plotting s curve in msp

Sreejith

While exporting the msp file to excel and trying to get the following columns I am not able to get the following labels and  a warning saying " Field ID does not exist". This I am doing by Export Wizard Task Mapping from File - Save As - Microsoft Excel Woorbook.

1) Activity ID
2) Weighting for the activity (Leave blank as of now)

So have copied the activity ids/ activities / start & end dates in an excel sheet. What to do about the weightages as you have said it to be left as blank, when are these to be filled? After copying the formula in the Planned Physical Column what are the datas to be filled in to work the formula?

Also, should the actual phsical progress be in percentages?

Am trying to follow the procedure you have mentioned in your thread for progress updation.Require your help to complete this.

Regards,

Rohit


 

Hi Trevor !

% weighting for preliminaries (ie activities were labour manhours are not spent) can be given arbitary.

These preliminaries include contracts ,Planning, engineering, Quality, procurement ..etc for a typical constrn project.(Assuming fabrication & erection are the major activities in the contract)

Now the large chunk of labour hours are distributed among - fabrication (Onshore) and erection (offshore)

Your estimators give you target hours for each of these headings.

Say we have allocated 15% for preliminaries (Contracts/ planning /engg/ documentation .etc)

The remaining 85% is to be distributed b/w on-shore fabrication and off-shore installation.

This proportion is arrived based on the target manhours estimated.

Onshore weighting = 85% X (Onshore Manhours) / (Onshore manhours + Offshore manhours)



Offshore weighting = 85% X (Offshore manhours) / (Onshore manhours + Offshore manhours)



Now we have sub activities in onshore fabrication. Weightage can be distributed among these based on the manhours allocated to them.



As explaned in this post and several other posts, for arriving a Physical progress for an activity the following methodologies can be adopted:

1)Use a sub tracker

2)Use qty exected / total qty method

3)Use 0- 100 0r 20-80 method

4)Use expert judgment (Least accurate)

For example , for piping , I use a sophasticated tracker (based on excel)

this tracker records no. of spools prepared, dia inch fitted, dia inch welded, no. of spools hydro tested, number of spools painted.etc

We give weighting to each of these activities based on our previous experience (Manhour based)

like prep-10% , fitup-15%..etc



Hence we arrive at a % completion for each ISO metric.



This is the Physical % complete.



Hand rail erection progress is measured as : Meters of handrail erected / Total length of hand rail

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Good planning is needed for finalizing the progress measurement strategy. The measured progress should reflect the actual progress at work.Above all THIS IS ABSOLUTELY PROJECT SPECIFIC ! What Iam listing here is only one methodology.

Majority of project manhour (90% +) account for labours who do the actual construction work (Banging steel and climbing structures !)

So identify the headings where actual labour hours are spent.

Allocate certain % for the preliminaries(say 10%)

So, the remaining 90% goes to actual construction activities.

Now the issue is how to distribute this 90% among various constrn activities. My practice is , distributing that based on the target manhours for various construction activities.



Once you have the concept , its easy to build a cascading progress tracker.



Hope this helps.



Cheers !



Sreejith

+974-5863241

I have been reading your explanation and attempting to follow your example, but I am a bit mystified by some of the terms and the purpose of some of the calculations.

I can’t get past Step 1. Perhaps you could show us your example numbers in Steps 1 - 5 please.



Questions:



Where does the % that you have against the major headings come from? How has 1%, 2%, 4% etc been determined? Is this simply a very early, top-down estimate (somewhat arbitrary?)?



What are they % of? Planned Cost in $, Planned Work in Hours?



At:

"Step 1 : Enter physical progress of individual activities with in this group",

how is "physical progress" defined and measured, ie what is it? Is it Actual Work Hours or Actual Cost Dollars or Actual metres of pipe (tonnes of steel etc)? Is it expressed as a %? If so, what is the numerator and denominator of this %?



In your example:

"6 ON-SHORE FABRICATION (40%)

6.1 STRUCTURAL

6.2 PIPING

6.3 E & I"



if I assume 40% refers to the Work and Work = 1000 Hours then total hours for the project is 2.5 x 1000 = 2500 Hours and 6.1 = 600 Hours (or .24 of Total), 6.2 = 300 Hours (or .12 of Total), 6.3 = 100 Hours (or 0.04 of Total).



Thanks.

Hi Cherie !

As per our company practice we measure only labour productivity. Staff & support services are excluded from this measurement.

Our manhour/ labour estimation is also based on labour hours.[So, the target hours for a specific job will only be labour hours]



Now list out the major headings in the schedule:

Example:



Project : Construction of Offshore platform for Shell

1 CONTRACTS (1%)

2 PLANNING (2%)

3 ENGINEERING (4%)

4 PROCUREMENT (6%)

5 QULAITY CONTROL (2%)

6 ON-SHORE FABRICATION (40%)

6.1 STRUCTURAL

6.2 PIPING

6.3 E & I

7 OFF-SHORE INSTALLATION (35%)

7.1 STRUCTURAL

7.2 PIPING

7.3 E & I

8 PRE-COMMISSIONING (5%)

9 DOCUMENTATION (5%)



Allow % weightings for each of the top level items.



Now you have target hours for off-shore fab , say 1000 hrs

out of which 600 is structural

300 is piping

and 100 is E&I



Sum of weightings of 6.1, 6.2 & 6.3 should add up to 40%

so , 6.1 = 40% X (600/1000)

6.2 = 40% X (300/1000)

6.3 = 40% X (100/1000)



Apply the same method to OFF-SHORE INSTALLATION as well



Remember that you apply the weighting to the lower most activity



Sum of all the weightings should be equal to 100%



Manhour required for an activity is generally derived from ’estimation manuals’ - Like John S Page book



There are some thumb rules like, we need 1.5 labour hours to complete 1 dia inch piping. So a job involving 100 dia inch may require 150 Hrs (Example only)



Now, for each isometric, you can distribute the hours proportionally based on dia inch of each isometric.



Similar way follows to structural also, but in structural we use Manhours / Metric Tonne



Now we have the weightings, and weighting adds up to 100%



Progress contribution of an activity to the project = Activity weighting X Its physical progress.



If you want to find the progress for a group of activities (Eg: ON-SHORE FABRICATION )then :

Step 1 : Enter physical progress of individual activities with in this group

Step-2 : Multiply individual activity progress by its weighting

Step-3 : add up weighted progress

step-4 : find out the sum of weightings for all the activities coming under the group

Step-5 :Progress of group (ON-SHORE FABRICATION) =

Sum of weighted progress / Sum of weightings for the group



Okay.. I think I have given enough into this methodology.



I dont mind writing another "Mahabharatha" on productivity tracking based on this progress tracker, if substancial public demand is there..



Till then..

Enjoy your day .. and take care



Cheers!



Sreejith Nair

+974-5863241

Sreejith



That’s great. Can you let me know how to undertake weightings etc please.



Thankyou



Cherie

I will have to write another "Ramayan" , if you want to know how to derive weightings and generate productivity curves,



I will do that , once substantial public demand is there !



Cheers !



Sreejith

Hi!

Create an Excel sheet

Export your MSP programme to excel

Now Make headings bold, indent / outdent sub sets



Use the following columns only:

1) Activity ID

2) Activity Name

3) Weighting for the activity (Leave blank as of now)

4) Baseline start

5) Baseline finish



Leave 2 columns blank namely

1) Actual start

2) Actual finish



Save the excel file.



After the "actual finish" column, add 4 columns

1)Planned physical progress

2)Planned weighted progress (Physical progress X weighting)

1)Actual physical progress

2)Actual weighted progress (Physical progress X weighting)

Put week ending on top of these 4 columns



Compute planned progress using the following formula :

=IF((100/(Baseline_Finish_date-Baseline_Start_date+1)*(Date_Now-Baseline_Start_date+1))<0,0,IF((100/(Baseline_Finish_date-Baseline_Start_date+1)*(Date_Now-Baseline_Start_date+1))>100,100,(100/(Baseline_Finish_date-Baseline_Start_date+1)*(Date_Now-Baseline_Start_date+1))))



Actual physical progress need to be entered manually

Or you may use a sub tracker to arrive the actual progress.



Save the file.



Now copy these 4 columns and paste to the right ( as many times equal to the expected no of weeks to complete the project)



Sum up weighted progress (planned and actual) to the top for each week.



Now create another sheet for drawing S-curve.

Row 1: week ending dates

Row 2: Planned progress for each week (Sum of weighted progress of individual activities)

Row 3: Actual progress for each week (Sum of weighted progress of individual activities)



Row 4: Forecast (Use linear regression or manual entry)



Now you can insert a chart object and link the cells.



What you see, is a dynamic s-curve for your project.



Since the progress updated looks exactly same as ur MSP plan, You may fill up the tracker first and transfer the data to MSP.

When ever you start entering progress for an activity , make sure to record the "Actual progress" and when ever you enter "100%" for any activity , make sure to record the finish date as well !



Sorry , if you feel this procedure .. but for me it works very well and act as a data base of historical data (What was the % progress for each activity every week)



It is easy to maintain , once the template is made.



Feel free to contact me, if you have queries.



Cheers



Sreejith Nair

Manager Planning

MG WLL

Doha - Qatar

sreejith.gce@gmail.com

u cannot have cashflow unless u feed in resource and cost.

u cannot have cashflow unless u feed in resource and cost.

Use MS Excel



By using week no.s i.e. 1,2,3..... on the top row of spreadsheet.Input activity weeks under each week per week.



Undertake a cumulative count up using excel of each week for the planned activity weeks to give you your cumulative output.



Do the same for actual activity weeks and then plot that curve and compare. The cash flow exercise is the EVA technigue. Your Commercial Manager must give you this information.

Go to reports function in MSP 2007 and you can plot s-curves, cash flows, EVA etc