)

A (2) 12 Resource units (men) 10 8 6 4 2 0 1 2

5 6 Time (weeks)

10
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Resource Leveling
Objectives: 1. To contain overall resource requirements within prescribed limits over the project's life. This may mean that the project duration set by the time analysis (critical path) can no longer be met. 2. To maintain a steady level of resource usage over all or part of the project's life. 3. To build up or run down resource usage in some prescribed manner. Resource leveling (or rescheduling) can be performed easily using the resource-scheduling chart since the most important component for rescheduling, the total floats, can be seen clearly on the chart. Consider the resource-scheduling chart shown earlier. Perform a resource leveling to reduce the number of men required in week 3 (11 men). Try to reschedule the weekly numbers of men required for whole project duration as consistent as possible.
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Resource Leveling
Since the minimum number of men required (2) occurs in weeks 7 and 8, shift activities E and K to weeks 7 and 9, respectively (using total float). Then shift activities F, G and H to weeks 4, 5, and 7, respectively. Hence, the maximum number of men required is reduced to 7 (weeks 7 and 8).
E (1) C (2) D (2) F (3) B (2) G (2) I (3) J (2) L (4) K (2) H (4)

A (2) Resource units (men)

8 6 4 2 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 Time (weeks) 7 8 9 10

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