Lesson 3 - Managing Assignments, Utilization, and Capacity

Table of Contents

Managing Assignments: Use Cases and Benefits
Understanding Assignments
Assignment Types in Foresight
      Status-Based Assignments
      Billability-Based Assignments
      Utilization Type-Based Assignments and Calculations
Assignment Creation Locations
Duplicating, Cutting, and Connecting Assignments: Right-Click Actions on an Assignment Tile
Understanding "Reduce Billable Capacity" and "Use Leftover Capacity" in Calculations
      What is "Reduce Billable Capacity"?
          When to use it?
      What is "Use Leftover Capacity"?
          When to use it?
      How They Work Together
      Key Benefits
Overbooking Notifications
Understanding Off-Hours Work and Calculations
      Purpose of Off-Hours Work
      Where to Change Off-Hours Work Settings
      How the Off-Hours Work Checkbox Affects Calculations
      Examples of Off-Hours Work Usage
      When to Use Off-Hours Work
Scheduling Utilization Outside Full Day Time Off and Public Holidays
      Schedule Utilization Outside Full Day Time Off
      Schedule Utilization Outside Public Holidays
Understanding "No Utilization" Assignments
Creating Bulk Assignments for the Entire Team
Customizing Assignment Display Settings

Managing Assignments: Use Cases and Benefits

Effective assignment management is a cornerstone of long-term planning and resource optimization in professional services firms. In Foresight Connect, assignments go beyond simple task allocation; they provide a framework for aligning team capacities with project demands, ensuring both client satisfaction and business profitability. By integrating assignments into strategic foresight, firms can anticipate workload distribution, forecast revenue, and address resource gaps before they become bottlenecks.

This comprehensive approach not only supports operational efficiency but also fosters informed decision-making. Assignments allow managers to simulate project scenarios, compare resource allocation strategies, and adjust plans dynamically to maximize outcomes. Businesses can fine-tune their planning processes by leveraging tools like draft assignments, filters, and utilization options, enhancing productivity and financial clarity.

In this article, you'll explore the fundamentals of assignments in Foresight, from understanding their types and statuses to utilizing advanced features like bill rate adjustments, bulk scheduling, and demand connections. Discover how assignments serve as a vital tool for driving long-term success and meeting the complex needs of modern professional services firms.

Understanding Assignments

Assignments are a crucial component of Foresight. They provide detailed information about who works, for how long, and on which projects. Furthermore, Foresight uses assignments to calculate the income and costs your team members generate. This step comes after creating estimations and is essential for effectively planning and managing your project.

Assignment Types in Foresight

Status-Based Assignments

In Foresight, assignments are categorized into three distinct statuses, each serving a specific purpose in resource planning and project management:

• Active Assignment
  This status is used when you are confident about an assignment. Setting an assignment to "Active" confirms it as part of the project plan. Active assignments are included in reports and impact resource availability and project budgets.
  
  
• Reserved Assignment
  Reserved assignments are used when there is a high likelihood of execution but some uncertainty remains. This status allows managers to earmark resources without fully committing them, helping to maintain flexibility while planning for upcoming needs.
  
  
• Draft Assignments
  Draft assignments are ideal for testing different scenarios or conducting what-if analyses. This status enables you to explore various resource allocation strategies without affecting live project data, helping to identify the most effective team or plan for a project.

Billability-Based Assignments 

Assignments can be either billable or non-billable, enabling differentiation between revenue-generating and internal tasks:

• Billable Assignments: Work tied to a client with defined rates, contributing to project revenue.
• Non-Billable Assignments: Internal or support tasks that do not generate direct income but are essential for operational success.

These assignment types provide a structured planning and resource allocation approach, enabling organizations to simulate, adapt, and optimize their project strategies effectively. By leveraging these configurations, businesses can enhance capacity planning, improve team productivity, and maximize profitability.

Utilization Type-Based Assignments and Calculations

In Foresight, assignments can be configured based on various utilization types, allowing for precise planning and flexibility to suit different project needs. Here’s an overview of the available utilization types:

Utilization by Capacity

Assign work based on a percentage of the staffer's capacity. You can specify the percentage (e.g., 100%) and define the workdays. Additional options allow you to:

• • Reduce billable capacity if needed.
  • Assign leftover billable capacity to other tasks or projects.

Choosing this option allows you to tell the system how much of the overall capacity of your employee you want to use on this project. Let’s say your employee, Francis, works full time, usually about 160 hours. The capacity of your employee can be set in his profile, in “Settings”. If we put his % of capacity on the project to 50%, this will inform the system to assign 80h from that month towards that project.

Please note that you can also choose weekdays in this option, for example, 100% capacity for Monday and Friday.

As we can in this screenshot, our project only chose 50% of Francis's available capacity.

Utilization by Time Frame

Assign work based on a specific time frame and duration (e.g., 8 hours per day). This type also includes options to adjust utilization around:

• • • Time Off: Decide whether to schedule utilization outside of full-day time off or reduce the planned hours.
    • Public Holidays: You can schedule utilization outside public holidays or reduce planned hours accordingly.

You can choose from Day, Week, Month, or whole Assignment. Then, you can select several hours in that particular time frame. You can also decide how to distribute that utilization by selecting workdays.

Let’s take a look at different examples.

If we set Day as a time frame and set 4 hours, Foresight will assign each working day 4 hours on that project. If we change it to a Week and decide that our employee will work 32 hours, Foresight will split those 32 hours to 6 hours and 24 minutes each day. While choosing a month, Foresight will take the number of workdays in said month, and distribute hours and minutes accordingly. The same will happen with the assignment.

So, what will happen if we decide to assign a number of hours and minutes that are not easily divided, like 37 hours and 17 minutes per week?

As we can see, Foresight divided that time into two groups, so that the sum of the assigned daily time will reflect how much we assigned per week. Foresight will alway

Utilization by Weekday

Plan work daily by specifying the exact number of hours for each weekday. You can also adjust schedules to account for the following:

• Full-day time off.
• Public holidays.

Here, you can assign the desired amount of hours per weekday. As you can see, there are also options to include or exclude time off/holiday, but as mentioned earlier, since this is daily utilization, Foresight takes this value as an absolute. It will not change it whether we check those adjusted scheduling to time offs/public holidays boxes or not. 

Utilization by Weekday by Capacity

Assign work as a percentage of capacity for each weekday (e.g., 100% Monday–Friday, 0% for weekends). This allows for tailored schedules while maintaining a capacity-based approach. Additional options include assigning leftover billable capacity.

We can use billable capacity, meaning Foresight will assign this % capacity out of the currently available capacity. Learn more about Reduce Billable Capacity in the section: Understanding "Reduce Billable Capacity" and "Use Leftover Capacity" in Calculations.

No Utilization

Use this type to assign an employee to a project without scheduling any work hours. This is useful for side projects, bench assignments, or situations where work hours will be logged based on actual activities rather than predefined schedules.

Last but not least is “No utilization”. It’s pretty simple - if you do not want to plan work for your employee, but give him the possibility to log time in the project - we can simply choose this type and Primetric will not assign him any working hours towards this project.

Assignment Creation Locations

Below, you will find a list of locations where assignments can be created:

1. Staff List Tab ➡ Staffer’s Profile ➡ Calendar
2. Projects List Tab ➡ Project’s Profile ➡ Team section
3. Projects List Tab ➡ Project’s Profile ➡ Team Calendar section
4. Calendar Tab ➡ Team Members subtab
5. Calendar Tab ➡ Projects subtab

You can create an assignment in any calendar except the Demand Calendar. Simply click with the left mouse button:

Duplicating, Cutting, and Connecting Assignments: Right-Click Actions on an Assignment Tile

When you right-click on an assignment tile in Foresight Connect, several key actions are available to quickly adjust, modify, or remove assignments as needed. These actions help streamline resource management and ensure assignments align with project needs and changes.

Available Actions:

• Copy Assignment To – Allows you to copy the assignment to another employee, making it easier to find a replacement if someone is unavailable.

• Cut Assignment After – Splits the assignment at a selected point if project dates change, ensuring the previous portion remains while adjusting future workload.

• Clone Assignment – Creates an identical assignment for the same employee, useful for repeating work periods or recurring tasks.

• Connect to Demand – Links the assignment to an existing demand entry in the same project, ensuring consistency between planned resource needs and actual assignments.

• Remove Assignment – Deletes the assignment entirely, including all associated financial data. This is useful in case of errors or an assignment is no longer needed.

Understanding "Reduce Billable Capacity" and "Use Leftover Capacity" in Calculations

When managing assignments in Foresight, features such as Reduce Billable Capacity and Use Leftover Capacity are designed to help you effectively allocate resources and prevent overbooking. Below is a step-by-step guide to understanding and applying these options:

What is "Reduce Billable Capacity"?

This option reduces team members' capacity for billable projects by reserving time for non-billable or internal work. For example:

• Suppose an employee is assigned 20 monthly hours to an internal, non-billable project. In that case, selecting Reduce Billable Capacity ensures these hours are deducted from their total capacity, leaving the remaining time for billable work.
• This ensures that the non-billable work is prioritized and accounted for in capacity planning.

When to use it?

• Assigning resources to internal activities like team meetings, training, or admin tasks.
• Reserving time for fixed non-billable tasks to avoid scheduling conflicts with billable projects.

What is "Use Leftover Capacity"?

This option allocates only the remaining unused hours of a staff member’s capacity to a specific project. Considering other existing commitments, it ensures the assignment doesn’t exceed the team member’s available time.

For example:

• If an employee has already been assigned to a high-priority project taking up 60% of their time, using Use Leftover Capacity on a secondary assignment automatically schedules only 40% of their availability.
• This prevents overbooking while efficiently utilizing the available capacity.

When to use it?

• Assigning lower-priority projects or tasks without risking overallocation.
• Balancing workloads by using only the uncommitted time of team members.

How They Work Together

1. "Reduce Billable Capacity" Example:
   An employee is assigned 10 hours per week to internal work (non-billable). This assignment reduces their availability for billable projects by 10 hours, ensuring the calendar reflects accurate availability for client work.
   
   
2. "Use Leftover Capacity" Example:
   After assigning non-billable hours, an employee has 20 hours remaining in their capacity. A client project is then assigned using the Use Leftover Capacity option, automatically limiting the assignment to 20 hours.

Key Benefits

• Prevents overbooking of resources by managing capacity accurately.
• Enables prioritization of critical assignments (billable or non-billable).
• Enhances forecasting accuracy for project planning and workload management.

By understanding and applying Reduce Billable Capacity and Use Leftover Capacity, you can optimize your resource allocation, maintain balanced workloads, and ensure efficient project execution while aligning with your business priorities.

Overbooking Notifications

Overbooking occurs when you assign more work to your employee than his capacity. This does not take into account any other active assignments. When this happens, Foresight will notify you.

Information about overbooking will also appear during adding or changing utilization. Before unveiling the “Utilization” tab you will see this triangle with an exclamation mark, informing you about overbooking, and how many hours are overbooked.

Once you click on the “Utilization” option, you will also be met with a simplified time frame informing you where overbooking occurs. You will see a violet bar covering part of the time where overbooking occurs. Here, on the screenshot, we can estimate it’s from around March to the end of May.

Understanding Off-Hours Work and Calculations

Off-Hours Work, also referred to as Background Work, is an additional assignment status that allows for work scheduling outside of standard utilization and overbooking calculations. It is particularly useful for tasks like software maintenance, preparation, or other supplementary work that should not impact a staffer’s availability for primary assignments.

Purpose of Off-Hours Work

• Schedule work without contributing to the staffer’s utilization percentage.
• To avoid this work affecting overbooking calculations, ensure that critical assignments remain prioritized.

For instance, if a team member has regular project commitments but needs to perform maintenance tasks that are not part of their main capacity, you can assign them as Off-Hours Work.

Where to Change Off-Hours Work Settings

To configure how Off-Hours Work interacts with utilization and overbooking:

1. Click on the Three Dots next to your profile name.
2. Select My Settings.
3. Scroll to the bottom of the page to locate:
   • Scheduled Utilization Settings
   • Overbooking Settings
4. Adjust these settings to define how Off-Hours Work assignments are calculated.

How the Off-Hours Work Checkbox Affects Calculations

1. Utilization Calculation
   When the Off-Hours Work checkbox is selected for an assignment:
   • The assigned hours will not count towards the staffer’s scheduled utilization percentage.
   • This ensures that the primary workload metrics remain unaffected.
2. Overbooking Calculation
   When enabled, the checkbox prevents Off-Hours Work from being included in overbooking thresholds.
   • This allows additional tasks to be scheduled without flagging the staffer as overbooked.

Examples of Off-Hours Work Usage

1. Example One: OFF-HOURS Work Disabled
   • Result: All assigned hours are included in utilization and overbooking calculations, affecting the staffer’s availability for other tasks.
2. Example Two: OFF-HOURS Work Enabled
   • Result: Hours assigned to this status are excluded from utilization and overbooking calculations, preserving availability for other assignments.
3. Example Three: OFF-HOURS Settings Unchecked (Globally)
   • Result: Regardless of assignment-specific settings, all hours are calculated normally.
4. Example Four: OFF-HOURS Settings Checked (Globally)
   • Result: The global settings ensure that Off-Hours assignments do not influence utilization or overbooking, regardless of individual assignment settings.

When to Use Off-Hours Work

• Scheduling supplemental tasks that are not part of regular project commitments.
• Assigning low-priority tasks without disrupting capacity planning for higher-priority work.
• Tracking background activities without inflating utilization percentages or triggering overbooking alerts.

Scheduling Utilization Outside Full Day Time Off and Public Holidays

When creating an assignment and configuring your staffer's utilization on a project based on the Time Frame, you will notice two additional options in the form of checkboxes. Each option will expand when selected, allowing you to decide how the utilization hours should be calculated concerning time off and public holidays.

Default Behavior Without Adjustments
If no options (checkboxes) are selected, the tool will assign the exact number of hours entered in the assignment, including time off or public holidays.

Adjusting Utilization Settings

• Selecting the main checkbox enables the system to consider time off or public holidays when scheduling.
• Additional checkboxes allow you to decide whether the system should reduce the total hours assigned or redistribute the hours across working days.

This configuration ensures flexible and precise scheduling tailored to specific requirements regarding time off and public holidays.

Schedule Utilization Outside Full Day Time Off

Reduce Utilization By Full Day Time Off - This option excludes full-day time off when calculating an employee’s utilization. For example, if a team member is assigned 40 hours per week and takes a full day off on a Monday, selecting this option will reduce the weekly utilization for that period to 32 hours. The daily utilization for the remaining working days, however, remains unchanged.

Schedule Utilization Outside Full Day Time Off – This option redistributes the hours assigned for the month, excluding any full-day time off, while maintaining the total hours in the assignment. For example, if you assign 168 hours in a month and an employee takes one full day off, the system will redistribute those 8 hours across the remaining workdays. Thus, the daily workload will adjust, but the total assignment hours will remain at 168.

Schedule Utilization Outside Public Holidays

Reduce Utilization By Public Holidays - This option excludes public holidays when calculating an employee’s utilization. For example, if a team member is assigned 40 hours per week and a public holiday falls on a Monday, selecting this option will reduce the weekly utilization for that period to 32 hours. The daily utilization for the remaining working days, however, remains unchanged.

Schedule Utilization Outside Public Holidays – This option redistributes the scheduled hours for the month, ensuring no work is assigned on public holidays while maintaining the total hours in the assignment. For example, if you assign 168 hours in a month with one public holiday, the system will redistribute the 8 hours from that day across the remaining workdays, keeping the total monthly hours at 168.

How does it work in practice?
The number of hours you entered will remain unchanged in the assignment settings at the bottom. However, in the financial summary of the assignment at the top, you will see that the planned number of hours is reduced accordingly. Check the values under Scheduled - Work to see the adjusted hours.

Understanding "No Utilization" Assignments

The "No Utilization" setting allows you to assign an employee to a project without allocating any planned work hours. This approach can be useful in various scenarios where flexibility or specific cost/revenue separation is needed. Below are practical examples of when to use this setting:

1. Side Projects or Non-Billable Bench Assignments
   If you want an employee to log time on a side project or a non-billable bench project, "No Utilization" is an ideal option. For instance, if the employee will only work on the project when they are on the bench, you can assign them to the project without planning specific hours. The client should add a dedicated bench project for this purpose, allowing accurate time tracking.
   
   
2. Uncertainty About Overtime
   When unsure whether overtime will occur on a project, you can create an assignment with "No Utilization." This allows the employee to log their time as it happens, without pre-planning hours. The logged time will be calculated based on the details provided in the budget section.
   
   
3. Time & Materials Projects with Out-of-Charge Work
   In cases where the client pays for specific tasks, such as development, but not for others, like bug fixes, "No Utilization" can help separate costs and revenue. For example:
   
   
   • Create one assignment for the billable development work.
   • Create a second assignment with "No Utilization" for the non-billable bug fixes.
     This ensures that only the costs, not the revenue, are accounted for on the "No Utilization" assignment, enabling clear cost and revenue tracking for the project.

This flexibility ensures accurate resource management and financial planning, even in complex project scenarios.

Creating Bulk Assignments for the Entire Team

This way, you will open a separate "Search for Team Members" modal to browse employees and assign them to projects. Click the "Bulk Scheduling" button and select the staffers you want to create assignments for this project. A new "Create Assignment" modal will open, not including the financial summary that appears when planning an assignment for a single person.

Customizing Assignment Tiles Display

To better adapt Foresight Connect to the needs of various management models, we provide the ability to customize the assignment view. You can easily configure your calendar views to display the most relevant data, ensuring quick access to the information you need.

There are the following possibilities to customize assignment views: 

• You choose which data you want to display on assignment tiles.
• Configuration is specific to your account only.
• Configuring Assignment Settings affects the following calendars: Team Calendar (Calendar Tab), Projects (Calendar Tab), and Team Calendar (in Project Profile).
• The data set you can choose from is adjusted to the permissions you are granted.
• You can customize all three assignment views: Compact, Standard, and Extended.

Data Set List For All Permissions

In the list below, you can check the data set available for managers with all permissions granted:

• Avatar
• Client Name
• Note
• Default Role
• Project Role
• Label
• Work
• Scheduled Cost
• Scheduled Revenue

The data set differs depending on the view.

Setting Up an Assignment Display

To configure Assignment Display Settings, follow the steps below: 

Log in to the Manager Role ➡ Go to the left navigation bar ➡ Scroll to the bottom ➡ Click button ➡ Go to the My Settings section ➡ Scroll down to the Assignment Settings