How to Get Resource Loading Histogram/S Curve in Primavera P6

The resource histogram allows us to use projected and historical actualized data to trend resource quantities, resource hours and cost in future. It also allows us to determine the potential risks of excessive supply of resources or lack of resource requirement.

This tutorial demonstrates how resources allocation chart (histogram/S curve) is produced in Primavera P6.  Assume that you have done “Assigned activities and Sequenced activities to see resource loading histogram/S curve bar chart in Primavera P6. After assigning and sequencing of activities,

(1) Allocate overall resource and their rated cost
(2) Assign resources in activity detail section and
(3) View resource loading histogram/S curve.

1) How to allocate overall resources and cost?

a)   Go to Enterprise > Resource >

Note: When you are at Resource, you will see the filter name “Current Project Resources” If you have already opened a resource loaded project. See figure below

A blank project resource dictionary only will be displayed if no resource has been added to current project. See below image.

  

b) Add New Resource (Note : If the existing resources are not applicable for a specific project or no resource has been assigned to current project.You can skip this step if the required resources are available in resource dictionary.)

When you try to add new resource, you will get the message like “In order to add resource, the filter will be changed to display all resources” and you will see all resources for all the projects. New Resource Wizard will be prompted, and follow the wizard. You will be asked to enter the following,

• Resource ID,
• Resource Name,
• Allocate Resource Type (Labor, Non labor and material),
• Rate (Price/Unit), Default Units/Time and Max Units/Time,
• Contact address if applicable
• Resource roles which describes their skills
• Resource Calendar
• Select “Auto- compute if you want actual units are updated by Primavera or select “Do not auto-compute actual” if you can update manually for actual man hours spent.
• Timesheets set up and log in

After entering of all data, you will notice that the newly added resources are not in the desired location. Therefore, allocate those resources according to their resource level. For example, Pipe fitter, Rigger/Signaler, General worker, Fire watches man, Workshop labor, Painter, etc are allocated under construction department of Petrochemical Projects. See figure below.

2) How to assign resources in activity detail section?

Go to Activities page > Select the activity > Go to Resource tab which is next to Relationships tab > Add Resource which is located near the bottom of activity detail box > Select required resource and assign it. You may also assign resource details such ; resource curve, budgeted units and actual units.

3) How to view and print resource histogram and S curve?

(a)  Go to Activities page > Select Resource usage profile, and then you will see “Current Project’s Resources” Column on the left and histogram and bar chart on the right side of the layout. The individual loading chart, for instance, welder’s resource profile is shown in the following figure.

Remember that you are not able to view both materials and labor or non labor histogram bar chart at the same time as they do not have the same unit of measure. You will be able to view material resource curve, both labor and non labor curve , labor or non labor curve each time individually.

b)   You can customize the appearance of bar chart by the Resource Usage Profile Options.  Right Click on the bar chart area to find Resource Usage Profile Options. You can select “By date” to see interval data (Histogram Chart) and select “Cumulative (S Curve) to see total manpower unit in the following check box below.

c)   The following check box is used when you want to show manpower resource profile instead of man hour unit. P6 will calculate total men per period (interval) based on working hrs per period (interval) and total man hours per period. For example, total men per week would be 10 when total man hours for a week are 400 and 40 working hrs per week.

d)    And then, select all resources in resource column to view overall man power allocation. To print the bar chart, Go to print preview > page set up > Options > Select “Profile” and unselect Activity Table, All columns, Grid lines and Gantt chart. Set the time scale start from “PS-Earliest Project Start” to “PF-Latest Project Finish”. Finally you will see the bar chart as below.

e) According to above bar chart, the weekly interval manpower is shown on the left side and total manpower allocation is on the right side.

f) One of the reason for viewing resource histogram is to identify overallocated resources against the available resources. To view any overallocated resources in your project, go to Data tag on "Resource Usage Profile Options" window, then select Show Limit and Show Overallocation. Any resource unit above the limit line (black line) is over allocated. Normally, overallocated resource is shown in red bar. see below snapshots.



 

How to view "Stacked Histogram?

You can also see “Stacked Histogram” for this manpower allocation. Right Click on the bar chart area to find “Stacked Histogram”. Firstly, click on "Stacked Histogram" tag, and then you can go to "Resource Usage Profile Options" to get screen shot in step-g. See figure below.

Go to Resource Profile options > Assign Resource Filter/Group Name > Select   Total cumulative curve as shown in Figure below.

Finally, you will get Stacked Histogram as shown in below. The stacked histogram represents the manpower allocation by individual trade/discipline for a particular period as well as total manpower allocation (total manpower = 200 men, see the following figure) for all time . It can be printed the same way done on item 3, d.

When Stacked histogram is viewed, one thing to take note is "Overallocated Resource" can't be identified on that view. Switch back to normal histogram by deselecting "Stacked Histogram" so as to analyse overallocated resources. 

Are you working on multiple projects environment ? 

Go to "Open" select all projects that you wish to view resource profile by pressing and holding control key if you are handling multiple projects. 

There are the related posts (1) Tutorial-How to generate S curve/histogram from Primavera, P6 which describes how the progress (histogram curve/S curve) are produced using P6 export excel data (2) Creating discipline wise manpower histogram using Primavera P6 export data .