10 Allocating and Managing Constrained Resources
Limitless material resources are not only unavailable most of the time, they may actually be a hindrance. And remaining lean and mean can often be a blessing.
—Michael Gibbert, Martin Hoegl, and Liisa Välikangas (In Praise of Resource Constraints 2007)
Objectives
After reading this lesson, you will be able to
- Discuss basic concepts related to resource management, including over-commitment and over-allocation
- Explain some geometric-order resource optimization techniques, including resource leveling, resource smoothing, and the critical chain approach
- Describe challenges related to resource allocation in Agile
- Discuss ideas related to sustainability and the triple bottom line
- Identify issues affecting resource management at the portfolio level
- List some advantages of resources constraints
- You have to have the right resources at the right time. This involves staying flexible and making changes as necessary, rather than hewing to a predefined structure that might not be useful as conditions change.
- Constraints on resources are inevitable, but by combining geometric-order techniques such as resource leveling and resource smoothing with an adaptive, living order approach, you can prevent project crises.
- Project managers have to look outside their projects to find the resources they need. Somehow, within their organizations, they have to secure the resources they need. Meanwhile, on the portfolio-level, executives have to manage resources to ensure that they are available for many projects over the long term.
10.1 Managing Resources in Living Order
The most detailed schedules and budgets in the world are useless if you don’t have the people, equipment, facilities, and other resources you need, when you need them. In reality, the schedule is only determined after the resources have been assigned. In other words, until you have assigned and committed resources, your project schedule and budget are not fully realized. They are based on assumptions, which are a huge source of uncertainty. This is especially true in the IT world, where productivity can vary so much from one person to another. You can’t really have a clear idea of how fast your team can work until you know who’s on the team.
Acquiring project resources usually involves looking outside the boundaries of the project itself to find what you need. In the early stages, that includes finding the right people for your project team. Inevitably, you will face restrictions on the resources available to you. And yet, to complete a project successfully, you have to figure out how to get the resources you need—people, office space, Internet bandwidth, computer, copper wire, shingles, 3-D modeling equipment, concrete, and so on—when you need them.
That’s why understanding the principles of resource allocation is so essential to successful project management. Most definitions of “resource allocation” describe it as something that takes place