question Difference between Resource Plans and Resource Assignments in SPM forum

Difference between Resource Plans and Resource Assignments

c-vkondrat — Thu, 17 Oct 2024 16:26:44 GMT

Dear Community,

Please help me to understand how does "Resource Assignment" work and what differs it from "Resource Plan".

I have following questions:

1. Why when resource assignment is created resource gets automatically allocated (hard allocation) and there is no review from resource manager?

2. Why when resource assignment is created there is no cost plan?

3. How does it work with resource assignment why OOB this related tab is visible both on demand and project instead of resource plan?

Thank you,

Viktoriia

Re: Difference between Resource Plans and Resource Assignments

Carina Hatfield — Tue, 10 Jun 2025 21:58:40 GMT

1. Why when resource assignment is created resource gets automatically allocated (hard allocation) and there is no review from resource manager?
A: They get allocated in a pending state. There is a configuration setting where you can decide if you want that to decrement from capacity or not. In the UI, it will show remaining capacity by state so you can see remaining capacity for approved first and then total including pending. Not every organization has strict governance processes.

2. Why when resource assignment is created there is no cost plan?

Because plans are constantly changing in reality... you can click the generate labor costs button to do this.

3. How does it work with resource assignment why OOB this related tab is visible both on demand and project instead of resource plan?

Resource assignments is the new approach in the new workspaces. They create resource plans on the back end to help existing customers migrate when they are ready.

4. Isn't that goal of resource management is to plan capacity of the resources and allocate only those that are available and their utilization will benefit project/demand the most? If allocation happens automatically the resource manager doesn't have a chance to plan the capacity, right?

Yes, the goal is to allocate resources that have available capacity to the highest priorities - the things that are prioritized and approved. After all, we all seem to have more work than people!

Re: Difference between Resource Plans and Resource Assignments

c-vkondrat — Mon, 27 Oct 2025 13:18:53 GMT

Thank you, Carina