After reading this article you will learn about resource scheduling and its types.
A resource is defined by the physical variable such as manpower (labour), finance equipment, size etc. The completion of any profit on the scheduled date depends on the availability of resources at due times at all stages of progress.
When resources such as men, material, machine, money etc. are limited and conflicting demands are made for the same type of resources, scheduling of resources systematic manner becomes essential.
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Otherwise it may lead to high idle time and ultimately increases the project cost. The object of resource scheduling is two-fold, it aims at bringing down the costs and at the same time reduces the pressure on limited resources in conflicting demands.
Depending upon the type of constraint involved, the resource scheduling many be of two types:
1. Resource Smoothening:
The analysis aiming to reduce peak demand for resources and reallocate among activities of a project in a manner so that the total project duration remains shortest is known as resource smoothing (or loading).
The process of carrying out resource smoothing can be summarised in the following steps:
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1. Calculate the earliest start and latest finish times of each activity and then draw a time scaled version (or squared) of the network. In this network critical path is drawn along a straight line and non-critical activities on both sides of this line. Resource requirement of each activity is given along the arrow.
2. Draw the resource histogram by taking earliest start times or latest start times of activities on the x-axis and cumulative resources required on y-axis.
3. Shift start times of non-critical activities first having largest float in order to smoothen the resource.
2. Resource Leveling:
Network, in general, serves the purposes of scheduling and control during the course of the project. The scheduling via resource allocation is aimed at bringing down the costs and at the same time reduces pressure on the limited resources.
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When the demands on certain specified resources are required not to go beyond the specified level and the duration of the project is not treated as invariant, then the process is known as ‘resource leveling’.
In resource leveling two types or problem are involved in general:
(a) Leveling resource demands with constraints on the total project duration time.
(b) Minimization of the project duration time with a constraint on the total availability of certain key resources.