The Resource Allocation page allows you to see and manage your resource allocation, capacity and availability. However, there may be instances where you would like to use the Resource Allocation page to also keep track of other items such as shared rooms, materials, etc.
The Resource Allocation page is designed to display resources (users and contacts) which means that if you would like to be able to see other items, you will need to create a placeholder resource for them. This also means you will need to create a placeholder Project where you can create tasks that represent when these rooms (or items) are going to be in use.
This help article will walk you through how to do this.
The Resource Allocation page is designed to only display resources (users and contacts). So if you would like to, say use the Resource Allocation page to also see and manage the availability of your boardroom, you will need to create a placeholder resource for your boardroom.
Navigate to "Contacts" and create a new contact record for the room (or item) you wish to track in Resource Allocation. For the purpose of this article, we will use the example of a boardroom. Let's say that we would like to be able to see when the boardroom is available in the Resource Allocation page. So we are going to create a new contact record and call it our "Main Board Room".
You will need to create a separate contact record for each room (or item) you wish to track in the Resource Allocation page.
In order for you to be able to search for resources in the Resource Allocation page, you need to create and assign a Resource Attribute to your resource(s).
After you've created the placeholder resource for your rooms (or items), go to the Resource Attributes tab. Then click on Add New Attribute.
Populate the Attribute Name and details and click on Create. In the example below, we are going to create a new Attribute called "Rooms" and then assign it to our placeholder resources for the different rooms.
Next, you will need to assign it to your placeholder resources. Click on Assign to Contacts.
Enter the name of your placeholder resource and click on Search.
Select the placeholder resource and click on Apply. Repeat these steps until you've assigned the Attribute to all your placeholder resources.
Next, you will need to create a Placeholder Project that will hold of the Project Tasks you will be assigning to your Placeholder Resource.
Create a new Project. It is recommended you give it a descriptive name that allows you to easily identify it.
In the example below, we are creating a new Project called "Boardroom Reservations".
Once the Project is created, you can then create individual tasks that represent the dates and times your rooms (or items) are going to be used.
In the example below, we will need rooms for our Sales Meeting, Client Presentation and Staff Meeting so we are going to create these as three (3) different tasks. We will then need to define the Duration, Start and Finish Dates and Planned Effort.
The Resource Allocation page is designed to plot hours according to the Planned Effort divided evenly across your duration.
So in the example below, if we are going to need a room for 1 hour, then we will set the duration to 1 day, choose the date of when we need the room and then set the planned effort to 1 hour.
Click on the Save Project Plan Icon to save your changes.
Now that we have the tasks created, we are going to need to assign them to our placeholder resource.
Double-click on the Assigned To cell and click on the Edit Icon.
Enter the name of your placeholder resource and select Contact. Then click on Search.
Select the placeholder resource and click on Assign Task.
You will see an equivalent Salesforce Task at the bottom of the window. Click on Close.
Repeat the steps above until you've assigned the tasks to your rooms (or items).
Now that you have the tasks assigned to your placeholder resource(s), you can then view them in the Resource Allocation page.
In the Resource Allocation page, enter the Attribute you assigned to your placeholder resource(s).
Inspire Planner will then return all your placeholder resources representing your rooms (or items) that have the attribute you entered.
To the right of each resource, you will see the total planned effort defined for all tasks assigned to each.
If you expand the resource(s), you will see the individual tasks that make up the total planned effort at the top.