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Different scenarios when planning and scheduling

14 replies [Last post]
Sat, 2005-10-15 15:48
Melinda Lopez
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Hi all,

I would like to know what could be (and how to face) the main different scenarios when planning and scheduling.

I appreciate your opinions and comments on this issue.

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Replies

Wed, 2005-11-09 22:06
#1
Alex Wong
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Dear all

Reading all these my only comments is

:)

Forgot to keep my month shut

Cheers

Alex
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Wed, 2005-11-09 21:56
#2
Clive Randall
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Gary, Larry, Omar
What you say gets to the core issues.
Melinda
Planning is not jumping on a PC and setting up the WBS, OBS, CBS )or any other BS)its about how best can I do the job.
Start with the logic, what comes first and what second, set up the chain. Dont worry about the durations. Once the chain is in place review the durations, is labour limited, is plant an issue, what construction systems are possible to use. Take a view and set the durations. See what the end date looks like. Does it meet the contract end date. If not review the durations and note down what you have done to get as close as possible.
Present your plan to the team and explain your assumptions, then listen. Defend your position if you belive you are correct. Add the comments agreed upon and see what your programme looks like. Then look at the unknowns, weather, geological conditions, delays in procurement or delivery (experience required here) and produce the 3 programmes. Best, likely, worst case.
Talk to the team again and listen. Finally compare what you have with what the client wants and hopefully if this is the tender stage allow appropiate commercial elements to your bid to allow for the mismatch. When u win the job explain your assumptions to the site team, again do not be inclined to change due to a site teams knee jerk reactions, probably brought about after studying the documents for a short time. Defend your position it should have be founded on the opinions of a number of people.
Of course if the site team pursue their goals assist but keep your original notes you may need them later.
Hope this helps
Clive
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Wed, 2005-11-09 11:50
#3
Charleston-Joseph...
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Hello Melinda,

The different scenarios when planning and scheduling started at the tender or proposal stage. Upon award of the contract, the tender plan and schedule will be reviewed and a new plan will be submitted for approval as baseline plan.

In the preparation of the baseline plan, a draft copy will be circulated to the project team for comments. After integrating the comment of the project team, the final draft will be circulated and, at the same time, will be submitted to the client for approval.

The client will comment on the submitted baseline plan. During the time interval that the baseline plan was first circulated to the project team and time that the client commented on the baseline plan, there is a big chance that the site project team modified the tactics in the attainment of overall project goals.

This is part of the planning cycle. As you update your schedule to reflect current activities and tactical goals, you will notice that you are in different scenarios on how to attain the overall project strategic goal.

This is the actual scenarios in project planning and scheduling.

Regards,

Charlie
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Wed, 2005-10-26 05:42
#4
Raja Izat Raja Ib...
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Hi Guys,
I think U are jumping from the topic... am i right..
Its good to understand each other.. by insinuation other post which not respect other people idea and didnt resolve the questioner question can make sombody feel like being challenge. In this forum we try to come out with solution, not trying to find others faulty.
thats my answer... Maybe we can open new thread about "insinuation vs insulting Post" post.
Sorry for interupt this topic....dont mean offended anybody

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Wed, 2005-10-26 03:54
#5
Gary France
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Well said Larry.

In my planning informative years, somebody once told me that we have two ears and one mouth and as a planner we should use them in that proportion. This has proved to be really useful advice, which I have tried to stick to.

Gary.
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Tue, 2005-10-25 19:06
#6
Larry Blankenship
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What worked for me on this project was having an experienced person (the reliability manager) sense check the estimates that I received.

When getting the estimates, I asked for the thought process behind the estimate, which I recorded in the task notes as we went along. For a lot of items, it was a matter of letting the person explain their thought process, even if I didn’t understand what they were saying. As I often tell people when I’m trying to figure something out, "Would you mind letting me explain this to you so that I understand it better?"

We continuously reestimated during the execution phase which also helped with identifying possible points of going past our deadlines.

I think the main thing for me has been keeping an open mind and a closed mouth.
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Tue, 2005-10-25 17:58
#7
Omar Grant
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As a newcomer to the forum I find it interesting to observe how little the subject of information quality is mentioned: after all, a schedule is only as good as the basic information, including the underlying assumptions, that go to make it up. As a planner of the ’old school’ who has used the paper & pencil a lot to construct precedence/network diagrams, where it was so easy to note data sources/assumptions next to tasks, I find that the modern process of leaping onto a PC and constructing schedules often means that the essential approach of the CPM methodolgy is ignored with the consequent lack of data quality, thought-out logic and history of original assumptions.
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Wed, 2005-10-19 10:13
#8
Oscar Wilde
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Now
this is worth a read
Oscar
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Sun, 2005-10-16 10:21
#9
pmkb .
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There is a relatively new program called RiskyProject that offers something they call event chaining which looks to be somewhat different that the PERT or Monte Carlo approaches to optimistic and pessimistic scenarios.

Stacy
Participate at the Project Management Knowledge Base!
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Sun, 2005-10-16 09:25
#10
Raja Izat Raja Ib...
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oh..please mr brennan, I could not gave her correct answer with the general question she ask, it could be anything we dont know, Dont tell me u can read people mind using instinct.... Even your optimis and pessimis answer also is very general... Why dont u elaborate your answer
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Sun, 2005-10-16 03:03
#11
Vladimir Liberzon
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Brennan,
It is interesting that you use an approach that is similar to the method that is recommended and supported in Spider Project.
We suggest our users to create 3 schedule scenarios (optimistic, most probable and pessimistic). Basing on this schedule Spider Project calculates recommended dates, costs and other parameters basing on the desired probability of project success (usually 70 – 80%). These data are used for negotiations and setting agreed targets that may be achieved with the reasonable probabilities.
During project execution the package sinchronizes all three versions, calculates current probabilities to meet project targets, and shows their trends. These trends are the best performance measurement indicators that show the whole history of the project performance and suggest corrective actions if the trends become negative.
You can read about this approach in http://www.spiderproject.ru/library/SDPM_Canberra2004.pdf and other publications at http://www.spiderproject.ru/library/
It may be of interest to discuss scenario approach here.
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Sat, 2005-10-15 22:30
#12
Brennan Westworth
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LOL Raja what kind of answer is that? This forum is suppose to promote discussion.

Different scenarios should always be considered when planning a project.

These basically fall into two categories "what if" and Schedule Risk.

I usually do my "what if" scenarios first and determine the optimal way to execute the project.

I then use this base case schedule to look at optimistic and pesimistic duration forecasts, productivity and resource levels.

The end result of this I display in bar chart and s-curves
in P3 i set target 1 as the Optimistic schedule and target 2 as the Pessimistic schedule.
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Sat, 2005-10-15 16:58
#13
Raja Izat Raja Ib...
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experience will tell the answer
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Sat, 2005-10-15 16:19
#14
Vladimir Liberzon
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Hi Melinda,
Please specify your question. At the planning stage there is always a need to play with the different scenarios, to create different schedules and to compare them choosing the optimal solution. There are many what if questions and your scenarios can help to find the best answers. These questions may include questions such as what technology to use, what number of resources is reasonable to assign, which supplier suggests better conditions from the project success criteria point of view, etc.
Best Regards,
Vladimir
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