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Vol. XII Issue I - January 2010

Project Management eJournal

 

MONTHLY COLUMN:

CONSTRUCTION PROJECT SCHEDULING TODAY: ISSUES & CONTROVERSIES

The Principles, Processes & Practices of Construction Project Scheduling

By Earl Glenwright
Colorado, USA


Editor’s note:  This is the first article in a new series on construction project scheduling.  The series was introduced in a Guest Editorial by Earl Glenwright in the January edition of PM World Today.  Please read that introduction, where Earl sets the stage for articles on this important aspect of managing construction projects.

The fundamental concepts of scheduling principles and processes were laid out by Jim Kelly and Morgan Walker 50+ years ago when they formulated the activity network method of managing a project’s resources and time.  Whereas these principles and processes are unchanged, the practices have evolved ever since.

I.  Principles.  The principles are embedded in the definition of a project.  These are that a ‘project’ has a definitive scope of work, is a temporary endeavor, and has a fixed ending time for producing a product. Moreover, work-items or activities are arranged in a logical network where activities are linked to predecessors and successors such that an activity can not start until all of it’s predecessors  are completed and none of its successor activities can start until the activity is functionally complete. This can be restated as an activities inputs and outputs for the ‘work’ done by an activity-work item. This is the bedrock upon which the processes and practices take place.

II.  Processes. ‘Processes’ include decomposing the project’s scope of work [SOW] into deliverable components, sub-components, and work packages of activities.  This structure, the Scope [work] Breakdown Structure has neither implied durations, logical sequences, nor activities…


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About the Author

Earl Glenwright, PSP

Author

UK

Earl Glenwright, PSP, has a career spanning 40+ years in construction project scheduling.  Earl is certified as a Planning and Scheduling Professional [PSP] by the Association for the Advancement of Cost Engineering International [AACEi].  He frequently gives presentations at their annual conferences.  Earl has both a BS in Civil Engineering and MBA degree and is a Registered Professional Engineer. Earl’s career has included multi-year positions in several countries including Brasil, Saudi Arabia, and Sudan.  He currently lives in Colorado and Bulgaria.  Prior to 1988 he was employed by the [US] Bureau of Reclamation and the [US] Army Corps of Engineers. After retiring in 1988 he has been a free-lance consultant for both contractor’s construction scheduling and small business Enterprise Project Management.  His experience includes large and very large [super-mega] construction projects, very small projects such as construction planning, and scheduling for home construction by his Habitat for Humanity affiliate. Through his extensive scheduling experience he has been recognized as a Subject Matter Expert [SME], a Master Scheduler,  and an Expert Advisor. Earl has been active in the Project Management Institute (PMI) for 30+ years.  He has presented “Time & Cost” training at PMI’s annual seminar-symposia, and was a member of the initial PMBoK Guide Project Team, the 2000 update team, and the project team that prepared the 3rd edition.  Earl has recently presented ‘workshop/seminars’ for Bulgarian project scheduling and controls persons which cover the 3 phases of scheduling: framework preparation/planning, schedule development, and schedule management and control.  The workbooks are dual language English and Bulgarian. Earl can be contacted at earl_csss@yahoo.com.

 


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