• Experience can play a large factor in planning. Use previous project experience, whether good or bad to help develop future planning models. Talk with other senior planners or project personnel who have had experience with a particular type of project or industry. Find out what was good, what was bad, what worked, what not to do, etc.
• Develop a planning flowchart. It is important to plan the plan so to speak. Organize the flowchart into all the key project team members and their roles. Further details can be added if necessary, but it is an essential part; especially at the earlier stages of a project.
• You can accurately plan in detail only for nearby tasks. See below how schedule looks like throung the entire life of the project:

Project Plan at the beginning of the project

Project Plan mid of the project

Project Plan at the end of the project

• Always emphasize that the plan belongs to the group and must reflect the manner that the project will be executed.
• Use the prepared plan to investigate alternative strategies, this could save time later when remedial actions may be needed.
• Use the plan to check the content of the project scope and to conduct any Value Analysis studies.
• Set up your controls systems as early as possible. If you can identify all your systems and have them ready and in place in the early stages of a project, then you are not playing catch up. It gives you time to double-check any items that may have been missed or alternative areas that should be pursued.
• Get everyone involved. Build a team atmosphere if possible. Projects tend to get in the 'every man for himself' attitude; especially when the construction phase begins. This is not an easy task and never will be.
• It is always good to have alternative solutions in place when necessary. Planning ahead is essential, but all projects fall upon changes and occurences that may have not have been expected, but were possible. You should plan for those that are possible, even though they appear unlikely at the time.
• Make sure you have a thorough understanding of the job and especially your own scope of work. Then progress through all relevant documents to determine the scope of the project, engineers and the contractors. If you understand what they are supposed to do, then you know what you should expect from them
• Set up a communications plan. Make sure you have a detailed contact list, that all minutes of the meeting are recorded and distributed to the proper personnel. It is extremely important that all team members have a feel for what is going on at the moment.
• When planning the construction phase, determine through the estimate the number of men that will be on the project. You can even break it down to crafts. Determine if the number is feasible. Key questions to ask are:
  • how many will be working on the site at once?
  • what areas will they be working in?
  • are there any conflicts?
  • what is a reasonable number of men for that area or the site?
  • are these resources going to be available for this job?
  • what projects will deplete our resources?
  • will these resources be available for the duration of the project?
  • will we be looking at any overtime, if so when and how much?
  • do we need large equipment?
  • if so what sort of equipment?
  • how many do we need?
  • are they available?
  • will they fit on the site?
  • if they do fit on site, can the crafts still work around it, or in another area?
  • do the owners have any of this equipment we could use to save money?

solution

Along with making a baseline you might want to create predecessor milestones. These would be finish milestones that are direct predecessors from the General Contractor work to your work. Then you can manage by milestone. If the milestone slips then your work will move to the right along with the predecessor. Give the predecessor milestones a unique code so that you can filter them out from your regular milestones

Zoltan Palffy