A long time back, late Seventies to early Eighties, it was quite a fun to prepare Plans and programmes for Projects. It used to be challenging, creative effort involving lots of hard work but quite satisfying and enjoyable. This went on for quite som...
Distributed contingencies are normal in most aspects of project management but often result in sub-optimal use of resources. Typical examples include allowing some safety margin in each CPM duration estimate (eg, setting the durations at an 80% proba...
Probably the most common action undertaken by project planners everywhere is assigning a duration to a task; most of us do this almost automatically. Generally it is only when a dispute arises that the complex interaction of the factors discussed in...
The science of ‘scheduling’ as defined by Critical Path Analysis (CPA) celebrated its 50th Anniversary in 2007. In 1956/57 Kelly and Walker started developing the algorithms that became the ‘Activity-on-Arrow’ or ADM scheduling methodology for DuPo...
Undoubtedly the longest running ‘urban myth’ in circulation within the general project management community, arising from US Defence based research from the early 1990s, that the Cost Performance Index (CPI) always stabilizes at the 20% completion an...
I had a situation recently where a client stated that despite his people working as fast and seemingly efficiently as they could, he was seeing next to no progress reflected in his performance reporting, his end date was pushing out, his efficiency w...
As the end of 2012 approches, and assuming the world won't end of the 12/12/12 I have a few thoughts for every scheduler’s New Year resolutions.You can’t change the past, the present is being managed by the project workforce, the only thing you can i...
Only fools and the bankers who created the GFC think the future is absolutely predictable. The rest of know there is always a degree of uncertainty in any prediction about what may happen at some point in the future. The key question is either what d...
Delivering the wrong project on time and on budget with 100% of its scope completed to the defined quality standards is a complete waste of money!Before value can be created by the traditional project management processes defined in the PMBOK® Guide,...
Primavera have a function (called Level Resources) to solve the overload resource problem.I will explain how does it work in this article.We have 2 activities which is assigned resource called “Test”.Test can work 8 hour/day. These 2 activities happe...
The Agile Manifesto declared independence from constraining, process-centric software development methodologies. The Manifesto advocated for a product-focused, team-centric approach. As Agile has moved mainstream, it has spawned its own industry of...
In Primavera, when we filter critical path, it only show 1 critical path. In complicated project, we might need to show some more “near critical” path.I will show you how to do it.We have a simple project like this:Press F9 – Click on OptionClick on ...
In Primavera we have a function called “Top Down Estimation” which help us to calculate an estimated figure for Labor and Non-labor unit based on “estimation weights”. It can apply to WBS and Activity.I will show you how to do it.We have a simple pro...
Normally when we Level Resources, Primavera will delay an activity so that Resource is not overloaded. It can make Project Finish date delay.How can we make Project Finish date not delay? I’ll explain in this article.We have a simple project with 2 a...
In Primavera P6 -> Resources window -> Units & Prices tab, there is a selection box called Shift CalendarWhat does it use for? I’ll show how to use it in this article.The Shift Calendar control the Price/Unit for activity, depend on what time activit...
This post will briefly look at the three major problem areas affecting scheduling practice:The first is most organisations and managers simply choose to ignore the project schedule, in part because they have never worked with a good schedule produced...
Over the years I have seen many articles, discussions and questions about Earned Value Management (EVM). What is it, how valuable is it as a management tool, how do you use it? Often the explanation can be quite complex. As is usual for experienced...
In my career, I've worked across multiple industries and companies and one thing that stands out is the confusion surrounding the function of Project Controls and what it is meant to achieve. There are Project Accountants, administrators or finance ...
Many years ago I worked on an EPCM project for a major Tier 1 client. Like most companies we were always told that we had to keep the client happy. Client satisfaction was key! One particular young engineer took this to heart. If the Client’s tea...
In Resource window -> Details tab, there is an selection box called “Currency”.What does it do? I’ll explain it in this article.By selecting the currency in that box, it determines in which Currency the Resource will be paid with. The setting locks t...