January 2018 – Construction and Schedule Management Services

Construction Scheduling. Critical and Near Critical Progress Update Information for Owners.

As a continuation of my previous posts, I will continue to discuss some of the important progress update items we review and analyze.

I will now discuss the process of analyzing the actual performance of work on the Critical and Near Critical Path(s).

When the contractor adds the actual Start and Finish Date and expected Finish Date data to the schedule update, the new scheduled completion date if most often not what any of us want. Usually, there has been slippage in work progress in an area that must be addressed.

This is most often caused by a lack of adequate progress for work on the Critical Path and/or the Near Critical Path(s).

Quite simply, the planned productivity for the work scheduled is not achieved.

To analyze this, we compare the previous period update Critical Path work to the actual progress reported in the current period update schedule. We simply compare Original Duration and scheduled dates to the actuals. This tells us where the slippage occurred. It does not explain the why. This should be included in the schedule update narrative the contractor provides.

We do the same for the Near Critical Path(s).

Why do we do this?.

The contractor typically knows what is driving the project and what measures need to be taken to correct work slippage. The owner usually does not have this intimate knowledge of the background operations of the contractor. However, the owner is entitled to know as much as possible about the actual and planned performance of the project. They need that information to make internal business decisions which may impact the project, such as potential change orders and work integration by others, or to react to deviations from the planned contract milestone dates.

More importantly, to me anyway, the owner is always in a position to help the contractor and I’ve met very few owners who would not do so if they understand the problem and are in a position to do so.

Once we identify and quantify the lack of progress, we can determine the root cause and identify a trend, if one is developing. We cannot do this if we simply look at another Gantt Chart pdf and look at the scheduled finish date for the project.

The owner needs to understand what work is slipping and why and this should be discussed with all parties to find a solution to keep the project safe. But this does not happen if the owner is not fully informed of progress slippage for Critical and Near-Critical work.

I’m sure many of you have comments or additional insight into this subject. Please share!

I’d love to hear what you think!

Please visit https://conschmanservices.com to learn more about Construction and Schedule Management Services, LLC

Please visit my LinkedIn account to learn more about me.

Please visit my “The Blue Book” ProView.

Paul Epperson CCM, PMP, PSP, PMI-SP

Construction Scheduling. Actual Date(s) Progress Update Information for Owners.

In my previous post, I touched on some of the important progress update items we review and analyze.

I will now discuss the process for Actual Start and Finish Dates and partial progress of work in progress. I will not hit this too hard as most everyone understands this process and the process varies from industry to industry. But the basics are very similar.

When the project is large, or smaller, and there is a full-time Owner’s Scheduler on the project, the Owner’s scheduler can periodically walk the project with various team members to validate Actual Start and Finish Dates. More often, for me as a Schedule Consultant, I rely on that verification by the Owner’s Representative on site. It’s a standard part of developing the “pencil copy” pay application or draft invoice.

However, what often happens is the review is overly concerned with determining what percent complete work in progress is. While this is important, getting the accurate Actual Start and Finish Dates is critical as well.

When working with the contractor to determine the progress for a performance period, we typically walk the project and either agree or disagree with their assessment. We should also be reviewing our daily reports for the actual dates.

Back when I was an inspector, I liked to keep a copy of the three week look ahead schedule with me so I could jot down an actual date when I came across it in the field. This allowed me to write it and forget it so I could focus on other matters. It was also very helpful when reviewing the “pencil copy” pay application.

Coming to the agreement of percent complete for work in progress was not too difficult, but getting the expected Finish Date was. We really had to discuss the performance of that work individually, decide if the progress was improving, had some delay or was simply not important enough today to throw resources at. In any event, the expected Finish Date for an in-progress activity is crucial to determining what the status is and how the project proceeds from this update. It needs to be as accurate as possible. If we bag it, we can force it Critical or Near Critical resulting in an erroneous shift in resources. If we only rely on the best-case scenario, we may not allow the focus necessary to recover this next update period.

The owner really needs to have someone in the field, daily, keeping up with the actual and planned progress. The rest of the schedule progress update is based on this data. Any revisions and planning done by the contractor to recover time lost or shift resources to maintain schedule are dependent on this information being accurate. Any potential delay or change order issues are also affected by this information. This information sets the status of the project at the time of the progress update. This determines the current Critical and Near Critical Path(s).

I’m sure many of you have comments or additional insight into this subject. Please share!

I’d love to hear what you think!

Please visit https://conschmanservices.com to learn more about Construction and Schedule Management Services, LLC

Please visit my LinkedIn account to learn more about me.

Please visit my “The Blue Book” ProView.

Paul Epperson CCM, PMP, PSP, PMI-SP

Construction Scheduling. Network Logic Progress Update Information for Owners.

As a continuation of my previous posts, I will continue to discuss some of the important progress update items we review and analyze.

I will now discuss the process of verifying the network logic is complete.

The contractor will investigate and add resources or increase hours for that work or re-sequence the work in the most cost-effective manner possible to recover any lost time. The contractor is usually required to convey that plan to you with the schedule update narrative. However, this is seldom the complete picture…..

Quite simply, when there are logic changes made, it is easy to create missing logic such as an activity with one successor with only a Start-to-Start, SS relationship. This leaves this logic open as the finish of the activity does not drive the start or finish of any other work.

Reverse logic can also be inadvertently created. This is when an activity has only a predecessor with a Finish-to-Finish, FF relationship and a successor with an SS relationship. With this condition, any increase in duration of this activity will actually pull the successor back in time. Not realistic…

Those are a couple of the basic items we look at.

It is simple enough to “recover” time on the update by shortening a duration here or there and perhaps changing some Finish-to-Start, FS logic to Start-to-Start, SS logic. If the contractor can actually commit to the production necessary to achieve the shorter duration, great. If the work can actually be completed with the new logic, that’s good too.

The means and methods of how the contract plans to execute the project is really only of concern to us if it is blatantly clear it is not achievable. This is only my humble opinion. We won’t delve into construction contract law in my posts. I’m not qualified.

However, the schedule specifications and schedule best practices have been developed to provide a means of maintaining a valid schedule. We can argue means and methods of the execution, but the requirements for the schedule provide us with the tools to manage the schedule update process correctly and keep a valid schedule in place each period for managing the work and potential delays and changes.

That said, we run filters and programs that provide us with the list of items changed between schedules. This lets us know what changed, but not necessarily why. This is why the schedule update narrative is important. It is the contractor’s tool to convey this information to the owner.

If we find several relationship changes to activities which were on the previous period schedule update Critical Path for Near Critical Path(s), we need to know why these logic revisions where made. Was it to better sequence the work based on input from the subcontractor’s performing the work? Is it an attempt to shift the Critical Path? Is it masking a lack of performance for work on the Critical Path? Same holds true for the Near Critical Path(s).

Often times, the contractor is able to better plan the work immediately in front of them. This involves minor revisions to the logic and/or durations. Any changes to these items and other items such as calendars and resources should be included in the schedule update narrative and explained.

It’s easy to spot the poor performance trend when you have an Owner’s scheduler review each update period. This provides an early flag for the owner and the contractor, so the necessary actions can be taken to recover sooner rather than later……

I’m sure many of you have comments or additional insight into this subject. Please share!

I’d love to hear what you think!

Please visit https://conschmanservices.com to learn more about Construction and Schedule Management Services, LLC

Please visit my LinkedIn account to learn more about me.

Please visit my “The Blue Book” ProView.

Paul Epperson CCM, PMP, PSP, PMI-SP