Don’t Manage by Percent Complete
Most project management scheduling tools have a field for entering the percentage complete for each activity. Before an activity starts, it is 0% complete. When it is finished, it is 100% complete. However, in between can be tricky. On the surface, if a team member were 20 hours into a 40 hour activity, you would say he is 50% complete. But is he? He may be close to done, or he may be only 10% done.
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Investigate Further When ‘Completed’ Deliverables Are Not Really Completed
Sometimes a team member says that a deliverable is complete when in reality it is not quite done. This can happen if a deliverable is ’completed’ by the team member but not approved. The team member may say the work is complete, but when the deliverable is checked it is discovered that it is incomplete or needs additional follow-up work. …
There is concern from many project managers that they are expected to present a detailed estimate of the project work when the charter and schedule are created. However, the detailed requirements have not been gathered yet. So how are you supposed to estimate the work without having captured the detailed requirements? It seems like a valid question. Yet, when you talk about gathering detailed requirements, you are usually talking about the Analysts Phase of a project lifecycle, not the up-front project management work of defining and planning the project. …
Estimate the Project Work Before Gathering Detailed RequirementsRead More »
The definition of goals, strategies and objectives can be difficult to define. However, through practice and the use of some common definitions, you can start to identify and tell the difference. …
When a project or collection of projects is in the idea or concept stage, you want to put together a high-level estimate to see whether or not the project is worth pursuing. You typically do not want to spend too much time working on a detailed estimate at this point, since you do not know if the idea is a worthwhile. Basically, you just want to know the relative magnitude of the effort. While you may be asked to provide a high-level estimate of the cost, the business people are also struggling to try to understand and quantify what the benefits of the project will be. …
Detail and Summary Activities
If you look at a WBS activity and determine that it needs to be broken down to another level, the original activity becomes known as a “summary” level. A summary activity does not have any work or hours specifically associated with it. It represents a logical roll-up of the activities that are under it. …
Tips for Creating a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)Read More »
There is not necessarily sequential order between defining (planning) the project and building the schedule and budget. That is, you do not have to completely define the work first and then build the schedule and budget second. Some of the sections of the Project Charter, such as the estimates for cost and duration, cannot be completed without starting to lay out the overall project schedule. …
Work on the Project Charter, Schedule and Budget SimultaneouslyRead More »
When you create a schedule you generally don’t know enough to enter all of the detailed activities the first time though. Instead, you identify large chunks of work first, and then break the larger chunks into smaller pieces. These smaller pieces are, in turn, broken down into still smaller and more discrete activities. This technique is referred to as creating a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS). …
There are three types of communication – mandatory, informational and marketing. When you create a Communication Plan for your project it might make sense to have different types of communication that fit into all three categories.
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Construction Lifecycle Risk Management Conference
Date: 17th & 18th April 2011
Venue: Sheraton Abu Dhabi Hotel & Resort, Abu Dhabi, UAE
Welcome and Opening Remarks by the Chairperson, Samer H Skaik
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Good morning.
I am delighted to join our speakers in welcoming you all and open this Conference on “Construction lifecycle Risk Management” in Abu Dhabi.
It gives me great pleasure and honor to chair this conference. I am so happy that we have in this hall, dedicated individuals from different backgrounds and expertise, from various industries across the GCC region. Those delegates who travelled for miles remind us how important this conference is. Thank you all for coming.
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Opening and Closing remarks of Construction Lifecycle Risk Management ConferenceRead More »
Inherent risks are those that exist based on the general characteristics of the project. These are risks that can appear regardless of the specific nature of the project.
None of the inherent risks mean that the project is in trouble. Many of these risk factors will be rated as low or medium-level risks. Even if you identify an inherent risk as high, other project factors will come into play as well. For instance, the checklist below states that a large project is inherently more risky that a smaller project. This is generally true. However, an experienced project manager can mitigate many risks associated with large project size. Also remember, if your project falls into a high-risk category, it does not mean you will not be successful. It only means that you should put plans into place to manage the risks. …
Estimate in Phases
One of the most difficult aspects of estimating projects is that you do not know exactly what work will be needed in the distant future. It can be difficult to define and estimate work that will be done three months from now. It’s harder to estimate six months in the future. Nine months is even harder. The reason is that decisions made and deliverables produced earlier in the project have an impact on what the work looks like further along. Therefore, there is more and more estimating uncertainty associated with work that is farther and farther out in the future. …
