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22 Project Foundation Configuration: Define Project Resources

This chapter contains the following:

Manage Job Mappings

Manage Resource Class Attributes

Manage Job Mappings

Job Mapping: Explained

Job mapping enables you to associate granular human resource jobs to less-detailed project jobs that you can use for project management.

Job titles usually reflect human resource characteristics and can vary across countries or units, even within the same enterprise. For example, you may have a project manager in the United States and a chef de projet in France. However, when managing projects, especially global ones, you may want to use the same job definitions for all resources rather than unique jobs that are defined by each resource-owning organization. These common, or global, jobs ease the maintenance of costing rates and processes.

Following is a description of job mapping and a brief example.

Mapping Jobs

You map jobs from two job sets through an intermediate job set. That is, you must map jobs in your human resource jobs sets to jobs from an intermediate set of jobs. You then map the jobs in the intermediate job set to jobs in your project job sets.

For each combination of From Job Set, Intermediate Job Set, and To Job Set, you manually associate the intermediate job to the to job only once. For subsequent mappings, the to job is displayed automatically when you select the intermediate job and cannot be modified.

For example, and as illustrated in the following diagram, assume you want to map jobs from Human Resources Job Set to Projects Job Set through an intermediate job set called Master Job Set. Within the Human Resources Job Set, you want to map jobs Construction Worker and Forklift Operator to a single job called Laborer in the Projects Job set.

You first select Construction Worker as the from job, Master Laborer as the intermediate job, and Laborer as the to job. The intermediate job Master Laborer and the to job Laborer are now linked. Next, when you select Forklift Operator as the to job and Master Laborer as the intermediate job, Laborer is displayed automatically as the to job.

After you map the jobs, you can use the single job Laborer for project management purposes.

FAQs for Manage Job Mappings

How can I map a human resource job to a project job?

For example, you can map the human resources jobs Construction Worker and Forklift Operator to a single projects job called Laborer through the intermediate job Master Laborer. After you have mapped your jobs, you can use the single job Laborer for your project management purposes.

What's a job set?

An organizational partition of jobs. Use job sets to define how you create and use jobs in your business. You can define a single set of jobs and use them across your business. Alternatively, you can create separate job sets for each country or line of business.

For example, assume that the set of jobs your business uses for project management is less granular than that used to define human resource jobs for employees. You can define generic jobs for your project job set and map it to the human resource job sets. Associating the project job set with planning, reporting, and billing resource breakdown structures then ensures appropriate project reporting, costing, invoicing, and revenue generation.

Manage Resource Class Attributes

Resource Formats and Resource Classes: How They Work Together to Create Planning Resources

The resources you can create for planning and billing resource breakdown structures are determined by a combination of predefined resource classes and the resource format hierarchies you select for use.

Resource Formats and Resource Format Hierarchies

Before creating planning or billing resources, you must select the resource formats and resource format hierarchies you want to use on your resource breakdown structure. For example, if you want to plan for project-related expenses such as air fare, then you must select resource format hierarchies created using the resource type Expenditure Type.

Also, as resource format hierarchies support up to three levels, selecting from the available hierarchies enables you to determine the granularity with which resources are created.

For example, for planning resource breakdown structures used for high-level or preliminary planning, you may decide to enable only the Resource Class resource format. You can then create and use planning resources representing the four resource classes: Labor, Equipment, Material Items, and Financial Resources.

To plan in greater detail, you may decide to use a two-level resource format hierarchy, such as Resource Class: Job or a three-level hierarchy such as Resource Class: Job: Named Person. You can then create a resource such as Labor: Electrical Engineer or Labor: Electrical Engineer: Chris Black.

Note

Selecting more granular resource formats automatically selects resource formats higher up within the same hierarchy. For example, if you select the resource format Expenditure Type: Named Person: Job, then the resource formats Expenditure Type: Named Person and Expenditure Type are automatically selected for use.

Resource Classes

Resource classes influence the creation of planning and billing resources in the following ways:

Resource class as a resource format: As mentioned earlier, Resource Class is a resource type that is available for use within resource format hierarchies on planning and billing resource breakdown structures.
Predefined association with resource formats: For each resource format, you can create planning or billing resources based on certain resource classes. For example, if the resource format contains Job, then the only available resource class is Labor. However, if the resource format is Expenditure Category, then you can select any of the resource classes (Labor, Material, Equipment, and Financial Resources) when you create a resource.

Resource Classes: Explained

Resource classes are predefined classification of resources. For each resource class, you can define specific attributes that associated planning resources inherit.

Following is a description of the available resource classes and their attributes.

Available Resource Classes

The resource classes available in Oracle Fusion Projects are as follows:

Resource Class	Description
Labor	Named persons or any grouping of named persons whose time capacity is consumed to complete project work. Named persons may be grouped by attributes such as job, organization, or role.
Equipment	Nonperson resource such as machinery, equipment, or facilities with time capacity that is consumed to complete project work. Examples include telecommunication charges (charged by call), or shared facilities or laboratory (charged for hours used).
Material items	Resources that are physically tracked as inventory, subassembly, work in progress (WIP), purchasable items, or finished goods.
Financial resources	Resources that have a financial value for the project. These resources use Currency as the unit of measure.

Resource Class Attributes

The attributes you can define for each resource class are as follows:

Attribute	Description
Spread curve	Determines how planned amounts for a planning resource are spread across the duration of the project or financial plan. You can change the spread curve that you select for a resource class at the planning resource level and for any corresponding task assignments, or budget or forecast lines.
Item master and category set	Determine the material item and item category lists used in planned transactions and planning, billing, and reporting resource breakdown structures.
Expenditure types	Determine default raw and burdened rates for a planning resource. For example, if the resource format does not contain an expenditure type or nonlabor resource, then the application uses the default expenditure type for the resource class of the resource to determine the rates. You must individually specify expenditure types for project units.

Attribute

Description

Spread curve

Determines how planned amounts for a planning resource are spread across the duration of the project or financial plan.

You can change the spread curve that you select for a resource class at the planning resource level and for any corresponding task assignments, or budget or forecast lines.

Item master and category set

Determine the material item and item category lists used in planned transactions and planning, billing, and reporting resource breakdown structures.

Expenditure types

Determine default raw and burdened rates for a planning resource. For example, if the resource format does not contain an expenditure type or nonlabor resource, then the application uses the default expenditure type for the resource class of the resource to determine the rates.

You must individually specify expenditure types for project units.

Resource Class Rate Schedules

Create rate schedules for resource classes that you can use for project and financial planning. When creating resource class rate schedules, you can specify both rates and markup percentages for each combination of resource class and organization.

Note

Markup percentage takes precedence for amount-based transactions where the unit of measure is Currency.

You specify a resource class rate schedule in the planning options for a financial or project plan type, project plan, or financial plan version as the source for rates or markup percentages, unless they are available elsewhere. For example, assume you are using actual rates on your financial plan version. If one of the planning resources is an expenditure category, then resource class rate schedules are used to derive rates for that resource because actual rates are not maintained for expenditure categories.