Workload

Workload shows your team’s capacity against the work allocated to them. Each person has a row with their available hours, the hours allocated on projects, and the time they’re off. Use it to allocate people to projects, spot who’s over or free, cover work when someone is away, and plan ahead with job roles before you know who’ll do the work. Open Workload from the sidebar. Guests don’t see it.

Read the planner

Each row shows a person’s name, job role, and their allocated and available hours for the dates in view, for example 5h / 37.5h. The total turns red when they’re allocated beyond what they have. In Days columns, each working day is a small square:

• The fill shows how much of the day is Allocated.
• Over is red: more is allocated than the person has that day.
• Off but allocated has a red border: work is allocated on a day the person is away.
• Time off shows as an icon, such as Holiday, Sick, Parental leave, Bank holiday or Office closed. A Part day off is frosted across the top.
• Days the person doesn’t work are faint.

Hover a day to see its hours: how much is free, allocated or tentative, or why the person is off. Click a day to see what’s allocated on it in the day tile, and edit or add allocations from there. Click a red day to open what needs a decision in the sidebar. Click a person’s name to expand their row. Each project gets a lane with that person’s allocations as bars, and their cards appear under the allocations.

Allocate hours

To allocate someone to a project, do one of these:

• Select New allocation at the top of Workload, then choose who and the project in the dialog.
• Click an empty day, or drag across days on a person’s row.
• Select + next to their name.
• Click + in the day tile.

In the dialog:

1. Choose who in Person or role and the Project. Projects that are in progress come first, then those not started, then the backlog. Done and cancelled projects are hidden: select Show N done or cancelled projects at the bottom of the list to see them, or search for one.
2. Set the Start date and End date, or tick No end date for ongoing work.
3. In Measured as, choose Per day, Per week, Per month or Total, then enter the hours. Per day has Full day and Half day shortcuts. Total needs an end date.
4. Choose a Status: Confirmed, or Tentative for work that’s pencilled in. Tentative allocations are dashed, and their hours don’t use up free time or count as overtime until they’re confirmed.
5. Select Save.

The dialog shows how many hours the allocation adds up to, how much free time the person has then, and any overtime it would add. Under More options you can name the allocation, set whether it’s Billable, and add a description. When you allocate someone who isn’t on the project yet, the dialog offers to add them to the project’s members, so they can see its cards. It’s ticked by default.

Plan ahead with job roles

You can allocate hours to a job role before you know who’ll do the work, for example “Project A needs a designer for 4h a day”.

1. Start an allocation as usual, or in Group by Job role select + on the role’s header.
2. In Person or role, choose a role under Job roles: choose someone later.
3. Fill in the project, dates and hours, and select Save.

Each role with hours allocated like this gets an Unassigned row above the people. Its days show the hours that still need someone. Click the row to see its allocations by project. To give the hours to someone:

• Drag the allocation onto their row, or
• Open the allocation and choose them in Person or role. People with that role are listed first, with their free hours.

The allocation then becomes theirs, with the usual check for overtime. You can choose someone who doesn’t have the role; Superthread notes it, for example “Designer isn’t their job role”, so it’s clear when you look back. Unassigned hours count towards a project’s allocated hours. They don’t use anyone’s capacity until someone is assigned, but in Group by Job role they count against the role’s combined free time, so you can see whether you have enough designers.

Change an allocation

• Move an allocation by dragging its bar, including onto another person’s row. Cards due in that period move with it.
• Resize it by dragging its start or end.
• Edit it by clicking the bar. Delete is in the dialog.
• With a bar focused, Alt + arrow keys move it and Alt + Shift + arrow keys change its end.

Every change shows a message with Undo. If a change would put someone over capacity, Superthread asks first. You can spread the work over more days so it fits, Assign anyway, or Cancel, pick someone else.

Change the view

• Pick the dates from the range button, or use Today and the arrows. Presets run from This week to Next quarter.
• Filter by Project or Person, or search people by name.
• Layout sets:
  • Show in: Hours or Days.
  • Group by: Person, Job role or Project.
  • Columns: Days or Weeks.
  • Hide weekends: leaves out weekend days nobody works.

Group by Job role

People are grouped under their job role, with each group’s combined allocated and available hours per day or week. One person’s free time absorbs another’s overtime, so you can see whether a role as a whole has room. Every job role is listed, including ones nobody has yet, so you can plan for a role you’re still hiring for (roles nobody has are left out while you search or filter). Select + on a role’s header to allocate hours to it.

Group by Project

Each project gets a row comparing the hours allocated on it with the hours it needs, marked Short, Covered or More than needed. Only confirmed allocations count. A project’s needed hours come from its budgets, one in charge on any day:

• On the days a recurring budget runs, each period’s hours are spread over that period’s working days (a period the budget only partly covers gets a share of the hours, spread over the days it runs).
• On the project’s other days between its start and due dates, its time budget is spread over the working days no recurring budget covers.

So a project whose recurring budget ends partway through the month is planned from its time budget for the rest of it. Projects with no budget in the dates you’re viewing show Set budget; projects with a budget but no dates show Add dates. To plan a project that has nothing in view yet, select Add project below the projects and choose it. It isn’t offered while you’re filtering to one project. The project’s row stays while the page is open, and after that whenever it has allocations in view. Expand a project to see the people and roles allocated to it. Drag across a project’s days to allocate to that project. Job roles are listed before people, as you often don’t know who’ll do the work yet, and people whose job role is already on the project come first among the people.

What needs you

The sidebar lists what needs a decision in the dates you’re viewing:

• Needs someone: budget hours nobody is allocated to yet. Drag them onto a person to allocate them.
• Off but allocated: work allocated while someone is away. Select Suggest someone to see who could take it, or move it to the person’s next working days.
• Over: weeks where someone is allocated beyond their capacity. Suggest someone else, or push the allocation a week.
• Outside project dates: allocations that start before or run past their project’s dates. Fit to dates proposes moves that fit.
• Who’s free: people with the most free time.

Propose all suggests moves for everything at once: covering absences first, then overtime. Nothing changes until you accept. Accept or revert moves one by one, or select Accept all or Discard. When a project’s dates change, the project’s sidebar offers to review its allocations in Workload.

Time off

Add time off for someone from the Time off tab when you start an allocation: choose the dates, a reason (Holiday, Sick or Off), and for a single day, whether it’s the morning or afternoon. If your workspace is connected to CharlieHR, approved leave, working weeks, offices and company holidays sync from there instead. Synced time off can only be changed in CharlieHR, and the planner shows when it last synced. Admins can sync again from the planner. Who sees why someone is off is a workspace setting: admins and the person, or everyone. Others see Away.

Settings

Workspace owners and admins set up what the planner works from in Settings > Resourcing, or from the ⋯ menu in Workload:

• Working time: the default working week and day length, locations with their public holidays, office closures, and who sees why someone is off.
• Roles and rates: job roles with their rates, rules that give people a role from their HR job title, and each person’s role and own rate. Admins can also change someone’s role from their row in the planner.
• Time tracking: billable defaults, privacy and time categories.

CharlieHR is connected from Settings > Features > Integrations.