Forecast's Utilization Report is a comprehensive, standard report that focuses on resource utilization. Utilization is determined by a company's resource management setting and can be based on task-assigned hours, project hour allocations or a combination of both.
This article covers:
- Understanding the Utilization Report
- Understanding how billable time is calculated
- Breakdown of Utilization Report
- Managing the data displayed
Understanding the Utilization report
- Utilization Report provides a detailed breakdown of each resource utilization for a given period.
- The report draws data from People Schedule and Timesheets.
- Planned time appears immediately, however, actual time (hours registered by a team member on a task/project or on non-project time) will appear the day after.
- Report includes two key utilization metrics:
- Billable Utilization, which is based on billable work only
- Resource Utilization, which is based on all billable and non-billable work.
Understanding how billable time is calculated
Billable time in Forecast is derived from billable projects only. How billable time categories are calculated depend on a Company's resource management setting. To learn more about resource management settings, please visit Selecting your resource management strategy.
Metric | Allocate people to projects | Assign people to tasks | Both project allocations and task assignments |
---|---|---|---|
Planned Billable time | Sum of allocations in the period. | Sum of estimates on tasks in the period |
Greater of: or Sum of task estimates in the period. |
Actual Billable time | Sum of time registrations in the period. | Sum of time registrations in the period. | Sum of time registrations in the period. |
Remaining Billable time | Sum of allocations in the remainder of the period starting from today. | Sum of remaining time on tasks in the period. |
Greater of: or Sum of remaining time on tasks in the period. |
Forecasted Billable time | Actual Billable Time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining Billable Time (future billable allocations) | Actual billable time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining billable time (remaining estimated hours on unfinished billable tasks) |
Greater of: Actual Billable Time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining Billable Time (future billable allocations) or Actual billable time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining billable time (remaining estimated hours on unfinished billable tasks) |
Billable time with Both project allocations and task assignments
Combined resourcing looks for whichever is greater on a given project: time assigned on tasks or hours allocated to projects. Whichever is greater will be used for the sum of billable and non-billable time and the system will determine the billable / non-billable split of hours according to which of the following scenarios applies:
- Non-billable projects: For non-billable projects, there can be no billable time either on tasks or allocated, so all time is non-billable.
- Billable projects without non-billable tasks or time registrations: On billable projects, allocations can only be billable so all the time will be billable.
- Billable projects with non-billable tasks or time registrations and allocated time is less than time on tasks: Billable time from billable tasks and time registrations, non-billable time from non-billable tasks and time registrations.
- Billable projects with non-billable tasks or time registrations and allocated time is greater than time on tasks: The sum of billable and non-billable time will equal the allocated hours. Non-billable time will equal non-billable task estimates and non-billable time registrations. Billable time will be calculated as the remainder of allocated hours minus non-billable hours.
Breakdown of Utilization Report
The report is broken down into three components: General Settings, Gauge meter and Graph chart and Details table. Each of these components can assist with delivering an extensive utilization report of the company's resources.
General Settings
The general settings of the report give anyone with access to the report the ability to ensure that the information displayed on that report is correct.
Setting | Function |
Report Name | The name of the report. |
Period / Month By Month |
This setting determines what period the report should cover. Use Period to view certain months determined from the date selector. Use Month by Month to display the entire calendar year by month. |
Date Selector |
When set to Period the date selector will be available to change the months the report is covering. |
Gauge meter and graph chart data selection | Just above the gauge meter is the data selection dropdown. From here it is possible to select which data will be displayed on the gauge meter and the graph chart. |
Save Report |
The first setting on the right side of the report allows for any changes made to the report like a new name, new periods, and new data, to be saved. To the left of the save report button, it is possible to view who last edited the report and saved it. |
Export as CSV |
To the right of the 'save report' button is the export as CSV button. Clicking this will download the report in a CSV format. Important to note here that the CSV will NOT download the nested information but only the first layer of information. Warning: Users may export up to 50k rows of data at one time.
|
Eye Icon |
Found next to the download as CSV button. From the eye icon, it is possible to enable or disable all of the information that can be displayed on the project portfolio report. Eye is not available on Month By Month view |
Filters |
Next to the eye icon is the filters button. It is possible to apply filters to narrow the view of projects or resources that should be displayed in the report. |
Gauge meter and Graph chart
The Utilization Report shows two summary data visualizations in addition to the full data table. These summary graphics can be used to see the expected percentage of resources’ capacity spent on billable work (by selecting Billable Utilization in the dropdown) or the expected percentage of resources’ capacity booked for any work (by selecting Resource Utilization in the dropdown).
The two visualizations are a dial and a timeline line graph. The dial shows the overall figure for either Billable Utilization or Resource Utilization for the date range selected in the date picker. The line graph shows the figure selected week over week.
Billable Utilization selected in dropdown
If Billable Utilization is selected the Billable Utilization Target shows up for comparison.
Both the dial and the line chart will show the data category Forecasted Billable Utilization. This is the percentage of resources’ capacity that is expected to be spent on billable work and it is a category that is meaningful whether we are looking at the past, the future or a current period that spans from the past into the future.
Within the selected time period, the system is looking the expected total billable time (past billable time regs plus any future planned billable time) and calculating the utilization percentage of that time over the total capacity hours of the resources in that time period (working hours minus time off).
Forecasted Billable Utilization is calculated as Forecasted Billable Time / Available Time x 100. Available time is Working hours - Time off.
- In project allocation mode
Forecasted Billable Time is Actual Billable Time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining Billable Time (future billable allocations)
-
In task mode
Forecasted Billable Time is Actual billable time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining Billable Time (remaining estimated hours on unfinished billable tasks)
- In combined mode
Forecasted Billable Time is Actual billable time (past billable time registrations) + Remaining Billable Time (future billable allocations) OR Remaining Billable Time (remaining estimated hours on unfinished billable tasks), whichever is greater.
Resource Utilization selected in dropdown
Both the dial and the line chart will show the data category Forecasted Resource Utilization. This is the percentage of resources’ capacity that is booked whether billable, non-billable or internal time. It is a category that is meaningful whether we are looking at the past, the future or a current period that spans from the past into the future.
-
In project allocation mode
Forecasted Resource Utilization is calculated as Forecasted Allocations Total Time / Available Time x 100.
Available time is Working hours - Time off.
Forecasted Allocations Total Time is Actual Total Time (past time registrations) + Remaining Total Time (future allocations). -
In task mode
Forecasted Resource Utilization is calculated as Forecasted Total Time / Available Time x 100.
Forecasted Total Time is Actual Total Time (past time registrations) + Remaining Total Time (remaining estimated hours on unfinished tasks).
Available time is Working hours - Time off.
Within the selected time period, the system is looking the expected time booked on any work in Forecast (past billable time regs plus any future planned billable time) and calculating the utilization percentage of that time over the total capacity hours of the resources in that time period (working hours minus time off).
Details Table
Just below the graph is the details table. The details table will present all of the data that has been enabled for display in the report. The way that the details table is structured is as follows:
- First layer will show the resources totals for the period that the report is looking into and for the categories (data) that have been enabled through the eye icon.
- Nested layer goes into more detail by presenting the numbers per allocation. This means that the nested layer will show exactly where and for how long a resource was assigned during the period that the report is looking into.
Managing the data displayed
The data that is displayed on the project portfolio report may vary as one project manager might be interested in actuals while another might be interested in forecasted information. To that end, it is possible to decide what data is displayed through the eye icon feature.
To disable/enable information from the report
- Click on Reports.
- Select All reports.
- Click on an existing Utilization Report or, for a new report, click on New Reports and select Utilization Report.
- Click on the eye icon.
- Select any of the available options or just any of their nested options.
It is important to note that the data which is chosen for display from the eye icon will also be brought over into the CSV export of the report.
Project allocations vs tasks
If the resource management setting on an account is set to Allocate people to projects or Both project allocations and task assignments, the report allows users to view information both in regard to project allocations and tasks so that managers can view the information easier and compare the two. This is especially useful when it is necessary to review the actual hours (time registered) on tasks vs what the planned time on the allocation of the project, that the task belonged to, was. For example, an allocation can be created to last for an entire week (40 hours) but the hours spent on the actual tasks might differ. The report makes it easier to view that information and helps with planning more accurately for the future by allowing the user to view both project allocation and task information.
The data points, which are exclusive to project allocation, that shows this information in the report can be found in the eye icon and they are:
-
- Planned allocations vs Tasks - This will indicate what the planned hours on a project allocation are vs planned hours (estimate) on tasks of that project by the assignee.
- Remaining Allocations vs Tasks - This will show the remaining time on allocations vs tasks by taking into account all future planned allocation time vs all future planned task time. Both billable and non-billable.
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