How to efficiently do Hour Allocation in Workload Balancer?

[LeonhardWi1]

Hello together,

we have just introduced the Workload Balancer to help our Teamleader to allocate Hours for Tasks/Issues for 4 People.

• Issues take from Creation to Completion on average 60 - 90 Days with different Amount of Hours 
• Project Tasks have a Duration of 14 Days with 20 Hours each (I have set the 20 Hours in the Project Template).

-> That means in The Workload Planner automatically for Project tasks every Day 1.6 hours are allocated, for Issues around 0.08 Hours per Day.

How do I in a fast Way adjust Allocations to be realistic? I could go ahead and manually set

• 10 Days on 0 Hours; 4 Days on 8 Hours for Tasks 
• 55 Days on 0 Hours; 5 Days on 8 Hours for Issues

but that is very tidious Work.

Ideally I would like as a standard to have the balancer set the Hours from the last Day Backwards for as many full days as needed. I already have a global Simple Duration set, that didnt help.

Is anyone able to share their Knowledge or Experience? Thank you, Leonhard

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi @LeonhardWi1,

I am familiar with the case you are describing, and to my knowledge, Workfront's contouring features cannot be defaulted (e.g. in a Template), and are best suited for short term tasks (or Issues) given the tedious fill-the-box-typing you mentioned, especially considering that those values are automatically reset when something material changes (e.g. the amount of work required, the duration, the dates, etc.).

Given that, you might consider creating a template with two connected Tasks (and perhaps a parent Task above them) to represent the 10 days of prep (0 hrs), followed (Finish-to-Start) by the 4 days of real work (20 hrs), which might then give a more realistic rollup of the real work, within Workload Balancer. For Issues, on the other hand, since there is no comparable "sub issue", you might consider converting such Issues to Tasks, using a similar template to represent the 55 Days prep (0 hrs) and 5 Days real work (40 hrs).

When faced with something similar several years ago, we added several features to our Resource Grid solution including a "Back-fill From Completion Date" to help make it easier to do what you're after, which this video is queued up to illustrate (i.e. preserving a contour, reapplying it, then filling in the remainder, noting that if there was more than just one box, Flat, Back-Fill and Front-Fill would have then been offered).

This is an advanced area, and there are some other considerations worth discussing, so if you're interest in learning more, I'd be happy to chat further via doug.denhoed@atappstore.com

Regards,

Doug

[LeonhardWi1]

Thank you, Doug for letting me know. Is there any possiblity to Use the Hour Allocation in Workload Balancer as a Master-Tool, meaning if you write in the balancer for a Task: 4h on Tue, 6h on Wed, 8h on Thu -> Task automatically updates Planned hours inside Task to 4+6+8= 18h. Wouldnt this even a more logical Approach for multiple Situations overall summing up partial Hours, instead of splitting total hours into Days.

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi @LeonhardWi1,

Typing in Hour Allocations on Tasks (aka "Contouring", or sometimes "Shaping") is certainly an option, and compared to the "two tasks, chained" alternative I mentioned:

• allows manually entering allocation hours (e.g. daily), giving precision...but requires manually entering allocation hours, which is extra work
• one task instead of two, simplifying workplans and being less work...although depending how often you modify the duration and/or work of "either half" of the two tasks might then make such modifications easier
• historically, Workfront automatically resets such contouring (back to "flat line") when something material changes (e.g. the amount of work required, the duration, the dates, etc.)...but I would encourage you to run through some testing in case what/how you make such changes does not cause such a reset (an am interested in hearing what you learn)

Regards,

Doug