(1) Explain your problem, don't simply post "This isn't working". What were you doing when you faced the problem? What have you tried to resolve - did you look for a solution using "Search" ? Has it happened just once or several times?
(2) It's also good to get feedback when a solution is found, return to the original post to explain how it was resolved so that more people can also use the results.
Best % type & Duration Type or mix for large construction projects?
What works best while keeping it simple. Using too many types means that you have to open up the type & multiple columns to understand the numbers and to explain to PM’s. It can be too much for a simple construction project. A main issue is reconciling with the Schedule of Values without creating too many activities. (I think a matching code is best, too many items otherwise, & only have to get close with an adjusting item). But also, for example. Original Duration = 20, Remaining Dur = 10, Actual Duration = 90. Does it seem like this item have 90% complete? Yes, was originally suppose to be 20 days but that no longer applies once you are into it 90 days. If we change the original duration to 100 then the original duration is no longer correct. And adding the baseline original duration becomes info overload. How would you handle the above and what is most commonly used to keep it simple (keeping resources out of it…)? Do you use Fixed Duration & Units? Do you both a Duration & Physical Duration type? If using physical does it matter if there is a value in the Duration column?
(At least with P3 people knew the calcs were consistant.)
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While our software tools have improved beyond recognition in the last 40 years, our audience's understanding of what it is we are trying to do and why it is important has improved only a little.
I spend most of my time training, consulting or fire fighting. I do not see any perfectly evolved Project Controls environments. No-one has ever said "David, charge us for a couple of days to tell us how good we are".
I have been talking to some very capable clients for twenty years about cost/planning integration. We are still talking. It would seem that twenty spreadsheet-enabled cost engineers out-vote a few planners with a software tool that does both.
You complain about the quality of contractor schedules. Of course this is world-wide. But surely this is a simple issue for the contracts department? Who pays who? All that has to happen is that no contract is issued until the owner’s planning professionals write their part of the text. I have been banging that drum for years at all my owner clients. They all nod sagely and promise “next job”.
I have just done a count, I have charged 33 clients, excluding training, in the last 4 years.
All of the owners use Duration % complete, primarily because expended/timesheet hours are considered the contractors problem – so duration % complete and “Recalculate Actual Units and Costs when Duration % complete Changes” is ticked and the contractors report CPI.
All contractors use Physical % complete
Where resources are Disciplines (say, Maximo’s crafts or SAP’s work centres) – activities are “Task Dependent”
Where resources are Named Individuals – activities are “Resource Dependent”
Everyone uses two Duration Types – one for Lump Sum (“Hard Dollar” Stateside?) one for per Diem.
….and nobody, just nobody, has a properly defined scope of work.
Thank you for the reply. You have a unique perspective regarding "an activity that is 12 months long called "lead time for delivery of fabrication" is 12 times as important to the project as a one month actvity "pile all foundations". - The word important is tricky - I would think it is also a factor of the odds of the duration being off as well... I have been in scheduling a long time, in many environments, and I would have thought it would be farther along. (the NCAA March Madness pool software is often slicker than Scheduling software) It is a minor miracle to get a quality schedule from a contractor, and really tough to get one with cost, and nearly impossible to get resource loading - which has a tacit overtone in specs of not being serious. I just assumed the higher functioning issues are more common at Boeing & Intel where it is iterations of the same schedule over and over. Your quote: "Certainly in that world Duration % complete is the correct choice, And if resources are not considered, then the Duration type which controls the behaviour of all activities is not important." - The reason why I was looking at the mix was the involvment of Schedule of Values where time and money % might be different and if that was the case I would think it would be best to show Activity % which I thought was the mirror of the Dur or Phys % so it would not be necessary to show more than one. Possibly there is a poll out there how P6 is most commonly used...
"Keeping the resources out of it" ........ hmm.
If the resources are not considered, then each activity's weighting contributing to the overall project progress is a function only of its duration. So an activity that is 12 months long called "lead time for delivery of fabrication" is 12 times as important to the project as a one month actvity "pile all foundations".
Certainly in that world Duration % complete is the correct choice, And if resources are not considered, then the Duration type which controls the behaviour of all activities is not important.
I am firmly in the "Earned value is the whole of the law" camp. That requires something for the "Y" axis and that is usually resources, although often it is a dummy resource just to code the "worth" of the activity relative to the project.
So - ALWAYS Physcal % complete becasue I want EV, RD, and Remaining Units separate
Fixed Duration & Unts for "Lump sum" activities
Fixed Units/time period for "per Diem" activities (e.g. rent a concrete pump)
P3 had only one % complete - AND IT WAS ONLY LINKED TO DURATION IF YOU ASKED FOR IT. Other than that the % complete reduced the remaining manhours. I do have a lot of sympathy with that level of simplicity. I think I was 10 years into P3e/P6 before I preferred it to P3.
Email: PPadmin@planningplanet.com
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