Allocated Time % versus Duration

Justin

Our comapny has only just signed up, but some of the immediate limitations we have found are a little concerning.

Things like this Work Effort vs Duration issue is one. Another is the  slightly immature Resource Managment. The issues there are like not being able to assign multiple reources and split work effort; not being able to assign resources costs directly to a resource, etc.

As a new user of your platform I would strongly encourage you to quickly develop answers to these issues. It's these issues that hinder real project managers in the use of your platform. From my perspective I feel that you guys have the potential for a great platform. However without these few, extremely important features, it's not really a professional grade tool.

My only other feedback would be for you guys to have a greater (or perhaps more meaningful) engagement with your community. I notice that things I have mentioned were all first raised in 2015. 

I wish you all the best and I hope to see this platform grows into a real project management platform for professionals.

J. Craig Williams

Justin,

I'm not an employee of Smartsheet, so take this as you will.

1. You are responding to a post that was initiated in 2015. Many (many many) Smartsheet Community members were not active when this post is written. Because there is no easy way to search for "recently commented on" threads (which is a design issue and likely a good one), your post will be read by a handful of people, at best. Even the persons dedicated to monitoring the Community by Smartsheet may use the GUI front-end that the consumer does, and so may miss your valuable content.

Your voice will be louder if you post a new thread (and if desired, provide a link back here).

2. Your points on the limitations of Smartsheet and valid. I struggle with many of them, either for my own or for customers. Some of the limitations (or simplifications) are by design and are not as bad as it may first appear. Many of my customers have determined that they either did not need the information (and are glad of the time saved by not tracking it) or are satisfied (somewhat grudgingly) with the work-arounds that result.

Related to Resource Management (which I have abandoned nearly 100% due to the limitations), it was announced at ENGAGE last month that their will be a complete overhaul and redesign of the system. Good riddance and good luck I say. 

My suggestion to you would be to contact Smartsheet directly on these specific limitation. If you have a Business or higher account, then contact your dedicated account manager. If not, there are contact emails scattered throughout their website. You should ask for the "Early Adopter Program". You may be lucky enough to get in on the RM features when they are testing the UX.

3. For the 'meaningful engagement' with the customer base, you will need to be more specific in your complaints before I can understand them. In my experience with dozens of software support companies, Smartsheet's customer engagement is in the higher echelons. They aren't perfect but in general they truly exhibit customer facing engagement practices. If the complaint is they haven't added a feature that some one demands, then you are missing the point about product design and development, in my opinion. 

Last month, Smartsheet had its first user conference. It was packed with people from all industries. A huge percentage of the Smartsheet company employees were also in attendance. The excitement on both sides of the dialog on what the platform can do, should do, might do, will do was palpable in the air. I have never attended a user conference where everyone was so into it. It wasn't a sales event, it is an experience.

Related to (2) and  (3), there were several presentations on the product roadmap that were packed with eager participants that left the room excitedly talking about how they would use the features once they land in our laps.

If you have specific questions that are not answered on the Help Center, the Community is a wonderful resource.

I wish you well and hope you take my words in the spirit they were intended.

Craig

 

 

 

DWork

Another vote for this one.

It would be especially helpful. I am working on implementing the resource management features in SS for our team but without this feature it will require a lot more manual work. I plan to use another column to calculate days duration based on hours and effort, then use conditional formatting to point out any time I forget to update the duration. 

Haven't tried this yet, but hopefully that will get me part of the way there.

MattSpx

Literally the first thing I noticed when starting up Smartsheet for the first time. Why even bother to use a project management tool if it can't help me figure out basic things like the % effort split across projects that will be needed to meet deadlines?

Ivan Palomino

Another vote for this one.

Any update about this topic ?

 

clairepaki

Smartsheet, are you listening to your user community?

This functionality is make or break for me.  I would consider it to be a very basic requirement that has been requested for over 3 years from your users (well the ones who have commented).  Any progress?

Regards

Claire

Hector Aguirre

Any update? It is a shame that lots of users have been voting for this since long time ago and nothing happens. Instead you change the look and feel... 

Linda McGee

We need this functionality.  Resource management in Smartsheet is too high level to be helpful.  % allocation leveled throughout the duration is not accurate for our needs.  Are we REALLY the minority asking for this?

 

Darryl R.

Hi, All,

I'm upvoting this before starting a new thread to discuss potential workarounds.

Please provide some facility for dynamically adjusting end date (or duration) based on % Allocation. 

Thanks,

Darryl R.

cdeal

This really doesn't make a lot of sense.  You should define priority, allocation, availability, and task duration.  It should then spit out the timeline automatically.  This makes way more sense and I think is what people here are looking for: https://www.liquidplanner.com/blog/liquidplanner-gant-charts-smarter/

MikeyMike

+1

Robert Poddar

Hi, 

Please count my vote.. 

Any update on this? Been 3 years since this topic was first brought up!!.. Like other features such as having multiple resources assigned to a single task, or indicating holidays at resource level.. 

These features are important for a project manager, but i see that your focus are on other topics, rather than enhance the tool. In fact, there's a discussion within the organisation, whether to go back to MS or look at other project management tools.. 

thanks

Robert.

MJ44

About 8 months since last post.  I'm also still awaiting the fix for this issue.  Any updates from Smartsheet?

 

MJ

Nao

Hello,

 

Please count my vote on this as well. Our organization has been struggling with using the resource utilization function as we have to manually input the % allocated as it defaults to 100%. We have stopped using that feature entirely and resorted to using a spreadsheet to help us. Can Smartsheet please let us know when they will be taking a look at this? There seems to be a lot of users who are interested in this feature.

Andrée Starå

Hi everyone,

Please submit an Enhancement Request when you have a moment to have your vote added

A New Way to Submit Your Feature Requests

To make your Enhancement / Feature Request count, send in the form above because there isn’t a guarantee, it will be registered otherwise.

Original Post: https://community.smartsheet.com/announcement/new-way-submit-your-feature-requests

Have a fantastic day!

Best,

Andrée Starå

Workflow Consultant @ Get Done Consulting