Managing Time and Expenses for Project Resources
To estimate project costs accurately, you need to be able to accurately capture resource time entries for utilization and productivity on projects and assess how that time figures into each project.
The sections below describe what utilization and productivity are in relation to project management. Next, you can read how to customize the input of this data using Classifying Time for Projects.
Productivity
Productive time is time spent working on a project, but not on a specific task, such as time spent in training or in transit. Such factors can affect costs because resources aren't working their full assigned time.
You can adjust for productive time by having time classified as productive when resources make a time entry against a project. Then, run the Utilization by Resource Reports to assess time spent on projects.
Utilization
Utilized time is time spent working on a specific project task. Utilization affects the cost or duration of a task depending on the resource. When managing projects, you need to consider how utilization impacts tasks.
For example, when choosing which resource to assign, you should consider the experience or skill of each resource. A resource with more experience or skill than another may complete a task in less time or with fewer mistakes. This means a shorter task duration.
However, these resources usually also have higher hourly costs, so the project cost could increase as well.
For example, say you need someone to complete a task and can pick Joe or Billy. Joe has years of experience and has done this task many times, so he’ll finish quickly and make few mistakes—but his salary is high. Billy is new and costs less, but he doesn’t have much experience, so he’ll take longer and probably make more mistakes.
Because of this, you might need to adjust schedules and costs based on who’s doing the work.
The Target Utilization field lets you set how much of a resource’s total hours count as actual work time. For example, if you set target utilization to 85%, NetSuite multiplies the total hours on the work calendar by 0.85. So, 85% of the time should be actual work and entered in Timesheets, and the other 15% covers breaks, filling out timesheets, and other non-project work. The Total Hours column shows the total hours from the work calendar, and Available Hours shows how many hours need to be tracked for 100% utilization.
Time subtab on Tasks
The Time subtab on task records shows Planned Time and contributes to a real-time picture of project schedule.
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If resources complete the project task early, it pulls in the projected end date of the project.
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If resources take longer than expected, the end date gets pushed out accordingly.