Resources are the executors of your planning. Resources can be your employees, machines and/or spaces. Resources are linked to stages on the board. This way you know exactly which resource is available in which stage. Because a resource has a schedule, the resource’s hours are linked to the stage on the board. The total availability of resources in a stage on a given day is called the capacity. This article explains how to create resources and resource groups, and how to archive or delete resources.

A new resource can be added quickly and easily. Go to the Settings by clicking the gear icon in the top right corner. Then select Resources in the left-hand menu. You will now arrive at the page where you can manually add resources. Your resources that are automatically imported from your ERP system will already be visible on this page. You will also see two options here: resources and groups.

Behind the heading Resources you will see the plus sign (+) to add new resources. Give the resource a name, optionally a description, and select a type. Since vPlan recognizes employees, machines and spaces as resource types, it is possible to link three types of capacity to a stage. This allows people, machines and spaces to all work within the same stage, each with their own capacity.

Operational

Under the operational section, you set a start and end date for your resource.

Schedule

Here you enter the resource’s schedule. There are two options:

With a weekly schedule, the resource works the same number of hours every week. Enter per weekday how many hours the resource is available that day.

You can also use a multi-weekly schedule. This allows you to set up a schedule consisting of multiple weeks that repeat automatically.

You can create up to four weeks. Click the green plus icon to add an extra week. For each week, enter the availability per day.

In addition to the available hours, you also choose the start date of the multi-week schedule. From that date onward, vPlan starts repeating the schedules.

Boards

When creating a resource, you can immediately link it to the appropriate boards.

Select the relevant boards and indicate in which stages this resource is available.

Click Save to permanently add the resource. You can now schedule this resource on the days you have indicated it is available.

To add a new group, click the plus sign behind groups. You will now arrive on the page where you can enter the details. Give the group a name and click Add resource to link resources to a group. Resources can be linked to multiple groups. Select the resources you want to add to this group. Once you have selected all resources, click Close. To unlink a resource, move your cursor over the resource’s avatar. A cross icon will appear. Click the cross icon to unlink the resource. To add a group, click the Save button.

In the resource overview on the board, it is possible to filter by created groups. We also have a special group view where you can sort the timeline or list view by groups.

There are two ways to organize your planning by groups:

Whether you are working in calendar, timeline, list view, kanban, or all of them: everywhere you can filter your planning by a specific group. You simply open the vPlan filter, which you can find in the top right corner of every view.

In the filter, you can choose which group’s planning you want to view by checking one or more groups. Then click Apply on the left side of the filter to filter the planning by the selected group.
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When a planning card is assigned to multiple resources that belong to different groups, the card will still be shown regardless of which of those groups is selected in the filter.

Filtering by resource groups can also be combined with other filters, such as filtering by card status. Want to know which orders the Machines group still has open? Then filter by the Machines group and the Open status.

The Timeline and List view in vPlan can be displayed at group level. This works the same as displaying your planning by stages, resources, or collections. In the top right menu of the timeline and list view, you will find this option.
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When you click it, your planning is sorted by the resource groups you have configured.
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When an employee leaves the company or a machine is decommissioned, you may want to archive it. This preserves the history of the resource, but it will no longer appear in your settings or current planning.

To archive resources, go to the Settings by clicking the gear icon in the top right. Then click Resources in the left-hand menu. You will now see an overview of all your resources. Select one or more resources you want to archive using the checkboxes at the start of each row and click the Archive button at the top.

The resource will now disappear from the list, and also from your board if it was linked there. The resource can no longer be selected in your current planning, but it will still be visible in historically planned cards and events within a card.

If you want to restore archived resources, you can make them visible by enabling the Archived filter at the top of the page. Then click one of the archived resources (not the checkbox, but the title) to open it, and you can either restore it or permanently delete it.