Planning outstanding work: how to stay in control of workload and capacity

What is work backlog planning?

Work backlog planning involves keeping track of all outstanding work and deciding when it can be carried out. This means considering the priority of each job, the time required and the available capacity of your employees and machines.

The type of work in your backlog will vary depending on your organisation. A manufacturing company, for example, may have outstanding production orders, while an installation company needs to schedule maintenance and repair jobs. For an accountancy firm, it might involve client files that still need to be processed.

In each case, the challenge is the same: making sure the right people carry out the right work at the right time. By managing your outstanding work effectively, you can see which jobs are still waiting, what's already scheduled and how much capacity is available for new work.

Having a large amount of outstanding work isn't necessarily a problem. It becomes challenging when you lose track of what's in your pipeline and can no longer accurately estimate when jobs will be completed.

Why does your work backlog become too large?

A growing work backlog isn't necessarily a problem. In fact, it can be a sign that your business is receiving plenty of new orders. The challenge arises when more work consistently comes in than your team can complete. Jobs remain outstanding for longer, deadlines become harder to meet and scheduling new work becomes increasingly difficult. There are several reasons why this can happen.

Limited visibility of available capacity

When you don't know exactly how much time your employees or machines have available, it's difficult to determine how much work you can schedule. New jobs are accepted even though the schedule is already full. As a result, outstanding work continues to build up.

Unclear priorities

Not every job is equally urgent. Yet employees often start with the tasks that seem easiest or most obvious, while more important work is left waiting. Without clear priorities, it becomes difficult to complete jobs in the right order.

Starting too many jobs at once

When employees work on several jobs simultaneously, they constantly have to switch between tasks. This takes time and means jobs remain unfinished for longer. By completing ongoing work before starting new tasks, you can reduce the amount of work in progress.

Delays and dependencies

Some jobs cannot begin until other tasks have been completed. For example, a production order may be waiting for materials, or a service engineer may need a replacement part before starting a repair. When these dependencies aren't clear, jobs can be scheduled too early, leading to unnecessary delays.

A large work backlog isn't always caused by a shortage of staff or time. The way work is allocated, scheduled and carried out also plays an important role.

Work backlog, backlog and work in progress: what's the difference?

When planning work, you'll often come across terms such as work backlog, backlog and work in progress (WIP). These terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but each has a different meaning.

The main difference is the stage a job has reached. Some tasks are still waiting to be rescheduled, other have already been added to the schedule, while some are currently in progress.

TermMeaning

Example

Total outstanding workAll work that has not yet been completed, including unscheduled, scheduled and ongoing jobs.All open production orders within a company.BacklogWork that still needs to be scheduled and has not yet been assigned a specific time or resource.New orders waiting to be added to the schedule.Scheduled workJobs that have been assigned a specific time, employee, team or machine.A maintenance job scheduled for Tuesday morning.Work in progress (WIP)Work that has already started but has not yet been completed.A production order currently being processed.

The backlog is part of your total outstanding work. Once you schedule a job from the backlog, it becomes part of your schedule. When employees start working on it, it is considered work in progress (WIP). Only when the job has been completed is it removed from your outstanding work.

Making this distinction helps you identify where work is getting held up. For example, are lots of jobs waiting to be scheduled, or have too many jobs been started but not yet completed? With this insight, you can better identify which areas of your planning need attention.

How can you get a clear overview of your outstanding work?

Effective work backlog planning starts with having a clear overview. You need to know which jobs are still outstanding before you can decide when to carry them out. In practice, however, this isn't always straightforward.

New jobs might arrive by email, ongoing work may be tracked in Excel, and employees often maintain their own task lists. As a result, information becomes scattered, making it difficult to get a complete picture of all the work that still needs to be done.

By bringing all outstanding work together in one central place, you gain a much clearer overview. You can see which jobs still need to be scheduled, what's already in the schedule and which tasks are currently in progress.

What information do you need?

A list of outstanding jobs alone isn't enough. To manage your workload effectively, you also need information about what each job involves, its progress and how much time it will take. The following details will help you build a clear picture:

InformationWhy is it important?Job or task descriptionMakes it clear what needs to be done and what each job involves.PriorityHelps you decide which jobs need to be completed first.DeadlineShows when a job needs to be completed and helps prevent missed deadlines.Estimated hoursHelps you estimate how much capacity is needed to complete the work.Assigned employee or resourceShows who is responsible for the job or which machine or resource is required.Current statusIndicates whether a job is waiting to be scheduled, planned, in progress or completed.

With this information, you can assess your outstanding work much more effectively. For example, you can see which jobs are approaching their deadlines, how many hours of work are still outstanding and which tasks are waiting for a specific employee or machine.

This gives you an up-to-date overview to help you plan ahead. The next step is to decide which jobs should take priority.

How do you prioritise your outstanding work?

Once you have a clear overview of all outstanding work, it's time to decide which jobs should be completed first. Not every job is equally urgent, and some tasks can wait a little longer.

When prioritising your outstanding work, consider factors such as deadlines, urgency, customer commitments and the capacity required. This prevents employees from simply working on jobs in the order they arrive, while more important tasks are left waiting.

Decide which jobs should take priority

A straightforward way to prioritise your work backlog is to divide outstanding jobs into three categories:

You can also use a method such as MoSCoW, which divides work into four categories: Must have, Should have, Could have and Won't have. This is particularly useful when several stakeholders need to agree on which tasks are most important.

Whichever method you choose, make sure everyone understands the priorities. This helps employees know which jobs need their attention first and allows planners to take these priorities into account when scheduling work.

Take dependencies into account

A high-priority job can't always be carried out immediately. Sometimes materials are missing, another task needs to be completed first or a specific employee isn't yet available.

For example, a manufacturing company needs to complete an important order, but the required raw materials won't arrive for another three days. Scheduling that order for today wouldn't make much sense. Instead, the available time could be used for other jobs that are ready to be carried out.

That's why it's important to consider whether jobs are actually ready to be carried out when setting priorities. This helps ensure important work is completed on time without causing unnecessary delays to other jobs.

How do you match your outstanding work to available capacity?

You now have a clear overview of your outstanding jobs and know which tasks take priority. But can you actually fit all that work into your schedule? To find out, you need to know how much time each job requires and how much capacity your team has available.

Start by estimating the hours required for each job. Then compare these with the available hours of your employees, teams or machines. Remember to account for holidays, leave, maintenance and other activities that take up time.

With vPlan, you can easily see how much capacity is available. You can check how much work is already scheduled and where employees or teams still have room for additional jobs. This makes it easier to distribute work evenly and avoid overloading one employee while another still has time available.

A practical example

Imagine a service team has 120 outstanding work orders, representing a total of 420 hours of work. Over the next two weeks, the team has 300 hours of available capacity.

This means you won't be able to complete all jobs within those two weeks. There will still be 120 hours of work left to schedule at a later date.

To get better understanding of the size of your outstanding workload, you can use the following calculation:

Outstanding work / available hours per planning period = number of planning periods required

In this example, 420/300 = 1.4 planning periods. That means there is approximately 2.8 weeks of outstanding work, assuming capacity remains the same and no new jobs are added.

The planner can now decide which work orders should take priority and which will need to remain in the backlog for the time being.

Look beyond the total number of available hours

Having an overview of your total capacity is a good starting point, but it doesn't always tell the whole story. Your team might have enough hours available overall, while the employees with the specific skills needed for certain jobs are already fully booked.

That's why it's important to look at how work is distributed across your team. With vPlan's workload view, you can see how much work is scheduled for each employee or resource. This helps you identify potential bottlenecks and find available capacity for new jobs.

By matching your outstanding work to available capacity, you can make better-informed planning decisions. You'll know how much work your team can realistically complete, which jobs need to wait and when capacity will become available for new work.

How to plan your outstanding work: 8 practical steps

You now know which jobs are outstanding, which ones take priority and how much capacity you have available. It's time to turn that information into a practical schedule. These eight steps will help you schedule work at the right time and stay in control when things change.

Step 1. Gather all outstanding work

Start by collecting all jobs that still need to be completed. Include tasks that have previously been postponed or are waiting for a suitable time slot. Keeping everything in one place helps ensure that no jobs are overlooked.

Step 2. Review and update your outstanding work

Not every job on your list will necessarily still be relevant. A task might already have been completed, a deadline may have changed or the same job could appear more than once. Review your outstanding work regularly and make sure the information is accurate before you start scheduling.

Step 3. Decide which jobs take priority

Identify which jobs are most important and need to be completed first. Consider deadlines, customer commitments and any dependencies between tasks. This helps ensure that urgent work doesn't get left behind.

Step 4. Assess your available capacity

Check how much time your employees, teams or machines have available during the period you're planning for. Remember to account for holidays, leave and other commitments. This gives you a realistic picture of how much work you can schedule.

Step 5. Decide how far ahead to plan

The right planning period varies from one organisation to another. A service team that regularly receives urgent requests, for example, benefits from a schedule that can be adjusted daily. A manufacturing company with longer lead times will often need to plan several weeks ahead. Choose a planning period that suits the way your business operates.

Step 6. Schedule the work

You can now allocate jobs to the available employees or machines. Start with the highest-priority tasks and check that the estimated hours fit within your available capacity. Where necessary, leave some room for unexpected jobs or delays.

Step 7. Monitor progress

Creating a schedule is one thing, but you also need to know whether work is progressing as planned. Regularly check which jobs have started, which have been completed and which are experiencing delays. This helps you spot problems early and prevent outstanding work from building up further.

Step 8. Keep your schedule up to date

New orders, changing priorities or an employee unexpectedly being absent can all affect your schedule. By regularly updating your outstanding work and planning, you maintain an accurate overview and ensure everyone knows what needs to be done.

Following these steps makes planning outstanding work a regular part of your daily operations. You'll have a clearer picture of what still needs to be done and be better prepared to respond when circumstances change.

How much outstanding work is healthy?

There is no fixed amount of outstanding work that is ideal for every business. A healthy workload depends on several factors, including available capacity, job lead times and the volume of new work coming in.

A manufacturing company that plans months ahead, for example, will have different requirements from a service team that deals with new breakdowns and urgent requests every day. Having a large amount of outstanding work isn't necessarily a problem, as long as you know when jobs can be completed and can meet your commitments.

Signs your work backlog is becoming too large

There are several warning signs that your outstanding work is no longer in line with your available capacity. These include:

To spot these issues early, it's worth

regularly comparing how much new work comes in with how much your team actually completes. If your outstanding workload continues to grow week after week, it's a sign that you need to review your schedule, priorities or available capacity.

A healthy amount of outstanding work is ultimately one that you can manage effectively, schedule realistically and complete within the agreed timescales.

Managing outstanding work in Excel or with software?

Many businesses start by managing their outstanding work in Excel. And that's perfectly understandable. It's easy to create an overview of outstanding jobs, add deadlines and keep track of completed tasks. For a small team with a manageable amount of outstanding work, this can work perfectly well.

However, as your business grows, keeping that overview up to date often becomes more challenging. More jobs come in, several employees work with the same schedule and priorities change regularly. Updating all this information manually takes increasingly more time and increases the risk of errors.

This is where dedicated work backlog management software can help. It brings outstanding jobs, schedules and available capacity together in one place. Changes are immediately visible to everyone involved, reducing the time spent updating schedules and coordinating work.

Managing outstanding work in ExcelManaging outstanding work with softwareSuitable for small, manageable workloads.Suitable for larger workloads with frequently changing priorities.Information often needs to be updated manually.Changes and job statuses can be managed centrally.Calculating capacity requires custom formulas.Capacity and workload can be linked directly to the schedule.Collaboration requires clear agreements on versions and updates.Multiple employees can work from the same up-to-date schedule.Automations and integrations require additional configuration.

Integrations and automations are often available as built-in features.

When should you consider work backlog management software?

Switching to dedicated software becomes particularly worthwhile when managing your outstanding work starts taking up more and more time. You might have a clear list of outstanding jobs but struggle to see when employees are available. Or perhaps you have to manually adjust the schedule every time an urgent job comes in.

With planning software like vPlan, you can link your outstanding work directly to your available capacity. This allows you to see which jobs still need to be scheduled, where there's room for new work and how the workload is distributed across your team.

This makes it easier to plan ahead and respond to changes without constantly having to update multiple spreadsheets or separate schedules.

What should you look for in good work backlog management software?

There are various tools available to help you plan and manage work. However, not every planning tool is equally suited to managing outstanding work. Some focus primarily on tracking tasks, while others offer more advanced features for scheduling work based on available capacity.

The right software for your business depends on how you operate. A manufacturing company, for example, needs visibility of available machine capacity, while an installation company may be more interested in knowing which engineers are available to carry out outstanding work orders.

When comparing work backlog management software, there are several key features to look for:

When choosing software, it's worth looking beyond the number of features on offer. What matters most is finding a solution that fits the way your team works every day.

Pay particular attention to how well the software connects your outstanding work with your available capacity. When you can immediately see how much work is still outstanding and how much room you have in your schedule, it becomes much easier to plan new jobs and make adjustments before problems arise.

Plan your outstanding work with vPlan

Want to gain more control over your outstanding work and prevent jobs from being left waiting unnecessarily? With vPlan, you can bring all your outstanding tasks, schedules and available capacity together in one clear overview. This means you always know what still needs to be done, which jobs take priority and when your team has time to complete them.

Turn outstanding jobs into a clear schedule

With vPlan's backlog, you can easily collect all the work that still needs to be scheduled. Set priorities, add deadlines and other important details, and decide when each job should be carried out.

As capacity becomes available, you can move jobs from your backlog onto your planning board. Choose from different views, including timeline, calendar, Kanban and list, so your team can work in the way that suits them best.

Plan based on available capacity

One of vPlan's biggest advantages is the visibility it provides into capacity and workload. You can see how much work is already scheduled, which employees or machines are available and where there's still room for new jobs.

This makes it easier to distribute work evenly and avoid overloading your team. If an urgent job comes in unexpectedly, you can quickly identify available capacity and adjust your schedule accordingly.

Keep your outstanding work and progress up to date

With vPlan, you can stay in control even after jobs have been scheduled. Employees can update their progress, while you can immediately see which jobs have started, which have been completed and which are experiencing delays.

Automations and integrations with other systems can also help you reduce manual work. This keeps your schedule up to date and ensures everyone is working with the same information.

Discover how vPlan helps you manage outstanding work

Whether you're scheduling production orders, service jobs or projects, vPlan gives you a clearer overview of your outstanding work and your team's capacity. You can see what still needs to be done, schedule jobs at the right time and stay in control of progress.

Curious to see what vPlan could do for your business? Book a personalised demo and discover how to plan your outstanding work more efficiently. Or explore the possibilities and start your free trial.