Greetings community members!
In recent past I have noticed questions on operational resource plans via multiple posts. To answer all those questions, I have created this article. In this, I will focus mainly on operational resource plans and will cover following points:
1. What is an Operational Resource Plan?
2. Need of operational resource plan
3. When to create an operational resource plan
4. Different fields of an operational resource plan form & their significance / usage
5. Explanation with an example
6. Impact on resource’s availability on creating operational resource plan
7. Frequently asked questions
Resource Plans:
As we know, resource plan is the basic building block to request and manage resources for any type of work in PPM.
Work can be categorized as run vs build or run vs grow. Main difference between the two are:
| Run | Build |
| Maintain the existing business functionalities. | Enhance & expand business capabilities. |
| These activities are also known as “Business as usual”, “KTLO” or “Sustaining IT”, "Maintenance work" etc. | These activities can be project work or solution development etc. |
| Achieved via operational resource plans | Achieved via non-operational resource plans. |
Let's focus mainly on the operational resource plan in this article.
Define Operational Resource Plan
Operational resource plan is a way to keep aside a portion of team’s capacity for operational work.
Typically, resource manager creates an operational resource plan for her team. Often these plans are created for longer duration such as one year to plan for operational work in advance.
Need of Operational Resource Plan
In an organization, resources spend some of their time on the activities which are not related to project work. Operational resource plan should be created, in order to plan for these activities in advance.
Examples of non-project work could be Meeting, Training, KTLO activities, admin work etc.
When To Create An Operational Resource Plan?
As a best practice, capacity for operational work should be planned in the beginning of the year or quarter.
Operational Resource Plan Form & Its Fields:
1. Select ‘Create New Operational Plan’ from left navigation pane.
2. Operational resource plan form will open as shown in below screenshot:
3. Let’s discuss the fields and their values available on operational resource plan. I will cover when to select which value.
a. Number: This is auto-generated resource plan number. Just leave this value "as is"
b. Resource Type: It has three values:
i. Group
ii. User
iii. Role
Based on the requirement, you can create the operational resource plan for specific group, role or user by selecting one of these values.
Default Value: Group
c. Group / Role / User: Field below ‘Resource type’ depends on the value selected in ‘Resource type’. Based on whether Group/User/Role is selected in ‘Resource type’, the next field will be Group / User / Role. It allows you to select the desired group/role/user for which this operational resource plans is to be created.
For example: In above screenshot, I have selected Group in the 'Resource type' that is why the very next field is Group.
d. Member Preference: It has two values:
i. All Members
ii. Specific Members
Whether capacity for operational work is to be set aside for all the members of the group / role or for selected members, you can select one of the above two values.
Note: 'Member Preference' field is not available when ‘Resource type’ is selected as ‘User’.
e. Skills: Allows to select specific skills for group / role members.
Note: This field is not available when ‘Resource type’ is selected as ‘User’.
f. Request Type: It has two values:
i. Hours
ii. %Capacity
By selecting hours, you can set aside specific number of hours for a group / role / user for operational work.
Typically, deciding number of hours for operational work especially for group / role members becomes tricky for resource manager hence better option is to use %capacity.
By using %capacity, you can set aside specific capacity for operational work.
For example: Organization has a mandate for employees to spend 10% of their capacity on learning new stuff. To achieve this, resource manager can create an operational resource plan for Training by selecting request type as %capacity.
Default Value: Hours
g. Planned Hours / %Capacity: This is the field below ‘Request type’. It depends upon the value selected in ‘Resource type’ field.
Based on whether Hours / %Capacity was selected in ‘Request type’, the next field will be ‘Planned hours’ or %Capacity.
Note: %Capacity will not be available if Hours was selected in ‘Request type’
h. Planned Hours: System always populates this field irrespective of the value selected in ‘Request type’ is hours or %capacity.
System converts the %capacity value into hours and value is populated in 'Planned hours' field.
i. Confirmed / Allocated Hours: This field is auto- populated on allocating resource plan.
j. Name: This is to provide a name to operational resource plan.
k. Operational work type: This field provides the different types available out of the box for planning the operational work. This list is configurable.
l. Rate Model: If populated, the planned cost and confirmed / allocated cost is calculated based on the rates defined in the rate model.
Note: If matching rate is not found in the rate model, system considers out of the box default rate i.e. $50 per hour.
m. Start Date & End Date: Defines the duration for which the operational resource plan will be effective.
n. Allocation Type: It has three values:
i. Weekly
ii. Monthly
iii. Plan duration
Value selected in this field decides the allocation records created for resource plan.
Default Value: Monthly
If you want to track the planned hours / cost and per resource’s allocated hours / cost at monthly level, then select Monthly.
If the requirement is to track planned hours / cost and per resource’s allocated hours / cost at week level, then select Weekly.
However, if you just want to know the overall planned hours / cost and per resource’s allocated hours / cost for the whole resource plan duration then choose Plan Duration.
o. Allocation Spread: It has two values:
i. Even
ii. Front load
Default Value: Even
If the requirement is to evenly allocate the hours, then select Even otherwise select Front load.
How it works?
System evenly divides the total number of hours per time period.
Then the hours of every time period are divided between resources either evenly or in a front load fashion depending upon the value selected in this field.
Point to Note: Irrespective of even or Front load the initial distribution of total hours between time periods happens in evenly manner. This considers the total number of working days in every time period.
p. State: On creation, operational resource plan is in requested state. Once Allocated, the state changes to Allocated.
q. Planned cost: This is calculated as hourly rate * number of hours
Note: If Rate model is configured on the resource plan, system will fetch the group rate from rate model. If matching rate is not found, system will fall back to out of the box standard rate of $50 per hour.
r. Confirmed / Allocated Cost: This is calculated for per resource as
Sum of every resource’s hourly rate * number of hours
EXAMPLE: Let’s understand this with an example of group operational resource plan.
Scenario: It’s mandatory for the members of App Security group to spend 10% of their capacity in July and August months in learning new stuff.
To accomplish the above mandate, resource manager creates an operational resource plan for App Security group for 10% capacity for Jul and Aug, 2020.
Before creating operational resource plan for this group, let’s take a look at the data setup
Group Details:
Group Name: App Security
Number of members in group = 2
Each resource’s per day capacity = 8 hours
Both resources are available throughout both the months; no planned leave.
Group and Its Members’ Rate: Defined as following via rate model.
Group Hourly rate = $150
Jeff Grey’s hourly rate = $100
Clay Bresher’s hourly rate = $100
Operational Resource Plan Creation:
Let’s understand one by one each field’s calculation as a result of creating this resource plan. Note: This resource plan is in requested state, not yet allocated.
Number of working days in Jul = 23
Number of working days in Aug =21
Total Planned hours for group for 2 months = (23 * 8 * 2) + (21 * 8 * 2) = 368 + 336 = 704
Planned hours for 10% capacity for 2 months = 704 * 0.10 = 70.4 = 70
Per day planned hours for group = 16
Per day planned hours by 10 % of capacity = 16 * 0.10 = 1.6
If the number of working days were equal in Jul & Aug, we would have got 35 (70 / 2) planned hours in each month but that is not the case. July has 2 working days more than Aug hence
| July, 2020 | August, 2020 | |
| Planned hours | 23 * 1.6 = 36.8 = 36 | 21 * 1.6 = 33.6 = 34 |
| Planned cost | 36 * 150 = 5400 | 34 * 150 = 5100 |
As explained above, showing the values in application via screenshot, refer below.
Planned Cost is calculated as group cost * number of hours.
Planned cost = 70 * 150 = $10,500
Impact of Allocation Type = Monthly:
Since this operational resource plan is created for 2 months & allocation type is ‘Monthly’.
In Requested Allocations: One requested allocation record for each month will get created.
This helps in tracking the planned hours and planned cost at monthly level
In Resource Allocations: After the resource plan gets allocated, one record per resource per month will be created.
This helps in tracking the allocated hours and allocated cost per resource at monthly level.
Now let’s allocate this operational resource plan.
On allocating the resource plan, notice following fields are auto-populated:
1. Confirmed / Allocated hours
2. Confirmed / Allocated cost
3. Allocation records under ‘Resource Allocations’ tab because now resources are allocated to plan
Let’s understand the how the value of each field is calculated, in this case.
Confirmed / Allocated Cost = Each resource’s hourly rate per month * number of allocated hours.
Jeff’s Confirmed / Allocated Cost for July = 18 * 100 = $1800
Clay’s Confirmed / Allocated Cost for July = 18 * 100 = $1800
Jeff’s Confirmed / Allocated Cost for Aug = 17 * 100 = $1700
Clay’s Confirmed / Allocated Cost for Aug = 17 * 100 = $1700
Confirmed / Allocated Cost for operational resource plan= $1800 + $1800 + $1700 + $1700 = $7000
As explained above, refer the values shown in resource allocations:
Impact of Allocation Spread = Even / Front load
Even / Front load impacts the way hours are allocated at daily level.
If Allocation Spread = Even;
System will evenly distribute hours for each working day
For example: In July month, Jeff is allocated 18 hours.
Due to allocation spread = Even; system will evenly allocate 1 hour on each working day.
If Allocation Spread = Front load
System will try to utilize maximum availability of resource in the beginning of the duration.
For example: If allocated hours for Jeff in July month = 20 hours, Jeff will be allocated 8 hours on first working day, 8 hours on second working day and then remaining 4 hours on the third working day.
Impact on resource’s availability on creating Operational Resource Plan:
For allocated operational resource plan, hours are deducted from the availability of the resource.
Remember, in the beginning (before operational resource plan allocation) the App security group’s allocation details was as shown below:
After allocating 10% capacity via resource plan,
1. The resources are allocated for a specific number of hours
2. Availability of the resources is decreased as allocation has taken place
Frequently Asked Questions:
1. Where can I see the hours allocated for operational work?
It can be accessed mainly from two places:
a) Resource reports
b) Resource Finder section of resource allocation workbench
2. Can I post time for operational resource plans?
Yes.
3. To which project, an operational resource plan is associated with?
Operational resource plans are designed to plan for operational work which is separate from the project work hence operational resource plans are not associated with any project.
Additional Links:
1. For further reading, refer doc link
2. To post your ideas, use Idea Portal link present on this page
Look forward to get your comments and feedback.
The links in this reply no longer work and my question centers around this same issue. Thanks for this awesome post!
Namita,
Question: Does servicenow allow you to create and allocate team members to more than one operational plan category and log hours against the individual plans to demonstrate how the team member’s operational time is being utilized?
Background: My organization creates and assigns team members to 2+ operational plans per year so we can track actuals against the categories we have established. (Admin, Operational Work(KTLO), Training, etc.). When the team member uses the servicenow Time Sheet portal to enter their time the solution will default to the Admin operational resource plan and does not allow the team member to update this field. (See Image 1). The result is that all actual hours are being mapped back to the admin operational plan and the resource manager is not able to view actuals by Operational plan category in Allocation Workbench.
Image 1 – Team member has selected the Operational Work category RPLN0026736 but the Time Sheet portal defaults to Admin RPLN0026729 .
Image 2 – Resource Allocation Workbench View
Missing Actuals for Operational (KTLO) Work Effort
Hi @gjz ,
Glad that you found the article helpful.
"One of your posts indicated you showed how to do this in one of the videos that doesn't work" - I am sorry that video is no more available. Not sure which post has video because this post has no video link. Let me explain the steps with screenshots to achieve this scenario.
As a resource manager, you can set aside the capacity of resources for all the operational work in one operational resource plan, for example, KTLO.
Scenario: Troy has worked on two incidents on Monday. He would like to submit the time spent on these two incidents using the KTLO resource plan.
Steps:
- As an end user, using time sheet portal, under Other category, Troy can choose KTLO resource plan and open it in form view.
- From the form view, he updates the task field with the incident he worked on & updates the hours, in this case: 4 hours on Monday and saves it.
- Troy can now see incident on his time sheet along with the hours entered by him.
-
He adds another incident and adds 4 hours on Monday for this incident as well. As a result on the timesheet he can now see both of his incidents (for KTLO res plan)
- At this time, as a resource manager, i can see both the time cards on my operational resource plan in Submitted state.
-
After approving the timesheet, as a resource manager i can see the actual cost (in this case $400 because Troy's per hour cost is $50 and total number of hours are 8 so 8*50 = 400) as well along with the processed time cards.
Hope you find this helpful.
Please let me know if you have any other query, happy to help.
Thank You!
Namita Mishra
Hi @Beth Clingenpee ,
This response is for the query that you have raised above -
"@Namita Mishra or other Community Members:
We have operational resource plans set up that allocate around 25% of everyone's time to different operational activities - Admin (misc.), SME work, Meetings, & Training for the fiscal year. These plans are allocated to a group that contains all current employees; however, when we gain a new employee and add them to the group partway through the FY, they do not appear to have this operational time deducted from their capacity since the plans were allocated for the year already. Is there a way to refresh so the new person is added into the plan?"
New users can be added to existing operational plan and their availability will be deducted. I will explain the steps to achieve this.
OBJECTIVE: To showcase how to add a new resource to existing operational resource plan.
STEPS:
1. Below is the operational resource plan for Analyst group (9 members in the group) for 2024
2. As a resource manager, open the resource plan from Resource Allocation workbench and you can see the operational plan and the allocation for all 9 members.
3. Now a new resource has been added to Analyst group as shown below:
4. This resource will join the group on December 1st, 2024 as shown in his employee profile (employment start date)
5. After generating the newly added resource's capacity for December 2024, you can see his availability and capacity for December month is 176.
6. However the allocation is still blank because till now this user is NOT added to the operational resource plan.
So now let's add the resource to the existing opertaional resource plan and for this as a resource manager, I would select the resource and choose the option "Allocate for specific period" and allocate new user to existing operational resource pla for Dec, 2024
7. As a result, you can now see the resource is allocated to the existing operational resource plan
Hope this expalins the steps of adding the new resource to an existing operational resource plan.
If it does, please mark the response as correct.
Thank You!
Namita Mishra
