15 Actionable Tips to Level Up Effective Resource Management

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The success of any project depends on many factors. They force teams to improve in various areas, including professionalism in planning and organizing resources.

Effective resource management within your company opens numerous opportunities for achieving outstanding project outcomes and gaining a competitive edge.

How can we work with project assets efficiently? What steps must be taken to make the management process dynamic and continuous?

This article provides the answers and actionable tips for proper work with project management resources.

Contents:

• What is effective resource management?
• Why is effective resource management important?
• Start with drafting a resource plan.
• Take the time to find decent software.
• Bring order to your tasks, avoiding chaos.
• Identify available resources & ensure their proper allocation.
• Focus on employee skills & talents.
• Keep project finances under control.
• Improve time organization.
• Foster collaboration & encourage teamwork.
• Avoid resource underutilization & overburn.
• Track & adjust resources.
• Work with resource constraints.
• Implement a feedback loop.
• Train & develop your team.
• Plan for contingencies & be prepared for the worst.
• Evaluate resource performance & compare it with your projects’ historical data.

Each company manages its unique set of work resources. Their number can range from a few to hundreds.

The authors of the survey conducted by the Resource Management Institute (2022) learned about the amount of resources available in enterprises/IT & product development sector.

Below you can see the results of this survey.

You may actually manage only 5 resources in a small project but they will also require careful planning, control, and analysis.

Remember: the more resources you have to organize, the more thorough your professional efforts must be.

Now let us explain the importance of effective resource management in detail.

Why is effective resource management important?

Resource management goes beyond merely assembling a team and gathering available work assets. It involves achieving the right balance and identifying the optimal tools, processes, and practices to complete projects while aligning with company objectives.

Effective resource management strategies are crucial for various reasons. They are listed below.

• Improved project performance. When assets are managed efficiently, projects are more likely to be completed within scope and on time. Proper resource allocation in project management ensures that all aspects of a certain project receive adequate attention. It usually leads to higher success rates and increased stakeholder satisfaction.
• Optimal utilization of resources. Efficient management ensures that work assets such as time, money, or materials are used properly. It prevents waste and redundancy, maximizing output from available resources that leads to improved project outcomes.
• Cost control. Effective resource management in project management helps in monitoring and controlling costs. It prevents overspending by ensuring resources are used within the defined budget. Regular tracking and adjustments can avoid financial overruns.
• Better decision-making. When you organize resources effectively, you get accurate data and insights into their availability. It facilitates informed decision-making regarding resource allocation and prioritization and helps to align assets with strategic objectives.
• Enhanced risk management. You can identify potential risks early in the project lifecycle with thorough resource control. It assists in developing mitigation strategies to address these risks proactively. You reduce the likelihood of project delays or failures due to unforeseen resource constraints.
• Accelerated team productivity. When you manage resources effectively, your tasks can be prioritized and allocated appropriately. It boosts the overall productivity of your team or company. Streamlined workflows and clear responsibilities help achieve team goals faster.
• Increased employee satisfaction. Happy employees are more engaged and productive. Well-thought resource management ensures that team workloads are balanced and employees are not overburdened. It leads to higher job satisfaction and morale among team members.

Now that you know about the importance of effective resource management, let’s move on to specific recommendations to make this process within your project as efficient as possible.

15 tips to achieve effective resource management in a short period

Practice shows that resource management is an area that isn’t an easy feat to accomplish. And if you want to perform professionally, this area shouldn’t be ignored.

Luckily, there are several recommendations you can follow to increase your chances of succeeding in asset organization.

The tips below will help you get started on your effective resource management journey.

1. Start with a comprehensive resource plan

As with any fundamental PM process, effective resource management starts with thorough planning. 

A well-prepared resource management plan determines every asset required to complete a project. It is often used as a strategic document that should align with the overall business goals of a company. 

Regular reviews and updates to this plan ensure that it remains relevant and adapts to any changes in project scope or organizational priorities. 

To create a robust resource plan, you need to define asset requirements based on the project scope, identify resource availability, as well as predict possible bottlenecks. It’s also vital to estimate how long every single resource will be used as well as the work each stage will entail.

This thought is proved by many experts including Brian E. Porter, a trainer of the American Management Association. Here’s his professional opinion:

Such a plan will definitely require high-quality visualization, understandable not only to you but also to your entire team. 

This logically leads us to the next tip – choosing a visually appealing tool for resource planning and organization.

2. Take enough time to find decent software

Advanced visibility and centralized data allocation are key to successful resource management. Therefore, you should try your best to explore as many resource management tools as possible to pick up your favorite. 

Some project teams use an online PERT chart (Program Evaluation Review Technique) that helps them easily calculate reasonable deadlines based on dependencies and estimated time it takes to complete each task. 

Some of them apply simple Excel spreadsheets with a primary work breakdown structure (WBS) where they break down their projects into manageable pieces to get a better idea of where to allocate resources. 

Finally, there are those who prefer planning and controlling work assets using a Kanban board, a flowchart with swimlanes, and other tools.

However, if you strive to find a solution to advance in resource planning for multiple projects and organizing complex work, you’d better try a more powerful tool.

Below you can see the point of view of Barry Goldberg, a strategic PM and operations leader.

One of the best tools for resource planning is a Gantt chart.

This point is best considered with a specific software example. GanttPRO is a worthy one.

The high-demand Gantt chart generator provides real-time insights into resource availability and helps everyone who wants to know how to allocate resources in project management like a pro. 

The software also assists project teams in planning, monitoring, and analyzing tasks and assets, as well as reducing risks of overallocation or underutilization. 

By automating tasks, GanttPRO users can focus on strategic decision-making and problem-solving.

One of these users is Rostislav Chernichenko from GeoComply, a company that provides compliance and anti-fraud solutions. Being  the head of Infrastructure & PM of the DevOps team, he admits:

Rostislav Chernichenko

The Head of Infrastructure & PM of the DevOps team

It does not matter what plans and projects you are going to manage. There is one goal – to properly distribute work to team members and resources. With GanttPRO, we do everything right. The service perfectly allows us to see the resource workload.

Generally speaking, companies across various industries choose GanttPRO for its ability to meet basic project management needs and provide a comprehensive view of projects, tasks, and resources in one place. 

Additionally, the Gantt chart creator excels at visualizing several resource management techniques.

3. Bring order to your tasks & avoid chaos

Once you have decided on the choice of a decent tool, such as GanttPRO, it’s time to start distributing tasks and visualizing them.

As we noted above, managers usually divide tasks into smaller pieces using a handy work breakdown structure.

While a WBS in Excel looks quite simple and feature-limited, the work breakdown structure in GanttPRO serves as a powerful and reliable tool for work decomposition.

With it, you get the drag-and-drop feature to visualize all dependencies between tasks and mark key milestones on a chart.

All task updates are in real time here, so your teammates can instantly see new tasks or any changes.

Moreover, if you start working in Excel but decide to switch to a more powerful solution, you can easily convert Excel to a Gantt chart using simple and quick steps. 

4. Identify available resources & ensure their proper allocation

Now that you’ve organized all your project activities, review your resource plan and all the details about the required assets you want to include in your project. Make sure you consider not only staff and money but such resources like materials, time, facilities, vehicles, equipment, software, hardware, etc.

At this stage, it’s also crucial to define the type of resource calendar where you will track the state of all assets. This calendar can reflect a singular project or numerous projects. 

After that, you should carefully allocate your resources to projects and tasks.

Here you can also recall the advantages of GanttPRO, as the platform allows for working with all types of resources and applying different resource allocation methods.

You will need just a couple of clicks to assign needed workers or resources to the defined tasks. It’s possible to specify time periods or duration for each allocation.

Another great thing about this online solution is that it lets users invite specific team members, set their personal calendars, and define their work roles. 

You can include virtual resources such as people, hardware, machines, and so on.

5. Focus on employee skills & talents

PM professionals often highlight personnel as their number one resource. This opinion has a right to exist because without a high performing team, a company will unlikely be able to do anything great in the field of project management.

It’s important to understand what skills your employees have. It will help you easily allocate them where they are most needed. 

You can even compose a list or database of each team member’s skills to define who is best suited for a specific task. 

Anyway, remember that you work with human beings – the most valuable resource you have.

6. Keep project finances under control

Establishing and controlling a project budget is also a kind of golden rule for everyone who wants to succeed in effective resource management.

If you do it right, your team can easily determine all costs associated with each task and assess its viability. Proper budget management also enables you to avoid investing in projects or tasks that aren’t feasible or cannot provide a stable ROI (return on investment). 

It’s essential to timely count all project-related costs. This information will help you allocate your budget to high-priority tasks while assigning its smaller part to less critical initiatives.

Gina Yuan, a manager and asset specialist at Aurum Capital Group (Australia) supports the thoughts about the importance of budget management. Here’s what she thinks:

GanttPRO is also a good helper in budget control. It allows for scheduling project finances and monitoring expenses. 

With this platform, you’ll be able to define costs for all resources, whether per hour, per item, or just cost.

7. Improve time management

Time monitoring is also key to effective resource management.

However, this monitoring can often be a challenge. It happens when it requires a cumbersome process or consumes too much time. Luckily, this process becomes seamless with a reliable PM tool.

In GanttPRO, time logging is a simple and quick process.

You can track the exact time spent on your activities to optimize workflows and organize projects better.  It’s possible to set time for a task after its completion or activate a time tracker option in real time.

8. Foster collaboration & encourage teamwork

Barrier-free collaboration is also essential for successful resource management. 

If you have transparent and clear communication within your team, then every individual is always aware of their responsibilities, deadlines, and resource availability. 

Regular updates and team meetings help in addressing possible issues promptly and aligning every worker with the project’s goals. Modern communication channels also encourage collaboration and feedback.

By the way, extended teamwork in such tools as GanttPRO is a valuable functionality.

The platform inspires users to create a collaborative environment where everyone can work towards common goals, share ideas, and support each other. It’s easy to get notifications, leave comments, and attach files there.

9. Avoid resource underutilization & overburn

A balanced workload is crucial for ensuring the smooth progress of any project.

When teams manage multiple projects simultaneously, they may quickly face demotivation and stress that lead to decreased productivity.

Therefore, you should permanently care about the analysis and organization of workloads. This approach will enable efficient scheduling and management of work resources.

With GanttPRO, you can track and balance the resource workloads of your team in a centralized way. It will ensure that no one in your team is over or underworked.

Effective resource management software

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10. Track & adjust resources

Continuous monitoring of resource allocation allows managers to identify inefficiencies and make necessary adjustments. 

Regular tracking helps to spot potential issues early and enables timely intervention. 

By being proactive, managers can reallocate resources to where they are most needed, ensuring optimal utilization and minimizing disruptions.

11. Work with resource constraints

Resource constraints are a hidden killer of efficient resource management.

Unplanned constraints and other obstacles can limit the availability, utilization, and distribution of essential work assets, impacting project execution. 

These constraints may arise from the poor quality of resources, competing projects, budget restrictions, or the skill levels of staff. Such challenges often harm productivity and reduce team motivation.

To manage these constraints effectively, project managers should care about detailed planning, set clear priorities, and optimize workflows.

12. Implement a feedback loop

The mechanism of constant feedback will assist in identifying areas of improvement and recognizing resource management best practices. 

When you collect feedback from team members and stakeholders, you literally get valuable insights into the effectiveness of a current resource management strategy. 

This information can be used to refine processes, address shortcomings, and reinforce practices that are working well.

13. Train & develop your team

Investing in the training and development of your team enhances their skills and competencies. It makes them more effective in their roles. 

A well-trained team will manage resources more efficiently that will reduce waste and improve productivity. 

Continuous professional development also boosts employee morale and engagement, leading to better performance and job satisfaction. Therefore, try to arrange regular training sessions and encourage a culture of learning.

14. Plan for contingencies & be prepared for the worst

Unexpected events can disrupt resource management plans. In this case, you have to remember about a possible “Plan B”.

Anticipating potential problems and having procedures in place to mend them are important to the success of any project. 

While it is best to have extra resources necessary to fix potential problems at hand, you can also have a place or source where you can get external assets quickly.

15. Evaluate resource performance & compare it with your project’s historical data

Regular performance evaluations help teams to assess the effectiveness of resource management strategies. 

You should choose appropriate metrics to get objective data on resource utilization, productivity, and efficiency. 

Analyzing this data will help you identify trends, spot improvement areas, and make informed decisions. It means that you can use your historical data to repeat previous successful results and avoid experienced missteps.

That’s all we wanted to share with you. 

Make effective resource management a big part of your company’s success

Resource control is a vital process you need to consider for every project. Maintaining resource plans gives you a better understanding of what is available and what you need for the next project. 

When you care about effective resource management in your organization, you will ensure that you always have enough time, money, personnel, and other assets for every task and project.

By following the tips mentioned above and using professional software such as GanttPRO, you will have many chances to ensure that your resources are aligned with the company’s vision and objectives.