This article outlines everything you need to know about labor resources in ALICE:

• Why Assign Labor Resources?
• Four levels of Resource Assignment (Resource Tagging)
• How To Create Crews and Subcontractors
• How to Bulk Assign Labor Resources
• How Resources are Calculated for Imported Files
• Primary and Non-Primary Crews
• Crew Utilization
• Workforce Utilization
• Tips for Resource Loading a Schedule with ALICE Core  
• Using Excel Export/Import to Mass Edit Labor Resources

 

Why Assign Labor Resources?

Assigning resources to your schedule in ALICE enables a powerful set of optimization benefits. ALICE will dynamically shuffle resources to help you find the fastest feasible schedule duration while abiding by your scheduling, logic, and resource constraints. 

Most teams do not fully resource load their schedules today because it's a time-intensive process in legacy tools. However, we know that some consideration of resources is necessary to realistically assess the feasibility of your schedule based on the required resources in the schedule and your estimation of available resources.

With ALICE, users can assign resources and resource logic one time and create unlimited resource loaded schedules. The process is not all-or-nothing -- users can add detail where it is strategically beneficial and keep a coarse level of detail in less critical areas of the schedule.

Read on to learn how to create and assign resources to tasks in ALICE Core, how traditional resource loading is applied in Core and some of the unique benefits to using ALICE to explore schedule resources. 

 

Four levels of Resource Assignment (Resource Tagging)

We use the term resource assignment to tag an activity to a labor resource. There are four levels of resource tagging:

• Level 1: no assignment
• Level 2: Single "placeholder" trade assigned
• Level 3: Trade assignment or WBS assignment
• Level 4: Detailed resource assignment (typically have budgeted labor units information available)

 

How To Create Crews and Subcontractors

In order to assign a labor resource to a task, the labor resource must first exist in the Resources tab. If your ALICE project was created by importing an existing schedule, the resources from the native schedule will be imported. Resources can also be created and assigned within ALICE.

For a more hands-on experience, navigate through the player for an interactive walk-through, or if you prefer a more detailed approach, scroll down for a step-by-step guide:

 

Create Subcontractor:

1. Go to the Resources tab located in the upper right 
2. In the Labor tab, click + Create Subcontractor
3. Define Subcontractor name and Trade in the Info tab
4. Click Save to finish the process
5. NOTE: Other fields are optional

Create Crew:

1. Now, let's add Crew to that Subcontractor 
2. Click "+Add Crew" to add Crew 
3. Enter required crew data (more info for these fields are in the section below)
   
   • Crew Name 
   • Imported Resource Peak - available only for imported P6 or Microsoft Project schedules
   • Max. Units/Time - maximum number of available crews
   • Default Units/Time - number of crews assigned by default to task
   • #Prs./Crew - number of person in each Crew
   • $/Crew/Hr - crew cost per hour
   • Calendar
   • Idle Cost - choose if you would like ALICE to calculate Crew idle cost

Crew Resource Field Descriptions:

• Crew Name
  • Assign crews based on discipline, scope, and schedule detail
  • Crews can be grouped under a subcontractor or managed independently 
  • If you imported an existing schedule, this field will be pre-populated.
• Imported Resource Peak
  • This field defines the calculated peak of resource histogram from an imported schedule. It is non-editable.
    
    • Read more about how this field is calculated in the Importing your P6 Schedule article.
• Max Units/Time
  • This field defines the maximum number of crews available.
    • ALICE will not schedule your tasks such that the simultaneous number of crews needed is greater than this number.
    • When assigning crews to tasks on the plan page, users cannot assign a crew count greater than the max units/time defined in the resource tab.
  • Users can optimize resources by removing the max units/time constraint or increasing the upper limit in the resource tab. 
    • The max units/time can also be modified on the explore page to explore scenarios.
  • If you imported an existing schedule, this field will be pre-populated.
• Default Units/Time (applies to tasks)
  
  • Set this value to control how many crews are assigned by default to a task.
  • This is used to estimate Planned Labor Units = Crews required for task * # of work hours in original duration and relevant task calendar.
  • A change here applies to the task and planned labor units. 
  • If you imported an existing schedule, this field will be pre-populated.
• #Pers/Crew (applies to the project)
  • Set this value to control the number of people per crew at the project level. 
  • Please note that number of people per crew is tied to the daily workforce limit feature calculation.
• $Crew/Hour (applies to the project) 
  • This field is used to calculate the direct cost of crew labor hours and the idle cost (downtime) for the crew when it demobilizes and remobilizes until it fully demobilizes from the job. 
• Calendar for Crews
  • Calendars are defaulted to the task calendar. However, users have the flexibility to assign a default crew calendar and optioneer with crew calendars and task calendars 
  • Activity calendars are task-based by default (like P6)
  • Your default crew calendar in P6 is imported as your crew calendar in Alice.
• Idle Cost  
  • Turn on idle cost if you want to see a quantified measure of efficiency in your optioneering. Faster solutions can result in lower idle cost due to reduced downtime for crews 
  • Turn off idle cost if you want to easily see only direct labor cost changes, like the additional cost impact of overtime work or productivity changes. 

 

Notes: 

• Tip: You can also import resource metadata from a historical project and easily assign the resources to your new schedule.

 

How To Bulk Assign Labor Resources

After the resources have been created in the resources tab, they can be assigned to specific tasks in ALICE. Resources can be assigned one at a time or in bulk.

We recommend you start by resource-loading critical path activities to quickly identify risks and opportunities on the critical path that can make the biggest impact to project duration.  

For a more hands-on experience, navigate through the player for an interactive walk-through, or if you prefer a more detailed approach, scroll down for a step-by-step guide:

 

 

Crew, Equipment and Material Assignment (One at a Time):

1. In the Gantt chart, "right-click" and select "Edit Columns."
2. Select "Crews", "Equipment" or "Materials" and click "Done" to add the columns to the Gantt chart.
3. Double-click on the cell of respected resource column to open the assignment window.
4. Define the type and number of resource, and click Save to complete the process.

Crew Range:

1. Crew range is a unique functionality of ALICE that identifies the optimal number of crews required to achieve project objectives.
2. In the crew assignment window, define the minimum and maximum number of crews allocated for that activity.
3. Click Save to complete the process.

Bulk Assignment:

1. To ease the bulk assignment, use the Filter tool.
2. Go to "Task/Names" and filter for operations that share the same resources.
3. Select All and click Done to apply the filter.
4. Select all activities by clicking on the WBS summary
5. On the upper-left corner, click on "Resource Assignment" functionality
6. Select Crew, Equipment or Material assignment
7. Define the type and number of resource, and click Save to complete the process.

 

How Resources are Calculated for Imported Files

For a full list of mapped fields and logic, click here.

ALICE imports your budgeted labor units, actual labor units, and remaining labor units from your original P6 file.

Additionally, ALICE estimates your planned labor units using duration*default units/time (workforce required for tasks) this is an additional column labeled Planned Labor Units.

ALICE Core utilizes the concept of budgeted labor units to optimize resource loading. ALICE calculates the minimum resources required per task and the peak number of resources required for the project based on your histogram peak from P6. 

 

Primary and Non-Primary Crews

There are instances where an activity demands multiple labor resource types (or crew types) to ensure successful completion. For example, the “Level 10 electrical” activity may require both high voltage and low voltage electricians, while “Install steel beam” may require steel fixers and a crane operator. Depending on how the schedule is structured and the resources you aim to track, it is important to distinguish between primary and non-primary crew types, as this distinction impacts the duration of the work if parametric duration formulas are used.

Here is a simple example:

Consider four tasks, each assigned two crew types:

• Equipment Operator (quantity of 1)
• General Labor (quantity 2)

The limiting factor for these activities is the equipment required, meaning the number of Equipment Operators will drive the duration of the work.

Incorrect setup: Notice Tasks 1, 2, and 3 have a planned duration formula of 40/num_crews = 40/3, where num_crews = Workforce = sum total of all the crews assigned. This does not accurately reflect the intended planned duration.

Correct setup: Task 4 is set up correctly, where the planned duration is 40/primary_crew_count = 40/1, where primary_crew_count = quantity of Equipment Operators for the activity. 

How to setup primary or non-primary crews:

To designate primary or non-primary crews, follow these steps:

1. Download the .csv export file from the Plan Page.
2. Navigate to the "Task Crews" tab and column header "Is Primary*"
3. Set the primary crew type to "TRUE." All non-primary crew types remain "FALSE."

Note: It is currently not possible to change this property in-app.

 

Crew Utilization

Crew utilization graphs and downloadable .csv data are available for each schedule on the Analyze page.

The table below provides a general overview of the available analytic graphs as well as their basic properties.

Available Graph	Cumulative Vs Daily	Affected By Filters
Crew Utilization	Daily	By Crew Filters

 

Crew Utilization Graph Example

The Crew Utilization graph provides a daily histogram displaying which crews are performing productive work on site for the duration of the project. Please note that the graph does not include the presence of idle crews on site. ALICE computes Crew Utilization across all crews and shows the average crew utilization on the analyze page. 

The utilization is color-coded per crew so you can intuitively see what the crew composition is on site each day.

 

Using Filters

You may use crew filters to switch between the specific graphs for every crew, and, if applicable, use the search function to filter by subcontractor.

 

Export Crew Utilization Data

Exporting the CSV data for this graph will include a breakdown of crew utilization by day, by crew, and by subcontractor.

Note: A color scale was added in Excel to the CSV export shown above to make the data more digestible.

 

Workforce Utilization

Workforce utilization graphs and downloadable .csv data are available for each schedule on the Analyze page.

The table below provides a general overview of the available analytic graphs as well as their basic properties.

Available Graph	Cumulative Vs Daily	Affected By Filters
Workforce Utilization	Daily	No

 

Workforce Utilization Graph Example

Similarly, the workforce utilization graph provides a daily histogram displaying the total person power on site day-by-day, grouped by subcontractor.

The graph does not include/show the presence of idle crews on site.

 

Export Workforce Utilization Data

The CSV export for this graph includes a breakdown of workforce utilization by day, and by subcontractor.

Note: A color scale was added in Excel to the CSV export shown above to make the data more digestible.

 

How Utilization is Calculated

For any single crew, the Crew Utilization in a project is defined as:

Days Worked / Total Work Days on site

* It is important to remember that ALICE uses hours instead of days as the base unit of time
** Calendars are fully accounted for. So if a crew is on a 4 day workweek (i.e. working Monday to Thursday), they will have 4 working days in a week.

Example 1

Crew A is on a 4 day work calendar with Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off. In the project, they perform work on Monday and Tuesday in the first week and Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday in the following week and then finish. The Crew Utilization for Crew A is visualized as:

This example results in a Crew Utilization of 62% for Crew A.

Crew Utilization = Days Worked / Total Work Days on site = 5 / 8 = 0.625 or 62%

Example 2

Crew B is on a 5 day calendar. Here is Crew B’s time-sheet for a project:

Here the Crew Utilization for Crew B is 86%.

Crew Utilization = Days Worked / Total Work Days on site = 13 / 15 or 86%

 

 

Tips for Resource Loading a Schedule with ALICE Core

1. Analyze the critical path in your baseline solution
2. Start by creating a labor resource pool for crews that are on the critical path  
3. Use the filter builder to filter the activities that require the same resource type
4. Bulk assign the resource type and quantity required per task (default units/time) 
5. Repeat this process for all critical tasks to de-risk and optimize the critical path   
6. Repeat this process for all activities to resource load your entire schedule and develop an anti-fragile schedule 

First, create labor resource types:

Next, filter and select activities that require the same crew types:

Note: In this example, the user has created a mobilization crew and is bulk-assigning the crew to all mobilization & demobilization activities. 

Lastly, bulk assign required resources and type in the required count of labor for the tasks 

 

Using Excel Export/Import to Mass Edit Labor Resources

See this article on how to use the .csv (Excel) export to mass edit labor resources information, and then mass import back into the ALICE platform.