Human resource allocation in a multi-project R&D environment. Resource capacity allocation and project portfolio planning in practice

In their strive for more effective usage of scarce resources R&D organizations tend to seek the solution in forecasting in more spliced tasks and by allocating the most skilled person for such a small task. To get this done the aid of sophisticated project management software is evaluated on the possibilities of coupling these fine day-to-day tasks to the project portfolio plan as presented in the business plan. During the study by the authors of this article on how to optimize an existing resource allocation process in a large R&D organization it was found that a breakthrough in the allocation method could be made by introducing two indicators: namely, the project scatter factor and the resource dedication profile. By giving attention to these indicators the resource allocation process was significantly simplified and, the most important, better project and business results were made.