Resource Leveling and Resource Smoothing are among the tools and techniques used in project management.
They also factor into the PMP Exam, so if you’re planning to get your Project Management Professional certification, you’ll want to be familiar enough with the two concepts that you understand the differences between them.
In the Project Schedule Management knowledge area of the Planning process group, the PMBOK Guide, sixth edition, identifies five processes.
Develop Schedule is the last of those, and it has a ton of outputs — seven, to be exact — including the project schedule, the schedule baseline and schedule calendars.
Resource Optimization is one of eight tools and techniques used in this crucial process, and Resource Leveling and Resource Smoothing are types of Resource Optimization you can employ.
So what’s the difference between the two?
Difference Between Resource Leveling and Resource Smoothing
The end result is a key to remembering the difference:
- With Resource Leveling, you might need to adjust the critical path.
- With Resource Smoothing, there is no adjustment to the critical path.
More specifically, Resource Leveling involves adjusting activity start and finish dates based on the availability of required resources.
For example, if a key piece of equipment is only available for a specific timeframe, you might use Resource Leveling to adjust the planned start and finish dates of the activities that require those resources.
This, in turn, can require changes to your project schedule.
With Resource Smoothing, you attempt to use the free float and total float of an activity to account for resource availability.
This technique aims to keep the critical path, and therefore the project schedule, unaffected.