Company Planning Board - Add new items

Planning at a project level keeps the resource management views at a high level plan. This allows you to create a plan for staff to work on the project, before the Sub Projects or Work Breakdown items have been setup.

The disadvantage of using this planning method is that the hours included in the planned appointment are not shown in the project budget reports. This is because the budget is created at a Sub Project and Work Breakdown item level. When items are planned for the project level the link to the work breakdown budget item is lost, and therefore the hours planned are not shown in the scheduled column on the Planning Board or Work Breakdown tab of the Project.

Schedule items at a project level by:

1. Select the date for the appointment in the calendar, to ensure the correct month is shown in the planning board.
2. Change the display option to 'By Project'.
3. Locate the project in the Projects to Schedule panel.
4. Drag the project row onto the planning board for the date/time the work is to be completed.
5. Extend the project appointment to run for more/less than the default 4 hours by:
   1. Dragging the appointment across multiple dates/times in the planning board.
   2. Or double click the appointment and edit the start and end time fields.
6. (Optional) Allocate staff to the appointment, by double clicking the appointment and selecting the staff member from the drop down list.
7. Add additional appointments to other dates that staff need to complete work for this project.

Plan the appointments at a Sub Project level if the work breakdown structure has not yet been setup to include each of the tasks required for the sub project. Planning at a Sub Project level keeps the scheduled appointments at a high level, and allows the scheduled items to be linked back to any Lump Sum budget items entered using the 'Any' rate type on the Work Breakdown tab of the Project.

The disadvantage of using this planning method is that the ability to report on the scheduled vs budgeted hours for each of the work breakdown items is not retained. The work breakdown tab can only link this scheduled appointment to a lump sum budget item, and not a work breakdown item that has been setup with a task,rate and staff member assigned.

Schedule items at a sub project level by:

1. Select the date for the appointment in the calendar, to ensure the correct month is shown in the planning board.
2. Change the display option to 'By Sub Project'.
3. Locate the project in the Projects to Schedule panel.
4. Expand the project grouping row by clicking the arrow on the left of the project name.
5. Locate the Sub Project in the list.
6. Drag the sub project row onto the planning board for the date/time the work is to be completed.
7. Extend the sub project appointment to run for more/less than the default 4 hours by:
   1. Dragging the appointment across multiple dates/times in the planning board.
   2. Or double click the appointment and edit the start and end time fields.
8. (Optional) Allocate staff to the appointment, by double clicking the appointment and selecting the staff member from the drop down list.
9. Add additional appointments to other dates that staff need to complete work for this sub project.

Plan appointment at a work breakdown item level, to allow for comparison of the budgeted hours for the item vs the total scheduled hours on the planning board. Work breakdown items allow each of the tasks to be defined for a sub project, and the time required for the task to be added to the sub project budget.

Staff can be assigned to work breakdown items to complete the work, and this will display the work in the My Schedule plugin on their My Synergy dashboard on the date(s) the appointment is planned on. If staff are assigned to the appointment it will also display as a history row in their staff timesheets on the appointment date.

Schedule items at a project level by:

1. Select the date for the appointment in the calendar, to ensure the correct month is shown in the planning board.
2. Choose any of the display options in the tool bar to view the existing tasks with either project, sub project, task, rate, or staff details shown.
3. Locate the project in the Projects to Schedule panel.
4. Expand the project by clicking the arrow to the left the project name.
5. Locate the Sub Project in the list for the appointment.
6. Expand the sub project group by clicking on the arrow to the left of the sub project name.
7. Locate the Work Breakdown item in the list.
8. Drag the work breakdown row onto the planning board for the date/time the work is to be completed.
9. Extend the work breakdown appointment to run for more/less than the default 4 hours by:
   1. Dragging the appointment across multiple dates/times in the planning board.
   2. Or double click the appointment and edit the start and end time fields.
10. (Optional) If the work breakdown item displays the text 'Any Staff' in the projects to schedule panel, then add a staff member to the appointment by double clicking the appointment and selecting a staff member from the drop down list.
11. Add additional appointments to other dates that staff need to complete work for any work breakdown items for this project.

Before adding work breakdown items to the planning board, it is important to check how many hours have been allowed for item in the project budget. When scheduling the appointment for staff to complete this work, check that the budgeted hours will not be exceeded by adding the new appointment.

Example

The budgeted hours for the 'checking' task on the Design and Documentation sub project is 3 hours. This can be seen in the projects to schedule panel when viewing the work breakdown item. After the appointment is added to the planning board, the duration of the appointment will default to 4 hours. Adjust the end time of the appointment to an hour earlier, to ensure the work breakdown item budget does not get over-delivered.

Click the image above to see where to check the budgeted hours for a work breakdown item.

If a work breakdown item has been marked as complete, this indicates that no further work should be scheduled on the planning board for this item. Work breakdown items are marked as complete when the hours for the sub project task have all been entered into staff timesheets. This indicator is shown next to the work breakdown item on the planning board to warn the user not to schedule this task any further. The complete indicator is assigned to the item on the Project Work Breakdown tab.

Click the image above to see work breakdown items marked as complete.

The scheduled hours are shown on each appointment on the planning board. The scheduled hours on an appointment are controlled by three factors:

1. The start and end time entered on the appointment
2. The office calendar settings override the appointment. Office calendars are used to define how many hours per day all staff are at work, and which days of the week the office is open. Learn more about office calendars.
3. The staff calendar settings override the appointment and office settings. The staff calendars are entered if the staff member works different hours to the default office hours, or works a fewer number of days per week than the office is open. Learn more about staff calendars.

Example 1 - Office calendar settings overrides the planned appointment time

The task 'drafting' for the Terrigal Beach Apartments project has been scheduled as an appointment from the 24/12 at 9AM, until 25/12 at 10PM. This is shown in the edit appointment window in the screen shot below. The office calendar has been setup for the office to operate from Monday to Friday for 8 hours a day.

The appointment in the planning board shows 16 scheduled hours. The task is scheduled for two office working days, where the maximum number of hours work in a day is 8. This setting of 8 hours to work per day are taken from the office calendar setting. The office calendar is overriding the appointment time, and this is why the appointment shows 16 hours as the planned time, rather than the 35 hours planned on the appointment.

Click the image above to view the appointment and calendar settings in the planning board.

Example 2 - Staff calendar settings override the office calendar settings

The 'design' sub project has been scheduled on the planning board. The staff member 'Sam Witch' is assigned to the work breakdown item to complete the work. Sam works part time, and is in the office from Monday to Thursday for 7 hours a day. Sam's working hours have been entered his staff calendar. The office calendar is setup to show the office open from Monday to Friday for 8 hours per day.

The appointment in the planning board shows the task scheduled from Thursday the 20th December, till Saturday the 22nd December. The scheduled hours on the item in the planning board is 7 hours. This is shown as Sam does not work on Fridays and Saturdays. The appointment is including only the 7 hours on Thursday as the time Sam has available to complete the work breakdown item work. This shows that the staff calendar settings for Sam are overriding the office calendar settings.

Click the image above to view the staff calendar settings overriding the office calendar