Patent ID: 8612275

Claim:
A method of forecasting work hours per unit of time, comprising: estimating a total project hour budget for a project comprising a plurality of project phases; determining, with an analyzer stored as a set of computer readable instructions in a computer readable storage media and executable by a processor, a percentage of the total project hour budget to be expended in each of the plurality of project phases based on average percentages of project hour budgets expended in each project phase in completed projects; and distributing, with the analyzer, the project hour budget across a plurality of units of time based on the percentage of the project hour budget to be expended in each project phase, on the project hour budget, and on a schedule of project milestones, wherein distributing, with the analyzer, the project hour budget across each project phase is based on: estimate = { 100 ( P d ) ⁢ ( φ d ) } ⁢ { T ⁢ ⁢ φ % 100 } ⁢ LOE = LOE × T ⁢ ⁢ φ % P d × φ d ( 1 ) where P d is a total project duration, φ d is a percentage of the total project duration expended in each project phase, Tφ % is the percentage of the project hour budget to be expended in each project phase, and LOE is the total project hour budget for the project.