Establish resource management process

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Assign project resources for the project and hold a kick-off meeting.

Resource management
Resource management is a key element to activity resource estimating and project resource management. Both are essential components of a comprehensive project management plan to execute and monitor a project successfully. As is the case with the larger discipline of project management, there are resource management software tools available that automate and assist the process of resource allocation.

One resource management technique is resource levelling. It aims at smoothing the stock of resources on hand, reducing both excess inventories and shortages.

The required data are: the demands for various resources, forecast by time period into the future as far as is reasonable, as well as the resources’ configurations required in those demands, and the supply of the resources, again forecast by time period into the future as far as is reasonable.

The goal is to achieve 100% utilization but that is very unlikely, when weighted by important metrics and subject to constraints, for example: meeting a minimum service level, but otherwise minimizing cost. The principle is to invest in resources as stored capabilities, then unleash the capabilities as demanded.

A dimension of resource development is included in resource management by which investment in resources can be retained by a smaller additional investment to develop a new capability that is demanded, at a lower investment than disposing of the current resource and replacing it with another that has the demanded capability.

Tasks

  1. Identify key resources and assign them to the project.
  2. Initiate resource request process to identify and on-board required resources, as per the initial resource plan.
  3. Establish project team member roles and responsibilities.
  4. Start the resource cost forecast process.

Hints and tips

  • For a large IT room migration project, ramp-up of resources will take several weeks so start early with the process.
  • Core team members will be in high-demand and not necessarily available in line with the IT room migration project needs so plan for this and identify key personnel early.
  • Contractors will be required for SME skills. Engage the necessary resource deployment managers and be prepared to sift resume’s and schedule interview. For speeding up the process and not facing too much delay, hold telephone interviews.

Activity output

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