Level up your practice as a resource manager and gain a seat at the table by focusing on these key skills in 2026
Every day, resource managers make judgement calls that quietly but decisively shape the success of their organizations.
When to say yes. When to push back. What to prioritize. When to flag risk.
But making those decisions with confidence, and truly understanding the ripple effects they create, requires more than good instincts. It means being grounded in how the business operates as a whole.
The more clearly you understand the systems around you, the more intentional and impactful you can be in your role.
So what skills should you focus on in 2026 if you want resource management to act as a strategic lever, not just an operational function?
We were joined by Jennifer Wong, Resource Operations Lead at Sorren, and Gary Ward, Head of Outsourced Professional Services at Mews, who shared what they think the most valuable focus areas are for resource managers in 2026.
So, based on the insights shared by these experienced leaders in the field, here are seven key areas that can help you strengthen your resource management practice and elevate your impact.
Resource managers already understand utilization, capacity, and demand. The next step is learning how to connect that knowledge to the wider business conversation.
In 2026, effective resource managers are comfortable with concepts like revenue, margin, cost control, ROI, and delivery risk. Not because they’re trying to become finance leaders, but because they grasp how staffing decisions directly influence all of these outcomes.
Rather than getting stuck on the granular level of utilization percentages, think about the bigger picture:
Reframe your conversation, and lead with the delivery risk, the revenue, profitability, and margin.” – Jennifer Wong
When you understand how assignments affect profitability, client outcomes, and time-to-value, you can explain your recommendations with far greater impact.
This kind of framing helps leaders see what many resource managers already know: that resource management is not just about efficiency, but about enabling sustainable growth.
As organizations grow more complex, resource management becomes less about isolated decisions and more about understanding how everything fits together.
Sales forecasts, delivery commitments, customer success expectations, support load, hiring plans, and attrition don’t exist in silos. A change in one area almost always creates ripple effects elsewhere.
Strategic resource managers develop the habit of stepping back and looking at the system as a whole.
This often means asking better questions. Gary Ward recommends using the “five whys” technique to help uncover the real causes behind capacity challenges. Is the issue truly headcount, or is it a skills mismatch, unclear priorities, or misaligned incentives?
Go beyond just asking one question and getting the response…think ‘Oh, that’s interesting…does that tie in?’”
By connecting resource plans to product strategy, customer outcomes, and long-term capacity needs, RMs move from reacting to requests to actively shaping better decisions.
Learn more: The Difference Between Short-Term & Long-Term Goals of Resource Management ➡️
AI is becoming part of everyday work for resource managers, whether through dedicated tools or features embedded in existing systems.
You don’t need to be a technical expert to benefit. What matters is feeling confident using AI to support your thinking: summarizing meetings, drafting documentation, spotting patterns in data, or exploring scenarios more quickly.
At the same time, good data habits remain essential. As Jennifer explains, you need to have clean data and defined processes in place before you can get the most out of AI:
AI is not the starting point – it's not like AI can fix everything. You need to have clarity and clean data to be ready for AI.
Resource Management only really scales from being very disciplined and having the basics down. So whether that means consistent definitions or documentation, process, clean data is super important – clean input.
If we don't agree on all those things and have all those things set up, then we could end up with a lot of noise. And if you put that into AI, it could just be even noisier. So I think just having clarity is super important in this first step.”
From there, the real value comes from interpretation: turning dashboards into clear stories that help others understand risks, trade-offs, and opportunities.
As teams scale, informal ways of working start to strain. Strong resource management depends on clear, shared foundations.
High-performing RM teams invest time in designing and documenting standard intake processes for work and staffing requests. They align on what terms like “availability,” “emergency,” “bench,” and “priority” actually mean, reducing friction and misunderstandings.
One big thing for me is the standardization of things…the goal is really to make staffing more predictable and reduce the last minute scrambling type of situations…Leaning into the bigger picture, how do we make things easier? How do we make things more repeatable? How do we consistently build that forward and scale as we grow into a bigger organization?” – Jennifer Wong
Repeatable playbooks also make a meaningful difference. Whether it’s handling last-minute requests, ramping up a new project, or managing handovers across regions, clear processes free up mental space.
That allows resource managers to focus less on firefighting and more on improving outcomes.
Read on: How to Improve Resource Data Management ➡️
Resource managers sit at the crossroads of leadership, finance, delivery, sales, HR, and operations. Navigating that space requires influence, not authority.
Building strong relationships across functions is a starting point. As Gary Ward says, no amount of documentation about how other business units operate is going to beat having a conversation with people about their work:
The wider you go in those early conversations just to get introduced, the better. You want to understand what they do, what they're responsible for. What do they think is working? What do they not think's working? Why? It's amazing what you can learn.”
From there, effective resource managers learn how to challenge assumptions constructively, like asking whether something is truly urgent, whether a role really needs a specific skill set, or whether capacity estimates are realistic.
It can be a steep learning curve, but it's really interesting to dig into that and do a kind of compare and contrast with what you were expecting, what you thought was happening, what you're hearing is happening from other people.” – Gary Ward
By presenting options and consequences clearly, resource managers help teams make shared, informed decisions instead of pushing pressure downstream.
Learn more: Set Yourself Up for Success with a Listening Tour ➡️
Resource management is full of complexity, but communication doesn’t have to be. The most effective resource managers translate detailed capacity and utilization data into simple, meaningful narratives.
Rather than overwhelming stakeholders with numbers, they present scenarios, outlining how the different possible paths forward would impact revenue, delivery risk, and people.
Clear written and verbal communication is especially important when building credibility and buy-in with senior leaders. Simple charts, trends, and before-and-after views can quickly make patterns and risks visible, helping others grasp what’s at stake.
Few roles are as close to organizational change as resource management. Mergers, restructures, new delivery models, and tool changes often land directly on RM teams.
Change management skills help resource managers guide others through uncertainty while maintaining trust. Empathy and coaching skills matter just as much. Every allocation affects real people, and acknowledging that human impact builds credibility and respect.
Read on: Change Management Best Practices ➡️
No one can develop every skill at once. For many resource managers, the highest-leverage areas to focus on in 2026 will be:
Together, these skills help resource managers do what they already do best – connect people, work, and strategy, while making that value more visible across the business.
As the profession continues to evolve, one thing is clear: resource management is not just a support function.
And building a wide range of skills that help you understand and influence the bigger picture of your organization will help you stay ready for whatever is coming your way.
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