Managing Resources
Resources are workers, equipment and materials used for fulfilling
tasks in a project.
Evaluating resource requirements.
Having defined the subject and goals of a project and having prepared
the tasks list for developing your project, you can start planning
resources. To understand what types of resources and what amount of them
will be enough for realizing your project, follow the procedure described
below.
- Study your project object and a tasks list. It is the basic
way of defining needs for personnel, equipment and material
resources.
- Obtain data on work of resources in the past and about
duration of last projects. Collect every possible data from old project
files, databases and from people participating in similar projects. Study
the analytical information about results of previous projects. Pay special
attention to data on types and the amount of the resources involved, and
also about duration of their tasks.
- Find out, how the number of
resources is bound up with the project duration. Duration of tasks, as a
rule, depends on the amount of resources assigned. In most cases,
especially bound with tasks of an industrial nature, two resources can
accomplish a task twice faster than one resource. Precisely as the
resource sparing a task half of its working hours usually realizes it
almost twice longer than the same resource functioning a full operational
day. However, in some cases, for instance, while developing project tasks,
addition of resources cannot guarantee reducing their
duration.
- Ascertain, how capability of resources and quality of
their operation are bound up with the project duration. Duration of
majority of tasks is substantially defined by potentialities and
experience of resources assigned. For instance, a project participant
having a five-years' experience is most likely to complete his task
faster than an employee having a two-years' operational
experience.
- Scrutinize and specify evaluations of some run
duration. While gathering information about a particular project and other
similar projects, specify evaluations of duration of performance of
project tasks. Accuracy of these evaluations is closely tied with the
accuracy of estimating resource requirements.
- Define what types of
resources and what amounts of them are required for your project. Having
collected all necessary data, define types of resource requirements
(people, equipment, materials) and required amounts of resources of each
type. Note probable specific features and formulate offers concerning such
characteristics of each resource as the name of resource, qualification,
experience, facilities, quality of work, their category and
productivity.
- Show your evaluation of resource requirements to an
expert. Ask any skilled member of your project workgroup to carry out an
expert analysis of the calculated list of resource requirements and
evaluations of the project duration.
Creating Resources
Any ConceptDraw Project resource is created for the
whole project at first and then it is assigned to each specific project
task.

To create a resource:
- Click the Tools - Editing of
Resources button in the toolbar or in the Tools
menu.
The Resources dialog box appears on the screen.
It is empty. - Click the Add button. A new resource
is generated and displayed.
- Assign parameters to a new
resource:
- Name - the name of a
resource.
- Type - a resource
type.
- Cost - costs of a
resource.
- E-mail - the e-mail address of a
project participant. It is used for dispatching messages about tasks
assigned to a resource.
- Note - this parameter
indicates where any information concerning some project resource can be
filled in.
- Click OK.
Resource Types
There are two resource types - Worker and
Material - in ConceptDraw
Project.
People realizing any project are always its main
element. This factor is taken into account by introducing the parameter
Worker.
Realization of any project demands both
materials and financial expenditures. Proceeding from general provisions
of economics the material factor is included into ConceptDraw
Project by introducing an integrated Material
type combining any material expenditures in a project which are not
connected with people.
To create a resource type:
- In the
Tasks menu click the Editing of
Resources option.
The Resource Types list box
appears. - Select the required resource name and double click the
scroll-bar control in the Resource Type
line.
- Click the required resource type in the resource
list.
The Resource Type is assigned and
displayed in the typeline.

The Resource Costs Concept
The Resource Costs are the equivalent expression of
resources shown in the currency of a particular country.
There are
two types of costs in ConceptDraw Project:
- The
Relative Resource Cost, i.e., total costs of a resource
referred to 1 day of using this resource.
This type is used for
workers. - The Absolute Resource Cost is the cost
of a resource as it is, i.e. the usual cost of purchase, the bank credit,
materials, etc.
To assign a resource type:
- In the
Tasks menu click the Editing of
Resources option. The Resource types list box
appears.
- Select the required resource name and double click the
Cost line.
- Edit your costs for this
resource.
Assigning Resources to Task
To assign resources to task two variants can be used:
- Click the
Assign Resources to Task option in the
Tasks menu.
- Right-click in the Gantt
Chart window to call the shortcut.
Click the Assign
Resources to Task option in the menu.
For further actions: See Task
Information section.