Detailed Employee Planning Tab

This section includes the fields and descriptions for the Detailed Employee Planning tab.

Allocation Island

Field	Description
Range	The two pop-up fields in this field determine the date range within which Maconomy should distribute hours in the detailed planning for the current employee when hours are specified in the field “Distribute Quantity” in the table part. In the first field, you can select an option determining the starting date of the date range. Note that if the date specified in the field “Never Before” below is before the starting date in this field, the distribution of hours will never be before that date, regardless of the option selected in this field. The default value of the first field is “Planned Starting Date,” but you can choose from the following options: First Within View — If you select this option, Maconomy will distribute the entered number of hours as from the first date within the selected planning span, that is, the date specified in the field “Start Date” in the island Plan. First Possible Starting Date — If you select this option, Maconomy will distribute the specified number of hours as from the date specified as the first possible starting date for the task. If no such date has been specified, the date specified in the field “Never Before” will be used. If that date is also blank, Maconomy will use the date specified in the field “Start Date” in the island Plan. Planned Starting Date — If you select this option, distribution of hours will take place as from the date specified as the planned starting date for the task. If no such date has been specified, the date specified in the field “Never Before” will be used. If that date is also blank, Maconomy will use the date specified in the field “Start Date” in the island Plan. In the other field of the range, you can select an option determining the ending date of the date range within which Maconomy should distribute hours in the detailed planning for the current employee when hours are specified in the field “Distribute Quantity” in the table part. The selected ending date of the range can never be before the starting date selected in the first option in this field or in the field “Never Before.” The default value of the field is “Within View,” but you can select among the following options: Last Within View — If you select this strategy, Maconomy will distribute the entered number of hours within a period of one month from the starting date selected in this island. Maconomy will distribute all hours equally within that month, even if this means that the employee in question will be assigned overtime working hours. If overtime is not allowed, Maconomy will issue an error message telling you that distribution of the specified number of hours on the employee in question is not possible. Planned Ending Date — If you select this strategy, Maconomy will distribute the specified number of hours within the period covered by the starting date selected in this island and the planned ending date entered on the line. If no planned ending date has been entered, there will be no upper limit for the period within which Maconomy will distribute the number of hours. If the number of hours cannot be distributed without resulting in overtime for a given employee, the allocation can only be carried out if overtime is allowed. Please note that the use of this strategy might mean that the hours allocated exceed the planning span. Last Possible Ending Date — This strategy corresponds to the strategy “Before Planned Ending Date” described above, only will Maconomy use the date specified as “Last possible ending date,” instead of the planned ending date. Note that regardless of the selected strategy, Maconomy will never distribute so many hours to a given employee on a given date that the total distribution for the employee on this date exceeds the employee’s maximum number of working hours for the date. The employee’s maximum working hours for a given date are found in the employee revision applying on the date in question. For further information about employee revisions, see “Date-Dependent Employee Revisions” in the introduction to the window Employees. In addition, Maconomy will never distribute hours on a task before the date specified in the field “Estimate Date” in the table part if an estimate has been specified for the task.
Never Before	In this field, you can enter a date. This date will be used as the starting date when Maconomy distributes hours specified in the field “Distribute Quantity” in the table part, regardless of whether any starting date has been specified in the first range field above. In other words, Maconomy will never distribute hours before the date in this field. By default, the date will be today’s date, but you can change it. If this date is blank, the first date used for distribution will be determined by the date specified in the field “Start Date” in the island Plan. Note that if you convert the allocation type of a planning line, either manually or by means of the actions in this window, allocations on dates before the date specified in this field will not be converted.
Method	In this field, you can select a distribution method to be used when allocating hours to a given employee. The following options are available: Early Allocation — If you select this option, Maconomy will allocate as many hours as possible as early in the plan as possible when a number of hours is specified in the field “Distribute Quantity” on a line in the table part of the window. If the specified number of hours cannot be allocated within the available planning time of the employee in question, you can choose that Maconomy should attempt to allocate the remaining number of hours on days off (for example, weekends) by marking the field “Include Days Off” in this island. If the specified number of hours still cannot be allocated as desired, you can choose how Maconomy should react to such situations in the field “Unattainable.” Even Allocation — If you select this option, Maconomy will allocate the number of hours specified in the field “Distribute Quantity” evenly on the line within the time span defined in the window. If the specified number of hours cannot be allocated within the available planning time of the employee in question, you can choose whether or not Maconomy should attempt to allocate the remaining number of hours on days off (for example, weekends) by marking the field “Include Days Off” in this island. If the specified number of hours still cannot be allocated as desired, you can choose how Maconomy should react to such situations in the field “Unattainable.” Fixed Allocation — If you select this option, a fixed number of hours can be allocated to each unit within the plan from a specified starting date until a specified ending date, or until all requested hours have been allocated. The number of hours to be allocated on a planning line with repeating allocation is specified in the field “Fixed Number of Hours.” Within the planning span, the hours are applied to the days as if the distribution method “Early Allocation” had been selected.
Fixed Number of Hours	If the distribution method “Fixed Allocation” has been selected, you must specify the number of hours to be repeatedly allocated to each day in this field. See the above description of the distribution method “Fixed Allocation” for further information on the functionality of this field.
Include Days Off	If you mark this field, Maconomy will include days off for the allocation of the hours specified. Specifying that days off should be considered implies that if all hours specified cannot be distributed on working days, including any allowed overtime registered for the employee in question, Maconomy will attempt to distribute any remainder of hours on days off (nonworking days, for example, weekends). If only part of the hours can be allocated this way, Maconomy will issue an error message. If this field is not marked, days off are considered equal to absence days, on which no hours can be allocated to an employee. Note that this option cannot be selected for the distribution method “Fixed Allocation.”
Unattainable	In this field, you can choose how the system should react if a requested number of hours cannot be allocated to the employee in question. You can select one of the following two options: Cancel Allocation — If you select this option, the requested allocation is automatically cancelled, and Maconomy will issue an error message. Allocate Best Number of Hours — If you select this option, Maconomy will attempt to allocate as many hours as possible in accordance with the specifications entered in the window. The hours which could not be allocated will automatically be cut off, and Maconomy will issue a message informing you how many hours were allocated and how many hours were cut off.

Delete Allocation Island

Field

Description

Date Range

In these fields, you can enter a date range. This date range specifies the period for which allocations will be deleted or reallocated, respectively, for the current employee when selecting the action “Delete Allocations” or “Replace Employee.” This date range will always be used in connection with these two actions, regardless of the time span selected. The default values of these fields cover the period from the current date to the end of the time span specified, but you can change the dates as required. Note, however, that if you leave the first or last of these two fields blank, all allocations included in the selection criteria and assigned to the current employee, if any, will be deleted/reallocated backward or forward in time, respectively.

Replace Allocation Island

Field	Description
New Employee No.	In this field, you must specify the number of the employee to whom the hours allocated to the current employee should be transferred when the action “Replace Employee” is selected. Only employees with the Hour time unit can be selected.
Name	This field displays the name of the employee specified in the field “New Employee No.” above.

Redistribute Allocation Island

Field

Description

Keep Distribution

This field is used in connection with the action “Replace Employee” to specify whether or not the hours to be transferred to a new employee should be reallocated using the existing allocation of hours on days. If this field is marked, the allocations in question will be transferred directly to the new employee with no changes to the existing allocation of hours on days; that is, for each day only the employee will be changed; not the number of hours allocated. If this field is not marked, the existing allocations will be transferred to the new employee within the period in which the hours were originally allocated. The hours to be reallocated will be transferred in either of two ways: If an identical planning line already exists for the employee, the hours will be reallocated automatically within the period in question. If an identical line does not exist, the system will create a planning line, and the hours to be reallocated will be added to the value of the field “Distribute Quantity” on the line. See also the description of the action “Replace Employee.”

Properties Island

Field	Description
Use Previous Ranges	In this field, you can select which range of job budget lines should be included when the action “Create Plan from Job Budgets” is used. This field is also used for determining which planning lines should be shown in the table part of the window. If you mark this field, Maconomy will include all job budget lines on which the date in the field “First Possible Starting Date” in the window Job Budgets is earlier than the last date of the selected planning section. If you do not mark this field, the date specified in the field “Planned Starting Date” will be used instead of the date in the field “First Possible Starting Date.”
Ignore Blank Dates	This field is used in connection with the field “Use Previous Ranges” above. If you mark this field, Maconomy will not include planning lines having a blank value in the field “First Possible Starting Date.” Alternatively, if the field “Use Previous Ranges” is not marked, Maconomy will not include planning lines having a blank value in the field “Planned Starting Date.”
Resolve Exceeding Task Alloc.	In this field, you can specify the strategy to be used in cases when more hours have been planned on a given task in this window than specified on the job budget line that forms the basis of the planning. If you select a strategy in this field, Maconomy will try to solve the situation by removing the excess hours from one or more of those employees to whom hours on the task have been distributed in one of the following ways: Remove Smallest Allocations First — If you select this strategy, Maconomy will remove hours from the employee(s) who have been allocated the fewest number of hours on the task in a slot (if there are allocations of hours which are not provided with a specification of an employee, these allocations will always be removed first). If, for example, employee A has been allocated a total of 100 hours on the task (with, for example, 0.5 hours on a Friday), and another employee has been allocated a total of 10 hours (2 days of 5 hours), Maconomy will remove the half-hour from employee A, as this is the smallest single allocation. Remove Most Loaded First — If you select this strategy, Maconomy will reduce the number of hours for those employees who have been allocated the most hours, compared to the defined planning time. Allocations of hours with a specification of an employee are removed before allocations without a specification of an employee. When there are more allocations with the same value, Maconomy will select the employees who do not have the employee category specified for the task as their primary category. See the description of planning time in the “Central Concepts of Resource Planning” in the introduction to this module for information about the calculation of planning time. Remove External First — If you select this strategy, Maconomy will reduce the number of hours for the employees who are not assigned to the company being responsible for the job in question, and who are, therefore, regarded as external. In situations where there are several external employees, Maconomy will select the employees who do not have the employee category specified for the task as their primary category. When all task allocations for these employees have been deducted, and if there are still excess task allocations, Maconomy will use the strategy “Remove Most Loaded First” as described above. As the default, this field has the value specified for the corresponding field in the window System Information. However, the value can be changed manually in this window. Note that if an estimated time-to-completion has been specified for a task, Maconomy will only remove allocations on the task that are after the estimate date. In addition, Maconomy will never remove hours allocated on dates before the date specified in the field “Never Before” in the island Allocation.

Employee Information Island

Field	Description
Employee No.	This field shows the number of the current employee.
Name	This field shows the name of the employee in the field “Employee No.”

Plan Island

Field	Description
Start Date	In this field, you can specify the date on which the detailed planning should start.

Selection Criteria Island

Field	Description
Show Lines	In this field, you can mark whether or not the table part of the window should show the lines matching the criteria specified in this island. For performance reasons, it can be advantageous not to have lines shown before all selection criteria have been specified.
Empl. Category No.	In these fields, you can enter a range of employee category numbers. Only planning lines assigned to employee category numbers within the specified range will be shown in the table part of the window.
Project Manager No.	In this field, you can enter a project manager number. Only planning lines assigned to jobs having the specified employee as project manager will be shown in the table part of the window.
Job No.	In these fields, you can enter a range of job numbers. Only planning lines assigned to job numbers within the specified range will be shown in the table part of the window.
Company No.	In these fields, you can enter a range of company numbers. Only planning lines assigned to company numbers within the specified range will be shown in the table part of the window.
Activity No.	In these fields, you can enter a range of activity numbers. Only planning lines assigned to activity numbers within the specified range will be shown in the table part of the window.
Task	In these fields, you can enter a range of task numbers. Only planning lines assigned to task numbers within the specified range will be shown in the table part of the window.
Booking Type	In this field, you can select one of the three booking types “Preliminary,” “Requested,” or “Confirmed.” Only planning lines having the specified booking type will be shown in the table part of the window and will be affected when you select the actions “Delete Allocations,” “Replace Employee,” or one of the three actions for converting the booking type. If this field is left blank, planning lines with allocations of any of the three types will be shown in the table part and will be affected by the above actions. For more information about booking types, see “Booking Type.”

Transfer to Slot Island

Field	Description
Started	In this field, you can enter a starting time which you want to transfer to the planning slot. If you enter a starting time in this field, it will be transferred to the planning slot when you change the number of hours for a day on a line in the table part of the window. Once the starting time has been transferred to the planning slot, the field is cleared so that you do not accidentally transfer the starting time to other planning slots. Note that you can only transfer a starting time when the planning unit is “Day.” The times can be viewed and edited in the window Employee Calendars.
Finished	In this field, you can enter a finishing time which you want to transfer to the planning slot. For more information, see the description of the field “Started” above. Note that you cannot enter a starting and a finishing time at the same time.
Remarks	In this field, you can enter a remark which you want to transfer to the planning slot. For more information, see the description of the field “Started” above.