Why use a resource planning tool?

Resource planning
Shannon M 15 November 2021

A tool designed to meet your business needs.

None of us knew the ancestors of our Macs or PCs, those computers without screens and surrounded by hundreds of wires. But you may have witnessed the first Macintosh, which came out in 1984. This first personal computer revolutionised computing with its unique graphical interface! Users discovered features that were beyond their imagination, their use of computers was simplified completely! 

What about you? Aren't Excel spreadsheets like those early computers? And the many tools you use that are not connected to each other, like those tangled wires?

Early computers - 1930's

Don't you dream of a tool that would simplify your administrative tasks? In a way, you work the same way as with a computer without a screen, you lack visibility...

A resource planning software can provide this. It can help you streamline your processes for recruiting, allocating resources to your projects and managing your people.

In a few points, understand why:

1 - Efficient management of resource planning

What you need is an intuitive tool that allows you to manage your resources easily. A tool with an ergonomic interface improves your user experience and makes it easier to learn. A solution such as this one has this objective: to make your life easier and to make you more efficient.

The tool allows you to simplify the work of your employees by freeing them from repetitive tasks. Indeed, they can enter their own time spent on projects, complete their profiles and indicate their availability.

When we talk about visibility, this is exactly what it is: You can benefit from enhanced visibility on team schedules and allocate your resources to projects.

Without a resource planning tool: It is difficult to identify the best people for your projects, let alone know if they are available or not, and manage their absences and leaves. Other tools will provide you with some of the data you need, but a resource planning software provides real-time visibility on employees and contractors.

Your resources are in your hands and you can follow their progress and utilization rate in real time. Managing your resource planning more efficiently ensures a more motivated team with a smoother and more appropriate workload, and therefore better results. This visibility makes the reporting more accurate and the objectives are more likely to be achieved.

 

Discover the resource planning tool of Stafiz

 

2 - Detailed and optimised planning

Thanks to your complete and total vision: You will know who to allocate, where, and on which task. The software takes care of most of the planning and saves you time. The allocation of resources to projects is done in a few clicks, and if you wish, automatically.

Since you can see their availability, you can better manage the schedules of your teams. You can optimise their utilization rate in real time if you see that certain employees are over or under-staffed. By taking this data into account and acting quickly to adjust the workload of your teams, you will improve the profitability of your operations.

Since your challenge is to ensure that you are within your margin and that you have sufficient work capacity for the level of your projects, you need the right visibility (we can't repeat this enough!). By identifying who is under-staffed and who can therefore bring in more capacity, you can better anticipate the start of projects. Start them earlier or look to do more.

If, on the other hand, some people's workloads are too high, you will be able to identify the overload early enough. You will be able to make a decision on how to get back to a level of capacity that will grow your business. You will know who to recruit, when to recruit them and how many new staff are needed.

3 - A search for the best talent

Your projects deserve the best profiles for the different tasks and deliverables. With a solution from resource planning, you will find more easily the most suitable profiles.

A solution from resource planning gives you an overview of the skills of the profiles you find, their experience and their skills. When your software is equipped with Smart resource planning algorithms, it allows you to find internal or external resources more relevant to your projects in a talent search engine.

Make an intelligent resource planning : You have two options: let the software automatically allocate resources to projects by crossing criteria of competence, experience and availability; or make your own resource planning.

Download and keep on hand the CVs that have caught your eye and archive them in your database for future use.

 

4 - Centralise your internal and external requests

Teamwork is essential for your business.Your entire organization could be streamlined and communication between employees improved. This is the promise of a staffing tool. Workflows are automated and the right information is sent to the right people at the right time.

When requests for resource planning are made by sales people or project managers, they are directly sent, processed and centralised. The employees responsible for finding the right people are notifiedand have visibility of all requests. The algorithms then suggest the best profiles according to preferences of experience level, skills and availability.

No more need to go through your mailbox! You can rest assured that the solution will take care of most of your administrative tasks, exchanges within the organisation, etc. Moreover, you can plan projects with both internal and external resources.

The software makes it easy to collaborate with external contractors. Access to schedules and profiles is similar and collaboration between them and your company remains seamless.

5 - Synchronise

Finally, synchronisation! It is important that employees in a company stay organised. That they are aware of changes to their schedule instantly. If an event is added, if a task is extended, they will know. The information visible in your tool's environment will also be visible in the employees' personal Microsoft calendars after synchronisation.

Giving employees visibility is one of the main objectives of a resource planning solution. Better management of schedules and information received at the right time and in the right place make the management of your organisation more fluid and efficient.

 

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Stafiz is a solution from resource planning designed for service activities. It helps you get more visibility on the progress of your projects, their profitability and the workload of your employees. Real-time data allows you to better manage your resource planning and be more efficient. Stafiz is a SaaS solution for managing resource planning, project management and business intelligence. So budgets and margins are always respected and you make better decisions for your business.

To learn more about the Stafiz platform, request a demo.

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