Effective way of Resource utilization on portfolio
Asked by Khawar Shahzad:

I am trying to use Portfolio to plan our development timelines and ensuring effective resource utilization. However, facing issue as resource utilization is not as per our expection.

We are developing mobile apps (iOS, Android) with app Backend (web services). The estimates for each tasks are already entered in Portfolio.

![Screen Shot 2017-08-17 at 8.27.16 AM.png](/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/4796i5C354EE7EE639D5A/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screen Shot 2017-08-17 at 8.27.16 AM.png")

In above example "Wishlist" is user story, with sub-tasks for each of iOS, Android and Backend. The estimate for iOS and Android tasks is 7 days, however estimate for Backend is 2 days.

Now as per my understanding, the Backend guy should start on next user story "Saving Payment Cards", after 2 days, and iOS/Android guys should keep on working on "Wishlist". But according to portfolio, the backend guy will start working on next feature after 7 days (when iOS/Android are also finished). Which is actually not correct, as he would have already finished his work in 2 days and will be sitting idle.

Is there any why to effectively use portflio in such scenerio?


Answers:
author: Bojana Mandic
body: One more thing I noticed is that even though we are allowed to place estimations on subtasks in Porfolio and the amount sums up correctly on a Story level the value does not refresh the state in Jira after committing the change. When I look at my ticket Estimate and remaining are still blank and all my Jira reports do not work correctly since I don't have a value in the Estimated field.

How to resolve that issue?


author: Allard van Helbergen
body: Hi [@Khawar Shahzad](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/1145912),

I would need more details than what I can see from the screenshot to know exactly what's going on, but it seems that there is a mix up between stages and skills.

Stages work in sequence, whereas skills work in parallel. You currently have one stage defined (which seems superfluous) and I can't which skills are defined.

This page explains how stages and skills work:

* <https://confluence.atlassian.com/jiraportfoliocloud/learn-stages-and-skills-828785388.html>

Perhaps it can help you.

Cheers,  
Allard

comments: author: Khawar Shahzad
body: Hi [@Allard van Helbergen](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/502350)

Thank you for reply. Here is more information:

There is 1 stage "Development", with 3 skills (iOS, Android, Backend)

![Screen Shot 2017-08-19 at 12.10.45 PM.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/4929iA92351DF386DE3B6/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screen Shot 2017-08-19 at 12.10.45 PM.png")This how the team is created.

![Screen Shot 2017-08-19 at 11.23.38 AM.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/4930iCF72D35B9D5FC396/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screen Shot 2017-08-19 at 11.23.38 AM.png")

This is the schedule with estimate for all iOS, Android and backend.

![Screen Shot 2017-08-19 at 12.13.08 PM.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/4931i404B8BC663DFF2E1/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screen Shot 2017-08-19 at 12.13.08 PM.png")

As you can see, estimate for "Wishlist - iOS" and "Wishlist - Android" is 7 days. However, the estimate for "Wishlist - BE" is 2 days.

What I want is that, backend developer should start on next task "Saving Payment Cards - BE", after 2 days, not 7 days. But according to portfolio, backend developer will start next task after 7 days (when iOS and Android is also finished with their task).


author: Khawar Shahzad
body: Hi [@Allard van Helbergen](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/502350)

Could you please help, as per information I provided? If I have one stage, then all the 3 skills should be parallel in this stage.

As per my observation it is already parallel, but resources are not moving to next feature, until all resources complete that a feature.


Tags: advanced-roadmaps