Planning

One of the most important, if not THE most important part of any project is the plan.

To put together a good plan (schedule) you need to know how long each activity will take. Poor judgement may throw the project off course. Its important that team members have their say before the plan is committed. They need to agree that they can produce within the time constraints it contains.

As with estimating and unless you are completely confident in liquidating a plan, it would be very wise to seek the expert help of a professional Planner. A Planner will prepare, monitor and revue the plan. As long as he is provided with comprehensive project information and access to the key team members he will provide confidence to the project.

The Estimator, Planner and Cost Engineer (which we will look at later) are your immediate project confidants. Always find time to listen and work with them.

Consider looking at best and worst case scenarios. If the plan indicates time pressure points, consider what can be done to mitigate the situation. Is there adequate resource?

Look at how the activities inter-relate. Prioritise the activities, making sure that the activities that need to be completed first are in order. Some tasks will be dependent on the culmination of one or more earlier activities. Work through the plan to project completion.

Similar to the Decision Tree, discussed earlier, it would be useful to prepare a network diagram. The diagram may be simple or complex depending on how many activities and inter-related activities there are. Add up the duration of each task and the total time required to complete the route through the network. The longest route is commonly known as the critical path. It shows the shortest possible duration that the project could be completed in. The diagram can also be used to identify opportunities for reducing the duration of the project. Could, for instance, additional resources reduce an activity such that its completion open up sections of work that are dependent upon it being so? This action may have an initial cost implication but this could be recovered by the release of the other activities at an earlier stage. Remember that some activities can carried out in parallel. Keep to the critical plan to stay on schedule.

AGREE THE SCOPE & WORK THE PLAN