RESOURCE MANAGEMENT WITHOUT SLOW EXCEL PROCESSES

The task

Desire for better overview and organisation of resources

For many companies, the planning of resources – regardless of whether it is workforce, material or production capacity – is a time-consuming task, which is often dominated by slow work processes in Excel. In this case, our client had a desire to become keener about resource consumption in one of the development departments.

The company, which through the decades has developed and produced for a global B2C-market, "had need for creating more clarity about what we use our time on, and to become better at planning and prioritising future projects from a resource angle", says the Senior Project Manager responsible for the project.

Rather than running in a slow manual set-up in Excel, there was focus on creating a flexible and user-friendly data model which ensured an easily accessible and fast overview of the draw on resources with a view to disposition of resources – and which at the same time contained the possibility for a good graphic presentation of data.

The solution

Database set-up with opportunity for simulation

exacto has delivered a resource management and planning model in Excel with an attached database. That means data is updated in only one place, which ensures greater user-friendliness and eliminates manual errors. Also, speed is one of the many advantages of running in a database environment rather than in a pure Excel set-up.

Due to the improved data structure, it is even easy to add new projects and staff members into the solution. The users can easily retrieve specific data which may be relevant for them – for example, a total overview of resource consumption by the individual employee, the individual team or the entire department.

As for the most important functionalities of the solution, the customer highlights that data can be presented in graphic reports. And that has made it "far easier to report and communicate both 'up' and 'down' in the organisation", says the Senior Project Manager.

Also emphasised are the scenario reports with the opportunity to simulate for various scenarios. In the new solution, time actually consumed can be imported and compared with the estimate, which is an important factor in connection with the preparation of new and more-accurate estimates.

The result

Increased clarity about resources optimises the planning

To the question of what the new solution has meant for employees as well as management, the client answers:

"It has helped us to create an overview and help each other to focus on that we must not be spread out too thinly over the projects. And it has become easier to make visible places where there may be a lack of resources, etc."

The planning process is no longer time-consuming and manual, because it has become easy to form a quick overview of the historical resource consumption and make a plan for future disposition of resources. Time has been freed up to analyse and optimise the resource consumption rather than using the time to box around in Excel.

Overall, the solution contributes to an optimisation of the business, because it "increases clarity, and more structure has come about regarding which/how many tasks/projects we have the capacity to carry out", concludes the Senior Project Manager.