Best Resource Management Software Shortlist
These are the tools I’ve selected after assessing their resource allocation capabilities.
Our one-on-one guidance will help you find the perfect fit.
Choosing the right people, for the right projects, at the right time is essential to successful project management. Planning ahead to design the most effective resource allocation can save time, improve team morale, and prevent the stress of a last minute scramble.
In this article, I've carefully curated a list of the best resource management software and tools available on the market today. Following my detailed software descriptions, I've also included the answers to some FAQs about resource management.
What Is Resource Management Software?
Resource management software is a cloud-based SaaS platform that assists project managers in allocating resources during the project planning process.
These tools allow you to view current capacity levels, determine who is available, understand what their work preferences are, and allocate resources in a manner that's practical, strategic, and effective. Resource management software and tools make it easy to optimize your scheduling and keep the team organized.
The 10 Best Resource Management Software Overviews
Below, you’ll find my choices for the best resource management software and tools. I’ve provided a detailed summary of each, including screenshots, standout features, integrations and some pros and cons.
Parallax
Best for PS companies looking to aggregate functionality through integrations
Parallax is a resource planning and forecasting solution that is designed to help increase utilization and is natively built for integrations. It's best suited for digital services firms and software development teams looking to take full advantage of modern predictive resourcing and active forecasting to discover measured growth, higher revenue rates, and stronger margins.
Why I picked Parallax: Parallax gained a spot on this list because it does such a great job facilitating resource optimization for digital services companies. The tool gives you the ability to balance workloads, analyze utilization, and match the best available resources to the most suitable projects. This approach helps optimize team performance and improve overall productivity. Extensive integration capabilities can further extend the platform's functionality.
Parallax Standout Features & Integrations
Features that differentiate Parallax from the other tools on this list include the predictive resource management functionality. The tool has been purpose-built for project and resource managers, providing you with the tools you need to efficiently evaluate and optimize supply and demand. With better resource optimization, you should be able to keep teams happy and satisfied, your projects and resources on track, and everyone in the team and the organization perfectly aligned on common goals. Other notable features include skills tags with an advanced database search of employees, customizable billing models, real-time project P+L reporting, and project accounting.
Integrations include Hubspot, Slack, Tempo, Salesforce, Jira, Harvest, Microsoft Teams, Asana, and Oracle NetSuite. The integrations approach of the platform ensures you can aggregate the best features of each tool in your current tech stack under one roof.
Pros
- Excellent predictive reporting capabilities
- No additional cost for integrations
- Responsive customer service support team
Cons
- No tracking for billable vs. non-billable hours
- Non-Agile teams may struggle with it
Kantata
Best all-in-one resource planning for services teams and agencies
Kantata is a well-rounded tool that bridges the core planning, execution, project accounting, and analysis systems in a single operating environment. It has modules for project management, accounting, resource management, business intelligence, and team collaboration for services teams and agencies.
Why I picked Kantata: What appeals to me about Kantata is their system of dashboards, live time and expense tracking features, and their great documenting system. The resource management module offers real-time utilization and margins at the project and even the task level. Kantata truly offers a comprehensive RM suite that even includes accounting tools like project costing, budget management, and invoicing. Despite requiring time to truly master, Kantata has been widely recognized as being easy to use and learn.
Kantata Standout Features & Integrations
Features that are particularly impressive include Kantata's professional services. The platform makes its Kantata BI Consultants available to users, meaning you have access to a team who can build reports specifically for your business and provide training to your resources to help mitigate the risks and costs of implementation. Further worthwhile features include resource forecasting, capacity management, skills management, scenario planning, and role-based planning.
Integrations include pre-built integrations with tools like Expensify, G Suite, Netsuite, Jira, Hubspot, Xero, Salesforce, Slack, Concur, Qualtrics, Dynamics 365, and Quickbooks. They also provide an integration platform called M-Bridge to help you build your own integrations.
Pros
- Easy capacity management
- Distinguish between soft and firm allocation
- Good reporting functionality for resource data
- Resourcing fully integrated with master planning
Cons
- Custom reports can be difficult to create without training
- Proofing solution is an add-on
- Advanced features are available only in the Premier and Enterprise editions of the application
monday.com
Best for simple workload and capacity planning
monday.com is a flexible work platform to help teams communicate in context and get a birds-eye view of outstanding projects, available resources, and projected timelines.
Why I picked monday.com: I chose monday.com primarily for its smart design and straightforward interface. Even team members who are lacking resource management experience can quickly get started planning timelines, assigning project ownership, and managing projects. The monday.com app also gives you the flexibility and power to run your team on the go. You can organize your daily work, projects, and teams as well as establish workflow automations, share documents, and create Gantt charts for further clarity.
monday.com Standout Features & Integrations
Features that really set monday.com apart from the crowd include their 5+ views so you can see your project information the way you want to. For example, with the workload view, you can easily see who’s able to take on more work and who’s not. It's easy to visually gain insight into your team’s work capacity and make adjustments to timelines or ownership accordingly, and in real-time.
Integrations include apps like Slack, Google Calendar, Jira, GitHub, Excel, Google Drive, Gmail, Trello, Dropbox, Typeform, and thousands more accessible via Zapier.
Pros
- Color coded status great for resource overviews
- Easily create boards dedicated to operational resource tracking
- New features being rolled out regularly
Cons
- Gantt charts locked to mid-level plan
- May be too robust for small teams
- Comparatively complex pricing rubric
Smartsheet
Best for advanced and custom workflow automations
Resource Management by Smartsheet, a high-level project and resource management software, helps teams make confident decisions about project planning, team capacity, budget forecasting, team utilization, and hiring needs in real-time.
Why I picked Resource Management by Smartsheet: I chose Resource Management by Smartsheet because of its dynamic reporting capabilities. If your team needs advanced workflow automations, this is the tool for you. You can visualize complex data in an easy to understand and organized format, allowing you to identify project trends and plan accordingly for the future. Users can also create project reports by filtering project data, get insight into historical data, and see forecasts on team utilization, actual vs. planned time reports, budget tracking, expense reports, and projects in the pipeline.
RM by Smartsheet Standout Features & Integrations
Features that are particularly beneficial include their unique project and resource matching functionality, which allows users to match team members to project requirements according to different criteria like disciplines, skills, and availability. Resource Management by Smartsheet also offers built-in timesheets, mobile time tracking, and expense tracking. Other notable features include project and resource matching, dynamic reporting, time tracking, a resource management panel, and a resource timeline for projects.
Integrations include apps like Slack, Brandfolder, Workplace, Microsoft Teams, and Facebook Ads. It additionally has a flexible API you can use to build custom integrations with the tools you use and automation through Zapier where you can connect to 1000+ apps.
Pros
- Combines time tracking and resourcing
- Able to forecast resource utilization
- Skills database helps resource allocation
- Intuitive for keeping timesheets and assigning hours
Cons
- Initial resource set-up is time consuming
- Bulk project edits don’t apply to resource field
- No transparent pricing for RM add-on
Float
Best for digital agencies and production teams
Float is a resource management, planning, and scheduling software that helps teams manage shared work schedules.
Why I picked Float: Float deserves its spot on my list because its scheduling functionality is so easy and intuitive. You can create new projects quickly, and assign them to your team within seconds. The schedule view gives you an accurate, high-level overview of your team’s availability and capacity, and you can drill down deeper using Float’s search and filter functionality. Set custom work hours, import and assign public holidays, schedule time off, assign custom tags like location and skills to your people and projects, and set a scheduled status to let everyone know when you’re working from home or remotely, or what you’re up to on a particular day.
Float Standout Features and Integrations
Features that elevate Float's offering include time tracking functionality. When added, you can access pre-filled timesheets and compare your team’s scheduled hours with the actual time spent on tasks to maximize future resource allocation. Real-time reporting lets you track your resource utilization, monitor project budgets, and forecast your team’s capacity. Further notable features include right-click menus for splitting tasks, an activity timeline to track changes, capacity management, multi-project planning, forecasting, and reports.
Integrations include Jira, Asana, Teamwork, Trello, Google calendar, Outlook Calendar, Slack, and thousands more through Zapier.
Pros
- 24-hour support with 30 min response time
- 99.5% uptime
- Mobile app for iOS and Android
Cons
- Updating staff/personnel list takes time
- Time tracking requires you to get a higher plan
Saviom
Best for enterprise resource and workforce management
Saviom is a resource management software that's best suited to large enterprises. It's equipped to provide a visual overview of complex team needs and scheduling for projects with multiple moving pieces.
Why I picked Saviom: I chose Saviom for this list because it allows you to quickly identify which resources should be allocated where, based on factors like cost, availability, location, and competency, across the enterprise. You can easily gain high level visibility even in the presence of complicated matrices (for example, when you have verticals like domains, regions, teams, and departments, in addition to individual projects). Their project forecasting functionality helps to identify future vacancies, while keeping an eye on financials like profit margin, revenue, and costs.
Saviom Standout Features & Integrations
Features of Saviom that are particularly impressive include their real-time BI, which allows you to meet changing demands. You can build portals, analytics, reports, and dashboards that are tailor-made for your needs, since Saviom is highly expandable and configurable. You can also control the visibility of data with filters. Other notable features include a multidimensional resource scheduler and planner, advanced forecasting and capacity planning, and real-time business intelligence.
Integrations include Outlook, Google, Salesforce, Jira, and custom integrations you can build using its data exchange framework.
Pros
- Multidimensional resource forecasting & capacity planning
- Highly configurable & customizable RM solution
- Real-time resource optimization, modeling & simulation
- Highly flexible real-time reports, analytics & dashboards
- Seamless integration with other enterprise applications
Cons
- There is a learning curve as the tool comes with extensive features
- More suitable for medium to large enterprises
- Pricing is available only on request
Resource Guru
Best for fast and flexible scheduling
Resource Guru is a dedicated resource management software that aims to make resource management user-friendly with quick scheduling tools.
Why I picked Resource Guru: I chose Resource Guru for this list because of its conflict resolution capabilities. Resource management and team collaboration are built in to make resource booking more straightforward, with clash management, leave management, and a waiting list to prevent over-booking. It helps project managers make bookings simultaneously with no chance of stepping on each other’s toes. Clashes are automatically prevented, which will save you a huge headache.
Resource Guru Standout Features & Integrations
Features that really stand out for Resource Guru include individual resource dashboards that allow each staff member to log in and know exactly what they should be working on. To monitor business performance, powerful reports help identify which projects and clients are being over-serviced and assist you with monitoring team utilization and future capacity planning. Other notable features include drag-and-drop scheduling, equipment management, meeting room booking, capacity planning, and forecasting reports.
Integrations include calendar apps like Outlook calendar, Calendly, and Google calendar. Thousands of additional apps are accessible through Zapier.
Pros
- Availability bar for capacity planning
- Very affordable per-user rate
- Attractive and flexible UI
- Daily resource summary emails
Cons
- Unable to sort resources by experience level
- No copy-paste of resource tasks
Microsoft Project
Best RM software for Microsoft users
Microsoft Project includes familiar management tools for assigning project tasks to team members and using different views like Grid, Board, and Timeline (Gantt chart) to oversee the resource planning. Users can view and compare how resources are used across projects to optimize assignments.
If you are familiar with other Microsoft programs, in particular Excel, then the interface and navigation will be familiar to you. This can help teams on a Usability level, as familiar software makes for easier training; thus, they evaluated well in Usability in this regard.
If you’re looking for something similar to MS Projects, take a look at my writeup of Microsoft Project alternatives.
Integrations include other Microsoft software, like Outlook, Excel, Skype, and more.
A few critiques that would make this solution better for resource management is that you can’t open different projects across different windows (for, say, easily comparing resources between the two) and PDF exports look messy, so if you use them for reports or printable projects you will need some manual design intervention.
MS Projects costs from $7/user/month and has a free 30-day trial.
Pros
- Can generate a Gantt chart from a spreadsheet
- Helpful project template descriptions for guidance
- Driver prioritization module for ranking strategies/objectives
- Easy integration with other Microsoft software
Cons
- Limitations on collaboration tools
- Higher learning curve
- Few customization options
GanttPRO
Best for advanced resource workload calculation
GanttPRO is a multiple award-winning project management tool with an advanced focus on resource management. Teams from Sony, Salesforce, Intel, NASA, and many other organizations globally trusted it with their planning and management.
GanttPRO comes with lots of resource management features and allows working with different types of resources. Depending on them, you can arrange your cost and budget management and set different cost values: per hour for a labor one, per item for a material one, and fixed cost for anything with a fixed price. Besides, you can work with estimation, duration, and actual cost for each task.
The software allows seeing who is working on what tasks and projects, when and for how long. The color-coded resource workload shows who is underallocated, overallocated, or works optimally. With the drag & drop simplicity, you can instantly change your resource allocation in a way it brings more value. By the way, you can even export your team’s workload to XLSX format.
From the project management perspective, GanttPRO offers various ways to display and work with project-related data. The Gantt chart timeline is the tool’s basic and most prominent feature. Besides, it has a Board view tab that is very close to a Kanban-based project management approach.
Basic plans for 1 user start at $7.99/month if billed annually.
Pros
- Advanced workload calculation modes
- Color-coded resource’s status
- Personal resource calendars with days off, vacations, sick leave periods, etc.
- Quick access to resource’s availability on different levels
Cons
- Mobile app does not offer resource management
- Lack of integrations
Forecast
Best AI-assisted RM
Forecast is a full project and resource management solution powered with artificial intelligence that learns from the work being performed and helps optimize all parts of people, planning, and projects.
Why I picked Forecast: For resource management and scheduling, you can allocate people to projects or specific tasks. On task allocation projects, Auto-Schedule weeds out the need to manually assign resources to tasks. The whole resource allocation process, together with task estimations, can be fully automated. You can manage allocations directly in the heatmap feature, which is a quick visual way to see everyone’s capacity and utilization. You can also use the searchable database to find the person with the right role and/or skills that are most likely to be available for any task that’s not assigned yet.
The reporting features in Forecast are great. Timesheets and tracking are built right into the product (and there are iOS and Android apps for tracking on the go). Forecast uses actual and planned data to present customizable reports with key metrics such as real-time utilization, compare actual vs. scheduled utilization, track project progress, profitability, budgets, and get other insights on a portfolio or project level.
Forecast Standout Features & Integrations
Features include AI-based risk warnings and personalized recommendations, a fully customizable dashboard, financial reporting, time tracking, resource workloads, utilization data, portfolio management, and invoicing.
Integrations are above average—there are turnkey integrations with several mainstream tools in their extensive app catalog, as well as two-way sync with Jira.
Forecast Plans & Pricing
It has three paid plans and pricing starts at $29/user/month (25 British pounds).
Pros
- Quick top level view of available resources by user
- Easily compare budget and expenses
- Connects to your existing toolstack
- Colorful, intuitive resource charts
Cons
- Higher learning curve
- Time-consuming logging structure
Need expert help selecting the right tool?
We’ve joined up with Crozdesk.com to give all our readers (yes, you!) access to Crozdesk’s software advisors. Just use the form below to share your needs, and they will contact you at no cost or commitment. You will then be matched and connected to a shortlist of vendors that best fit your company, and you can access exclusive software discounts!
The Best Resource Management Software Comparison Chart
Here is a table you can use to compare all the tools we just covered in the overviews.
| Tool | Free Option | Price | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Parallax Best for PS companies looking to aggregate functionality through integrations | Free demo | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
| 2 | Kantata Best all-in-one resource planning for services teams and agencies | Free demo | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
| 3 | monday.com Best for simple workload and capacity planning | 14-day free trial + free plan available | From $8/user/month (billed annually, min 3 seats) | Visit Website |
| 4 | Smartsheet Best for advanced and custom workflow automations | Freemium version available | From $7/user/month | Visit Website |
| 5 | Float Best for digital agencies and production teams | 30-day free trial | From $7.50/user/month | Visit Website |
| 6 |  Saviom Best for enterprise resource and workforce management | 60-day free trial | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
| 7 | Resource Guru Best for fast and flexible scheduling | 30-day free trial available | From $3/user/month | Visit Website |
| 8 | Microsoft Project Best RM software for Microsoft users | 30-day free trial | From $10/user/month | Visit Website |
| 9 | GanttPRO Best for advanced resource workload calculation | 14-day free trial | From $7.99/user/month (billed annually) | Visit Website |
| 10 | Forecast Best AI-assisted RM | 14-day free trial | From $29/user/month | Visit Website |
Other Resource Management Solutions
These are some extra options you can pick from. Even though they did not make it to the top 10, they are still worth considering as your next resource management tool.
- Paymo
Best RM tool for remote teams
- ProjectManager.com
Best for resource monitoring through project dashboards
- ActiveCollab
Best for built-in invoicing
- Planview Clarizen
Best enterprise-grade resource management tool
- KeyedIn
Best for resource management at the PMO level
- PSOhub
Best RM that integrates with CRMs
- Mosaic
Best for its recommendations based on resource skills and availability
- Schedule It
Best for scheduling work shifts & client bookings
- TeamGantt
Best for ease-of-use and UX
- NK Tech, LLC
best resource management software for unlimited users
Check out our video on resource management software!
Selection Criteria For The Best Resource Management Software
Are you curious how I selected the best resource management software and tools? Using my years of project management experience, I assessed the tools based on the evaluation criteria below:
Core Functionality
I began by evaluating a wide range of resource management software and tools with positive user ratings. I made sure each had the following list of basic functionalities:
- Allow you to schedule individuals and teams
- Provide visibility on future utilization
- Enable you to create customizable workflows
Key Features
In order to deliver the core functionality listed above, it's my opinion that your resource management software should offer the following features:
- Workload resource planning: A view where you can see who is doing what, how much time it will take, potential bottlenecks, and who can handle more tasks.
- Timesheet integration: Metrics relating to time spent, time used, and time costs are key to resource scheduling, so a timesheet integration or built-in solution is critical.
- Resource allocation automation: Resource allocation is time-consuming, so you want to be able to automate some of the grunt work. Look for automation features that require no coding. Most resource planning tools nowadays have drag-and-drop automation builders.
- Resource utilization alerts: Gone too far over time or cost budgets without noticing? You want a tool that monitors the relevant utilization metrics and catches this for you. Especially if you handle multiple projects.
- Resource manager permissions: The tool should allow you to set different permissions for users depending on their required level of access.
Read more about common features of resource management.
Usability
The amount of information related to resources can be overwhelming, especially as our projects grow. Therefore, the user interface of the software we use must make good use of white spaces and have easy-to-navigate toolbars and menus so we can find our way through the tool and schedule resources. You should have adequate access to tags (pertaining to skills and preferences) to help filter your search. Drag-and-drop features help speed up the allocation process as well.
Integrations
Some cloud-based project management software on this list might not have the level of depth required to be excellent resource management software, but they use integrations to compensate for that. Integrations extend the functionality of a platform by connecting it to external tools, like a CRM, or accounting and finance programs. It makes sense that resource management, time tracking, and invoicing can be connected in order to streamline processes.
Value for Money
A tool's price is an important factor to prioritize your options. Therefore, I searched through pricing information to find if there are free versions of the software, free trials, and the starting price of paid plans. The tools on this list represent a nice variety of different price points, with some even offering a freemium plan. In my opinion, there should always be a balance between price and value.
People Also Ask
Find answers to common questions about resource management and resource management software.
What is resource management?
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How do you calculate project resources?
Do I need resource management software?
Should I still be using spreadsheets?
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Is Jira a resource management tool?
Other Resource Management Reviews
If you're looking for a different type of resource management software, check out the reviews below:
- Enterprise resource planning software for resource management at large companies.
- Resource planning software to help you forecast required resources and their utilization on your projects.
- Resource scheduling software to help you schedule equipment, rooms, staff, and other resources.
- Resource allocation software, which is specifically designed to help you alllocated the right resources to the right projects and tasks.
- Free resource management software, in case you need a less expensive option that will still cover your primary needs.
- Marketing resource management software (MRM software) which is designed specifically for marketing teams. Read more about MRM here.
- Resource booking software that can help you plan for current and future projects.
- Agency resource management software for agency-specific needs, like managing freelancers and external contributors.
- Resource tracking software, which combines resource planning with tracking to help you monitor and adapt your plan as you go.
- Open source resource management software for extra flexibility and (often) cheaper pricing.
- Web-based resource scheduling software, in case you require a SaaS solution, rather than an on-premise option.
What's Next?
Resource management tools can help you create a culture of retention by mitigating the risk of burnout. So what are you waiting for? To learn more about resource allocation, check out our complete guide to workload capacity. Or if you'd like to explore what you can do with Excel a little longer, here's an example and free template on resource allocation.
Related tool lists:
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