In business, we can identify several critical resources that determine the growth of your business. One of the most important is capacity, i.e., how much you can do in a given time. Such an important factor cannot be left unchecked, which is why many capacity management tools have been developed. But how to choose the best one?
In this article you will learn:
Important features when choosing a capacity planning tool
A few suggestions about best practices in the resource capacity planning process
How does resource planning software make the capacity planning process more efficient
Capacity management is not a simple task, mainly because this one factor consists of several others interacting with each other. The number of employees, their time, availability, and competencies – each of these data influences the capacity of your company. This is why capacity planning tools are important.
This isn’t easy to comprehend with just ten employees. And what about when you have 100 or 200 people in your organization? To avoid bottlenecks, chaos, and frustration, you need the support of a dedicated application – especially battlefield from each member of the resource planning process.
Balancing between available resources (employees) and project or client demands – for many, is the essence of capacity planning (or capacity management, if you like) in project management. The importance of capacity planning is a result of its strong connection with other project management areas: time, team, work, and project resource management. But let’s begin with a general question about the capacity.
Capacity is defined as the ability to achieve, store or produce. For an organization, capacity would be the ability of a given system to produce output within the specific time period.
“Ability to achieve” seems to be the essential question of capacity planning, especially if we compare it with the definitions below. Trying to give a very good, justified answer to the question “do we have an ability to achieve?” never lets up and is continuously inspiring to make optimizations, analyses, and so on. This is why capacity planning tools can be helpful.
Skills-based resources searching [Source: Teamdeck – Resource Management and Capacity Planning Tool]
To have full knowledge of whether your company or a particular employee has enough hard and soft competencies that won’t let you down – that will be defined as the “ability to achieve” – you must be pretty close to her/him.
Time spent on given tasks, availability or maturity, and expected experience in a given field – that’s a few criteria taken into account during the resource capacity planning process during which you’ll try to scope out whether a resource is a reason to think that indicated employee, or your team, or company has an “ability to achieve”, especially with capacity planning tools.
To make it harder, all we know is that we’re in the business environment. So time isn’t the one and only indicator determining your decisions. And according to our competitor – the capacity planning tool vendor – which we agree with:
Capacity planning is the management process that ensures your organization has the skills and resources it needs to complete projects on time, on budget, and to customer expectations.
This definition highlights that accurately skilled resources (employees) have to meet 3 challenges: (limited) time, (limited) budget, and client’s expectations (in other way, project demands). Or, in another way, those skills have to be good enough to help solve mentioned challenges. And the role of someone responsible for capacity planning is to ensure the accurate number of accurately skilled employees. In connectoin with, capacity planning tools are important.
Part of the capacity planning process is actually identifying what we have and how fast and where we can get accurate resources.
Capacity planning is a process that identifies whether or not you have the resources and skills to do the work, or the supply to meet the demand.
As we see, capacity management is not a simple task, mainly because this one factor consists of several others interacting with each other. The number of employees, their time, availability, productivity, utilization, and hard and soft competencies – each of these data influences the capacity of your company. This is why best capacity planning tools can help.
This is difficult to comprehend with just 5 employees. And what about when you have 15, 35, or 50 people in your organization?
Maybe it wasn’t mentioned above – the authors of this article are people from the software house. Each below-located resource capacity planning tool was checked by us – by CEOs, project managers, developers, marketers, etc. Some of them when we were part of the current company and some at previous stages of our careers.
Price: $ 3.99 / Full Member / monthly
Team’s availability team utilization overview in Teamdeck.io – resource management tool with resource capacity planning functions.
Team time tracking tool and timesheets
Resource and project scheduling
Workload Management
Project planning
Custom organization working time and availability
Ability to assign custom fields to people and projects ie job titles, skills, technologies, etc.
Transparent view of work schedule and availability for different departments, and positions using the calendar view
Custom tags
Leave management acceptance process
Automatic bank holidays for multiple localisations
Available in mobile version
Integration with other systems like Google Calendar, Slack, Podio, SageHR, Zapier, and REST API
Free trial
No feature to check recruitment processes
No workflow planning features
The mobile app to track hours does not allow to see only the active projects
Pricing: $12.5 for Resource planning + time tracking per person
Easy to use drag and drop panel
Multi-project planning
Planning of future projects
Possibility of assigning roles, departments, competencies, and status
Custom availability
Forecasting and reporting
Available in mobile version
Additional functionalities: resource scheduling, leave management system
Integration with other systems such as Jira, Teamwork, Asana, Trello
Free trial
Cons of Float project management tool
Price – $6 – $10 per person
Lack of functionality to check recruitment processes.
Float is a very recognizable project management software that also helps with resource capacity planning.
Pricing: $40 per user per month
ProjectCOR – an app for managing a team’s capacity, or resource management.
AI-based
Real-time visibility of availability per team and member
Project planning tool functions
Estimation of required competencies and time
Ability to assign roles and skills
Transparent view of project status and capacity
Centralizes information, communication, and files in one place
Other functionalities such as automated time tracking, the business intelligence panel
Free trial
No reporting
No leave management
No integrations
The UX is often the reason why some of them are rejected just after trial by project managers.
Anyone – privately and in business – use many apps. In business, depending on the job position, we use many interfaces. That makes habits. And this is a reason why a resource capacity planning tool’s functions are the source of irritation.
So take into account whether the capacity planning tool contains only really useful functions, whether the interface is understandable for anyone in a company, whether it has a high level of automation and whether it is flexible enough to respond to the specific needs of your company. And – last but not least – get to know, will the tool be still useful if your company structure or business goals will change.
In today’s business, it’s increasingly rare to have a standard working model, in the office from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. People work different hours, part-time, in different time zones.
Resource availability management is much easier with customized settings. [Screen from software for capacity planning]
These variables and settings are critical to accurately calculate the capacity, so the ideal tool must have the ability to customize the availability of every employee, and whenever is needed. It is also important for the users of capacity planning tools to be able to edit their availability and working hours whenever it changes.
Some of the capacity planning software providers have many reports to offer, but only some of them are customizable.
Companies use different metrics (capacity planning tools) for measuring the effectiveness of the business depending on the industry or company structure. Many system providers offer predefined reports, which are – we can say – an integral part of the offer…so integral that it cannot be changed or, even worse – cannot be adjusted to the expectations of project teams.
So, watch out for capacity planning tool vendors that offer reports that not only fit your expectations but also aren’t open to changes while your organization is growing. Are the reports customizable enough? Can they be shared and exported? It is easier to develop good practices in a company to find weak and strong points if you can analyze the data. An ideal tool should have rich reporting functionality.
In the case of a capacity plan, effective capacity planning and/or capacity planning strategy transparency is critical.
Access to the data using capacity planning tools should allow one to focus on a small period but also get a perspective over a wider date range. Team leaders and project managers plan the engagements of their team in relation to the skillset required but also the tentative or unconfirmed projects.
Also, the visibility of new hires and when they are joining the company and are available for work is important. The work of different departments and teams is closely connected, so the tool you choose should provide insight into all the key information. Especially the data from the sales department.
For capacity estimation, not only time and number of employees are essential, but also their competencies.
Tags management in Teamdeck.io – the capacity management software.
8 hours for a senior and 8 hours for a trainee have a completely different value in terms of work done. Similarly, when it comes to performing specific tasks – if you need graphic design, it doesn’t help that your HR Specialist just happens to have some bench-time.
To optimally plan capacity and allocate the right people to projects, you need best capacity planning tools and additional information such as skills, job titles, departments, and other tags to set everyone’s role in a project. It is also important to be able to tag each piece of information i.e. to differentiate billable and non-billable projects or track the time spent on meetings to better calculate the rates using reporting features.
Leave management feature using best capacity planning tools. One of the most common mistakes when estimating capacity is not calculating holidays and days off. In a well-managed organization, every employee is important and has an impact not only on the daily workflow but generally on project and resource workflows.
To plan your team’s workload and project workflow optimally, you need a system that takes into account different types of holidays: vacation, sick leave, maternity leave, and bank holidays (which might be different for every localization in an international institution).
Ongoing recruitment processes. Every company faces employee turnover.
This is completely normal in today’s reality, but you cannot let it paralyze your business. Capacity planning tools should take into account ongoing recruitment processes and notice periods. This way you can see at a glance how many people you have onboard ready for work, including the proper onboarding process.
Integrations. Take into account not only logos but also the potential of an API and the ability to fast integrations.
Don’t be fooled by the number of logos shining on websites. The number of new tools is still growing, so the number of logos will be growing as well. So, it doesn’t matter how many logos you see, but how fast the capacity planning software vendor is able to integrate with the new tech solution.
So, if you’re looking for integrations and for a tool that should be open for new – let’s say – connections – take into account not only logos but also API’s flexibility.
Capacity planning tools advertise themselves as one that “Optimises your workflow”, “Takes your organization to a whole new level”, and “Allows you to achieve results like never before”. These are all nice-sounding slogans, but let’s get down to business. What will capacity planning tools REALLY give you?
Thanks to capacity planing tools you will be able to see what each employee, team, and department is currently doing and how much they have to do. This will help you decide who to assign more tasks to in order not to lead to a situation when and some people will be overloaded with work and the rest will have too few responsibilities.
The situation with capacity is very dynamic. Holidays, task completion, new projects, new employees. These are very important factors influencing your work planning decisions, therefore it would be very difficult for you to do it effectively without sufficient knowledge.
The capacity planning software will send you current notifications about changes or potential bottlenecks in your company. Of course, for many capacity planners, it’s very important the resource management tool allows one to decide which notification should be turned on or turned off.
This function of capacity planing tools allows you to monitor how much time your employees spend on particular tasks, whether they have some space or, on the contrary, do overtime. This knowledge is vital for you to estimate team capacity, and decide which projects and departments need more support and who can be assigned new tasks.
Projects in each company have different priorities and deadlines. As a project manager, you surely have to decide more than once what is the most important at the moment and needs all hands on deck to fulfill the contract. The capacity planning tool will allow you to track the status of your projects and allocate resources according to your needs.
You can’t improve something or maintain good strategies by capacity planing tools if you don’t know if they are effective. And not everything can be deduced from simple observation. One of the most important functions of the capacity planning tool is to provide you with data on key metrics related to work planning. These include:
I.e. your company’s capacity vs. its needs.
I.e. how much of your organization’s potential is being used, whether any competencies or resources are missing or even too many.
I.e. predictions of how your capacity will look in the future based on the information you introduce (planned projects, upcoming events, new recruitment, etc.).
Shows which persons are assigned to a given project, their availability, position, and competencies.
We have already discussed exactly how to choose the best capacity planning tool and how they help our business. A good tool will do almost all the dirty work for you, but to get the most out of it you first need to understand the capacity planning process. We will now discuss it step by step.
The starting point for working with capacity planning tools on any process in an organization is to know what it currently looks like. Only then can you assess the strengths and weaknesses and decide what you need. Check what the capacity of your company is: how many employees you have, what their availability is, and what are their skills.
Next, you need using capacity planning tools to assess your company’s need for different resources. By comparing this factor with your capacity you can easily see which resources you are lacking. This will be crucial in planning your growth strategy.
At this stage, check whether all your company’s resources are planned most effectively. Maybe some employees have competencies that are not being used or certain processes are taking more time than they should, such as long meetings or revision sessions.
As a manager of a large company, you are not able to know and notice everything and this is perfectly normal. However, it is useful to know as much as possible, and no one can tell you as much about your company’s processes as the employees who are involved in them. Do regular 1:1 meetings and get your team’s feedback on what frustrates them, makes things difficult, wastes their time, or is inefficient. Their perspective can have a huge impact on your strategy using capacity planning tools.
Now that you know what your organization has and needs, it’s time to plan solutions. Prepare a strategy outlining what needs to happen for the business to operate optimally. You may need to hire more people, assign employees to support other projects, or restructure certain processes. Also include key goals and milestones in your plan. This will make it easier for you to monitor your progress.
Optimizing the capacity management process is a challenge that almost every company faces. Some will do better, others worse, because they will choose different ways to reach their goal, not always relevant to their company’s individual needs. However, we have some universal tips for you to become a master of capacity planning.
Use good capacity planning tool to constantly check available resources and demand and gather all important information about the company in one place
Plan a well-thought-out strategy instead of making ad hoc changes
Forecast your future capacity and demand to optimize utilization
Gather feedback from employees on processes you can improve
Avoid wasting time on inefficient procedures and reduce bench-time
Make full use of your employees’ potential and be aware of their skills
Plan recruitment processes based on the capacity of each department
Capacity management is one of the most important processes in every organization. It allows you to increase efficiency, make better use of your budget, increase employee satisfaction and productivity, prevent potential bottlenecks and get to know your company’s workflow inside out. It is a lot of work, but its effects cannot be overestimated. And the market offers perfectly designed tools to make this process comfortable and intuitive.
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