As a project manager, I think about two lenses for staffing: roles and skills.
Role-based planning assigns work by job title or function (for example, developer, QA, designer, civil engineer). It is efficient for early planning, enables capacity blocking with placeholders, and supports timeline estimates while staffing is still uncertain. The limitation is precision: a senior developer may not have Terraform expertise, and a civil engineer may lack specific certifications.
Skill-based planning matches tasks to concrete competencies such as frameworks, certifications, languages, or tools. This approach increases delivery quality and reduces rework because the match is specific. Keep profiles current. When skills are missing, the system cannot match people to work well.
A practical approach combines both: plan by role first, then validate by skills as start dates near. Begin with soft allocations on role placeholders to confirm demand and dates; replace placeholders with named resources once availability and competency fit are verified.
Example: reserve a senior civil engineer for a road project at the planning stage, then assign the professional who holds the required traffic control certification during resourcing. This sequence keeps schedules moving while ensuring quality and compliance.
Bottom line: use roles to move quickly and forecast capacity; use skills to ensure the right expertise is applied to each task
