(1) Explain your problem, don't simply post "This isn't working". What were you doing when you faced the problem? What have you tried to resolve - did you look for a solution using "Search" ? Has it happened just once or several times?
(2) It's also good to get feedback when a solution is found, return to the original post to explain how it was resolved so that more people can also use the results.
I have a question, not related to any planning technique.
I have made several attempts to introduce the position of a planner in our office. I even posted a job advertisement here. The situation is that we probably would not have work enough to occupy planner for 100%, therefore the idea was to combine planning with some other activities (e.g. tracking of documentation status or doing small projects), whilst at the same time maintaining overall schedule, consisting of several projects.
Main responsibilities were to do resource leveling, what if analysis, resource forecast, avoiding conflicts with vacations and holidays, collecting and analyzing actual performance information etc.
In reality I never found somebody, who was doing planning as his job in the past. We did use several times project managers to do this job. However somehow it never worked out the way I envisaged. And the skills were not a problem. They either could use MS Project or I could teach them how.
The problem was more psychological. It just seem to require certain personality type to maintain the schedule again and again, collect tasks statuses, reschedule if management asks to analyze what happens if we for instance lose one engineer, reschedule it again to analyze what happens if new project gets added to the program etc. I could never find anybody who could do it for a long period of time day after day. Let us agree, most of Project Managers would consider this job boring.
At the same time it requires somebody with quite a good analytical skills and good level of intelligence to work out the planning software, earned value analysis etc. These 2 requirements seem to be in contradiction with each other.
So, if next time I will be looking for a planner, I will 1st most probably be looking for his psychological characteristics, not his knowledge of MS Project or planning
Questions:
How to find a good planner and what to pay attention to?
Did I make any wrong assumptions in my post above about the work of a planner?
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HI Evgeny, I have just joined the PP and I am quite excited about it.
I totally understand your frustation as I am a Senior Planner and worked on big projects and quite small projects in the past 2 years.
Firstly, sounds to me that you need a planner for simple tasks such as update project schedule and follow your directions. As you see as a part-time role you need someone to do also some change management, cost control and progress reporting to reduce your time spent on basic project management tasks.
Secondly, someone with such skills to actually agregate some value to your project would have to have a very good view of project management and how to integrate costs, physical progress, change management, risk management and so on. This type of person is not easy to find and usually have a good job on big projects.
In my opinion, you have three options: 1- find someone with at least software knowledge and teach he/she how all the other processes integrate with project time management; 2- find someone that knows about project management and teach he/she the required software. Both of this options require some effort/invest from your side, so make sure you hire someone that you can keep in the job for at least two years. The Third option is to hire a subconbtractor to do just the schedule updates and do some progress reporting, it will give you the flexibility to pay by hour.
When you talk about male or female employee, I am a bit skeptical as I had good and bad experiences on both ways. My suggestion is, look to your current team and see which kind of gender you work better with and make the decision.
I hope that I could help.
Rodolfo Kurek
@ Mike - Thanks & it so nice to hear that someday, there we'll be going to have another basis in recruiting planners other than years of experiences.
@ Evgeny Z - I agree what you've said, as quoted below, as it often happens everywhere;
"Otherwise he/she may just walk a way exactly at the moment, when he/she learned most of the new things and is ready to start doing job properly"
Cheers.
Clint,
Thanks for your feedback.
I actually think, that provided you have a proper beginner, he can do a good planning job, the issue is to find a proper one.
E.g. you say, that “most importantly, the personality of one person that he/she may be willing to learn something once needed.” However in my experience the willingness to learn new things often conflicts with requirement to be able to do the same thing again and again with proper quality without being bored, which is also essential for a planner. Otherwise he/she may just walk a way exactly at the moment, when he/she learned most of the new things and is ready to start doing job properly
Regards.
Evgeny.
Hi Clint
Since there are currently no qualifications for planners you can only judge by years of experience.
A planner of 20 years experience may only have experienced the same year 20 times over with no progression.
Currently hiring planners will always be by trial and error - often error.
The CIOB are moving to remedy this by offereing graded qualification by way of thesis and interview - anyone can apply.
Best regards
Mike Testro
Hi to all,
All companies are looking and seeking excellent planners which seems a little bit near to the perfections.
I would suggest that on selecting a kind of planners for each companies, the company representative shall first identify the type of services needed for that planner, identifying what are those tasks needed to perform.
The reason is, most of the good planners were employed with high compensation but do exactly nothing different with the beginners. So, instead of hiring expert planners and give higher salaries, you may divert your needs to at least with a minimum qualification of planners, that would also fit to your current project needs. And by that, you helped them by giving time to explore and gain more experiences and at the same time you save time in hiring and most of all by economical reason.
But most importantly, the personality of one person that he/she may be willing to learn something once needed.
The bottom of my above statements is to "GIVE CHANCES TO ALL BEGINNERS".... :D
Cheers.
clintmarqz
The best are those who understand the processes that are planned. So it could be perfect if a person in your team may be willing to become a planner. But it is very important job and shall be respected. In small organization like you described project planner plans and monitors the whole portfolio of company projects, plays with their priorities and resource allocation, plans and analyze company cash flow and suggests potential decisions, He/She is a main advisor to company top manager and shall understand and plan jobs, resources and costs.
Becoming a planner shall be seen as a jump in the career. But this job is not only working with PM software but also management of project archives, preparing project management meetings, administrating contracts and I am not sure that one person is enough.
These are usual functions of PMO and add development of the corporate PM methodology, standards, norms and databases.
So the selection depends on the functions that will be assigned - entering data or analysis for decision making. And it is always risky to have only one person able to work at this position.
Look for grumpy old men no longer interested on climbing the corporate ladder one more time, if a woman be aware might be even grumpier (LOL).
It does not necesarily has to be a PM, an estimator can be a perfect fit, in your industry it might be someone who knows IT Jobs but who no longer does the coding. Anyone that can handle IT has the potential to be very good at scheduling.
eheh thats true also in my opinion the woman are better planner then man , also because have less disorder and are less chaotic
Patrick,
thanks for links for a document. Quite a comprehensive description of a planner's work.
With your post you actually confirm, what I thought as well: the personality is more important, than skills.
So, assuming you need to employ a planner to do relatively easy planning and assuming you did not manage to find a planner with good job record, what sort of person would you be looking for?
Is there any psychological test you can run to determine such person?
I personally tend to think that may be females have a better chance of becoming good scheduler (not that I am a sexist). Ladies are more likely to have this patience do work out the schedule carefully day after day without getting bored too quickly.
Finding good planners is hard. Very few people have the right balance between being good a communication and people and good at driving software accurately. The attributes of a scheduler are documented at: http://www.mosaicprojects.com.au/PDF/Attributes_of_a_Scheduler.pdf
From 30 years experience the one thing I have learned is it is far easier to teach someone with the right personal characteristics how to use a piece of software than it is to try and change an introverted software jockey into an effective planner that can deal with people.
eheh im quite agree to your post but of course generally in small company there isn't the planning figure , is not exactly necessary; for example in my society there is a department for project controls and offcourse planning engineers and i think that are not this only 2 skills that u described very important, there is a method to do planning without doing mistake day by day of course in some cases is boring and in others u have some satisfaction .
However i dont know where to find good planners there are some sites for jobs offering and so on i think there,we dont growt on the tree as way to say;
in detail i explain to u from my experience wich skill a planner should have :
for first 5 years maybe is boring most of the work is consisting mostly in data entry activities upgrade of schedules ect.. low level of analitical skill in most of the cases is someone else that told u how to set up the schedule wich activity insert . how should be the wbs ect.....
after at intermediate / senior level is required for a planner the capacity to develop a schedule starting of course from engineering and contract documents in self manners without a guidance of somebody else and in this case the analitical skills become more important and stronger however im young and im working just since 4 years so i dont know for entire wich kind of responsability a senior planner should have of course the technical skill loses importance for analitical , management and self-confident skills;
i hope i was a little bit exhaustive
ciao
Andrea
Email: PPadmin@planningplanet.com
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