Use Cases

How different teams use Resources Planner

A forward-demand board has roughly the same shape whether you’re a PMO managing a portfolio, a department head balancing BAU against project work, or a finance partner forecasting effort across the year. What changes is the rhythm of how the board gets used, who owns each row, and where the squeeze tends to surface. The patterns below are the scenarios we expect Resources Planner to be used for first; the product underneath is the same in each case.

One board, every project, every quarter

Programme offices need a single view of demand across the portfolio that doesn't rely on chasing project managers for spreadsheets. Resources Planner gives the PMO a board it owns, fed by the team leads who own the demand items they raise.

Portfolio demand board

Every project’s demand on one board, grouped by Team and Role, across the next four to eight quarters. Programme reviews open with the picture already loaded, not assembled from emails.

Squeeze surfaces quarterly

The red cells flag where a particular team-role-quarter intersection is over-allocated. Programme decisions land before slip dates do.

BAU plus project work, on one row each

Department heads carry both ongoing operational work and a flow of project demand. Resources Planner puts both on the same board so the conversation with the team is "here's the total" rather than "here's the project bit, you know the BAU bit".

BAU as a demand item

Steady-state operational work is captured as a recurring demand item per team-role-quarter, so it sits in the same column as project demand and the capacity comparison reflects the actual load.

Team owner accountability

Each row’s team owner sees their team’s loading at a glance. Capacity adjustments (leavers, joiners, sabbaticals) are entered against the matching quarter and the board reflects them immediately.

Sequencing dependencies across teams

Programme delivery often hits trouble because two workstreams need the same team in the same quarter, and nobody surfaced the conflict before the budget round. Resources Planner makes the conflict visible from the moment the demand items land in the same cell.

Cross-workstream visibility

Demand items from different workstreams sharing the same team-role-quarter sit in the same cell. The total tells you whether the sequencing assumption still holds.

Linked to the decision that set the sequence

On Standard tier or higher, demand items can reference the Decision Planner record that set the sequencing decision. The audit trail follows the work, not just the workbook.

The same demand numbers, into the forecast model

Finance partners need a credible view of forward effort to feed their forecast model. Resources Planner gives them a board they can trust and a SharePoint list they can export from, with the audit trail already in place.

Standard SharePoint export

Both lists export to Excel via the standard SharePoint export path. The forecast model picks up the numbers; the board stays the single source of truth.

Same effort numbers across teams

When the same demand item is referenced in finance’s forecast and in the team’s planning, both sides are working from the same record. Reconciliation conversations get shorter.

One board, every project, every quarter

Portfolio demand board

Every project’s demand on one board, grouped by Team and Role, across the next four to eight quarters. Programme reviews open with the picture already loaded, not assembled from emails.

Squeeze surfaces quarterly

The red cells flag where a particular team-role-quarter intersection is over-allocated. Programme decisions land before slip dates do.

BAU plus project work, on one row each

BAU as a demand item

Steady-state operational work is captured as a recurring demand item per team-role-quarter, so it sits in the same column as project demand and the capacity comparison reflects the actual load.

Team owner accountability

Each row’s team owner sees their team’s loading at a glance. Capacity adjustments (leavers, joiners, sabbaticals) are entered against the matching quarter and the board reflects them immediately.

Sequencing dependencies across teams

Cross-workstream visibility

Demand items from different workstreams sharing the same team-role-quarter sit in the same cell. The total tells you whether the sequencing assumption still holds.

Linked to the decision that set the sequence

On Standard tier or higher, demand items can reference the Decision Planner record that set the sequencing decision. The audit trail follows the work, not just the workbook.

The same demand numbers, into the forecast model

Standard SharePoint export

Both lists export to Excel via the standard SharePoint export path. The forecast model picks up the numbers; the board stays the single source of truth.

Same effort numbers across teams

When the same demand item is referenced in finance’s forecast and in the team’s planning, both sides are working from the same record. Reconciliation conversations get shorter.

The same shape, every quarter

What every scenario has in common is the rhythm. Demand items get raised. Capacity entries get adjusted as the team changes. The board reflects both, with the traffic-light cells lighting up where the squeeze is. The questions the board answers are the same questions PMOs and capacity managers have always asked; what changes is that the answer is in one place, kept current by the people closest to the work, and visible to everyone who needs it.

Resources Planner doesn’t own the data. Demand items and capacity slots live in SharePoint lists you already govern. Removing the web part leaves both lists exactly where they are, with their content unchanged.

What this enables

One shared view of forward demand, across every team and quarter
Capacity gaps surfaced in the quarter they appear, not three quarters later
Audit trail by default: status lifecycle, change reasons, and SharePoint version history
A common record finance, PMO, and team owners can all read from

Why it feels low risk

Two SharePoint lists you already govern
No parallel system, no shadow database
Existing permissions, retention, and Microsoft Graph all keep working
Removing Resources Planner leaves both lists unchanged

Want to see where the squeeze is, before slip dates do?

Resources Planner is available free on the Microsoft Marketplace, with a 30-day Enterprise licence included so you can try every feature.

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