David
Agree with you
If you dont know much about construction ask a man who does when your preparing your programme.
Clive

Building schedule where to start

First determine what the project is, sounds simple but worth the effort to understand the project scope. Have you for example got any design responsibility, what does the contract require you to coordinate, is there any nominated subcontractors.

Assess what you are building, has it got foundations, are there piles etc etc.

Try to build a picture of the building in your mind.

Once youve done that think about the numbering of your programme. ie how are you going to use the activity ID. Im lazy so I tend to build my numbering in a way that allows me to copy it up the building ie I will detail level 1 add all my links, resources, and associated fields in then run just that level. Check it works. I will also add some hooks in to enable me to link it to the next level, ie strip formwork, wet trades completed , floor weathertight required etc etc.

Once im happy with the floor programme I will copy and paste it up the building. Normally I will do this by renumbering the IDs ie if level 1 was 1000 for say concrete to floor level 2 will be 1000L2 the reason for this is as I said was Im lazy. Instead of me having to filter and set up numerous filter fields I can sort by ID contains L2 that gives me all L2 activities or conversly ID contains 1000 which will give me all the concrete to floor activities. This is usefull for adding linksd between similar activities and also when you want to pull out trade resources.

Thats a start point however I wont say more but just let you have a go to see how you get on.

I agree with other people comments that you must keep it simple it makes your life easiere and people can understand what you have done and are therefore more likely to use it.

Clive

A real quick lesson to get you going

Firstly try to break your project down into phases, Design, Procurement, Manufacture, Construction, Commissioning & Handover is a simple example. Under each phase you may have sub-phases if you will. For example in design you may have Outline proposals, detailed proposals, final proposals etc. From here you can start to build your programme structure.

However, it is not important to get all this info onto the planning software before you start, it’s more important to find out what the project involves, what work/activities you will be looking after & monitoring. Once you have ascertained this information it will be easier to structure the programme into phases and to what detail you need to be planning at in that phase.

This can be quite difficult because people see it in different ways and only with practice & experience will you become more confident each time you start a new project. If you break your project down into easy enough phases then it will be easy for you & others to understand.

Calendars, resources, costs etc are all important too, but try not to get ahead of yourself, my suggestion for your first time is plan the activities out first (use simple bars for starters then add the detail, this helps if you would like to alter the structure of your programme as your building it), add your calendars and schedule then input resource/cost data and review.

Remember, keep it simple and easy to use, at the end of the day it’s about how you communicate the status of the project and how you can assist the project team to improve delivery, or get them out the crap because they never listened to you in the first place.