Microsoft Project is a scheduling tool that is extremely useful for Planning Engineers and Project Managers. Through MS Project, you can create a schedule of the tasks in a project, small or big. Also, you can prepare exhaustive planning by adding resources to your schedule. Hence, adding resources to your schedule is an extremely useful way to efficiently plan your project.

Table of Content

• Why add resources to your MS Project schedule?
• What are the various types of resources in MS Project?
• Which type of resource is to use when?
• How to assign resources in MS Project?
• How to assign multiple resources to a task in MS Project?
• How to add cost to a cost type of resource?
• How to assign a fixed cost to a task?
• How to derive project cost after adding resources to an MS Project schedule?

Why Add Resources to Your MS Project Schedule?

You need resources to complete the tasks of a project. A resource can be a material, a particular category of workmen, equipment, or even some overhead.

There are multiple benefits of adding resources to your MS Project schedule. Below are some of the major advantages of adding resources to your schedule:

1. You can get the month-wise or week-wise or day-to-day requirements of all the resources. Accordingly you may initiate action to procure them at the right time.
2. You can add the cost per unit of the resources, and derive the planned cost for your project.
3. You can track the schedule along with the cost of the project.

What are the various types of resources in MS Project?

There are three types of resources in MS Project that you can assign to the tasks in your schedule. These are:

1. Material
2. Work
3. Cost

Which type of resource is to use when?

Now that we know what are the various types of resources available in Microsoft Project, let us see which one when should we use while preparing a project schedule.

1. Material type of resources

Planners use these types of resources most generally for planning a construction project. As an example, all the construction materials required in a project like cement, steel, blocks, tiles, etc. fall in the category of Material resources. Same for the labour resources if you pay the wage per unit. For example, if you pay the workmen or the contractor for ‘Fabrication of steel per Ton’ instead of paying them on headcount, it will come under the resource category of Material. This type of resource is assigned by quantity and not by time. For example, the same number of bricks will be required to build 1 cubic meter of brick wall, irrespective of the time you take to build it.

To go easy with the conception, simply think about whether the cost of the resource will vary with time. If it’s fixed over time, it’s a material type of resource.

Read More: Estimating Task Duration in Project Management

2. Work type of resources

Work types of resources are those which are associated with time. For example, the equipment and machinery required in a project fall in the category of work resources. Also, the Project Manager and other human resources are work resources. This type of resource is tracked by time, not by quantity. For example, if you want to build a brick wall it can take any amount of time depending on the skill of the workmen, even if all the materials are available. Hence, the workmen required to build a wall is an example of a work type of resource.

3. Cost type of resources

You can use the Cost type of resource when the cost per use of the resource is fixed for executing a task.

For example, say, you need the transportation of materials for reinforcement fixing, and the number of trips will be different as per the quantum of the work involved. But, it does not directly vary with the quantities of materials. If the capacity is 20 Ton for the truck carrying steel, and the quantity of steel is 35 Ton, you have to move the truck twice although the second time it will have a partial load. Hence, here you are not paying the truck rental per unit of reinforcement steel and paying ‘per use’ of the truck.

Let’s take another example. Say, you need to hire a consultant for examining a particular work that is related to task 1. And, you need the same consultant for examining task 2 also. But, the consultant’s charge is different for the tasks. Say, for task-1 they will charge you $1000 and for task-2 they will charge you $1500. This consultant resource is an example of a cost type of resource.

How to assign resources in MS Project?

Now that we know the basics of the types of resources, let us see how to assign the resources to a task in your schedule. As the first step, you would need to add the resources to your schedule, and the next step would be to assign them to a particular task/multiple tasks. Keep your list of resources and their quantities & rates handy so that you can complete the resource assignment process seamlessly.

When you create a schedule, it is basically consisting of some tasks. A sample is given below:

A simple schedule of raft foundation is here. The tasks are linked to each other, and the Gantt chart is created based on the relationships between the tasks. Now, we would create resources and also assign them to various tasks.

As the first step, click on the left-top corner of the window where it is showing ‘Gantt Chart’.

The following window is open now:

Adding a Work type of resource

Let’s see an example of assigning equipment to a particular task. We will assign an Excavator to the related tasks – Excavation of raft-1 and Excavation of raft-2.

1. Type the Resource name you want to give, ‘Excavator’ in this case.
2. The type will appear automatically as ‘Work’.
3. You can not enter the material type as it is not a material type of resource.
4. Std. rate: Enter the rate of the resource. In this case, if the per day rental of the Excavator is $50, enter 50 in the field.
5. If the Std. rate unit is showing ‘per hour’ instead of ‘per day’, you can change the unit. Click File->Options->Advanced->General options for this project.
6. For now, we will select ‘No’ from the dropdown ‘Budget’.
7. If there is a fixed cost per use for the resource, put it in the ‘Cost per use’ field. For example, if the work completion bonus of your Excavator per structure is $100, you can put it here.

Now go back to the Gantt Chart view. Right-click on the columns to add two new columns: Resource Names and Cost.

The new look will be like this.

Now, against the Excavation tasks (Task ID-3 and 9) click on the dropdown. Then select Excavator to assign it to these tasks.

Now you have added the Excavator resource to two tasks in the project. The cost of the project is appearing in the named column.

For the Excavation of Foundation-1, cost = Excavator hire of 10 days @ $50 / day + Cost per Use $100 = $500 + $ 100 = $600.

For the Excavation of Foundation-2, cost = Excavator hire of 8 days @ $50 / day + Cost per Use $100 = $400 + $ 100 = $500.

Adding a Material type of resource

Now, let us add other resources as required for completing the tasks in the schedule. The process is the same as the Work type of resources, but here you select the Material option from the dropdown and put the unit of the material in the Material Label column. Enter the rate per unit in the Std. Rate column and you observe that the per day/per hour label is not there anymore once you select the Material type from the dropdown.

Now, go back to the Gantt Chart view and assign the appropriate resources to the tasks.

You will see that, on selection, the material type resources have taken 1 unit as the default quantity. You can directly change it from there, or double-click on the resource name to open the Task information pop-up. Then go to the Resources tab, and change the Units number to the required quantity.

Now, after adding the quantities of resources to all the tasks, the project cost will be like the below:

Adding a Cost type of resource

We have entered a resource ‘Transportation of materials’ and selected the Cost option from the dropdown, and what you observe is, you cannot enter any figure in the Std. Rate or Cost Per Use columns. We will shortly elaborate on this, in this tutorial itself. For now, let us assign this resource to the appropriate tasks.

How to assign multiple resources to a task in MS Project?

To assign multiple resources to a task, you can check them all while selecting the resources from the dropdown. As an example, we will add the Transportation of Materials resource to two tasks, going back to the Gantt Chart view.

Also, you can just edit the resource names column field for the task if you want to add multiple resources. Then just type and continue to add along wtih a comma (,) between two resources, and it will yield the same result.

How to add cost to a cost type of resource?

As you have seen, you cannot add the cost to a Cost type of resource directly from the resource sheet unlike the other two types of resources (Material and Work type). The reason is, the cost of a Cost type of resource may be different for various tasks. As an example, a Consultant may charge differently for the same test for different tasks if the magnitude of the work is different. Or the transportation cost involved for two tasks may be different.

If in our example, the cost of transportation is $400 for the reinforcement work of Foundation-1 and $500 for the reinforcement work of Foundation-2, then we will assign it like below:

Step-1: Select the Resource Usage sheet from the top left corner as shown below:

Step-2: Select the View tab from the Ribbon, click on Tables, then select Cost.

Here you will see that the tasks to which the Transportation of materials named resource was assigned are visible with cost as zero. You can now enter the cost of the same resource which may be different for different tasks to which you have assigned it. Note the Green highlighted are below.

Now go back to the Gantt Chart view -> select View -> Click on Tables-> select Cost, and see the changes in the Total Cost column for the tasks Reinforcement in foundation-1 and in foundation-2. The cost of the Transportation of materials are now accounted for.

How to assign a fixed cost to a task?

If even after adding all the resources, you feel that there is some cost that has not been covered through the resources, you can enter the cost directly into the task. For example, if you want to add the concrete pump hire charge for RCC tasks of Foundation-1 and Foundation-2, go to the Gantt Chart view -> select View -> Click on Tables-> select Cost. Now add the fixed cost in the appropriate place against the task.

If the Fixed Cost column is not available, you can add it by right-clicking on any of the columns and selecting Fixed Cost from the dropdown. From the Fixed Cost Accrual column, you can select when this fixed cost is to accrue to the task, at the start of the task, at the end, or pro-rata basis. It is like the below table.

How to derive project cost after adding resources to an MS Project schedule?

Once you’ve added all the resources to the project schedule and entered the cost to all, now it’s time to get the project cost and its distribution. Click on Project from the Ribbon -> Click on Reports -> Click on Costs from the pop-up -> and then select the Cash flow option, and click on Select.

You will get a cash flow over the period you select like below, along with the total cost for the project.

If you have any query that remains unanswered in the above tutorial, you may ask it in the comment.