Also late to the party - I've found myself with an interesting mix. When I start a fort - and there's a lot to do, and few people to do it - I use either autolabor or labormanager depending on the results. I noticed with 7 dwarves, labormanager might leave one or two idle at all times - presumably because they're not well suited to work/they deserve a break. However, I really just want bedrooms dug out and logs hauled around. In that case, autolabor seems to keep everyone busy. Labormanager, to its credit, gives the right dwarves experience in the right things - which is beneficial for my next step.
By 10-15 dwarves, however, I'll switch off labormanager/autolabor and open Dwarf Therapist. I have a handful of pre-made professions (breaking people into basically Craftsdwarves, Farmers, and Stoneworkers - plus a soldier designation and noble designation [useful for the later game migration waves of 20 people well-suited to be leaders/liars/poets]) I apply these in wide brush-strokes depending on the dwarves and on their natural abilities. This is followed by a little micromanagement for special cases (a woodcutter who is a master diagnostician needs some special assignments.)
The end result of this - I think - is a better allocation of labors. And it gives me absolute control over certain things. Specifically, I can stop everyone from fishing until I've pierced the aquifer and set up a fishing zone or I can switch off hunting entirely and keep everyone inside. Generally, I'm never in such a rush that I need to perfectly optimize each work station. Every wave of migrants, I pop open Dwarf Therapist and put people into their profession groups and usually give them some nicknames. On waves of 20+ migrants, I will admit that this is an inconvenience.
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Topic: Anyone here use autolabor or labor management over Dwarf Therapist? (Read 11780 times)