Construction

Management
ENGR.M.ABUBAKAR TARIQ|
Project Planning,
Scheduling and Resource
Levelling
CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT
Scheduling for Construction Projects
The Critical Path Method (CPM) is a planning and control technique that provides an accurate,
timely and easily understood graphic depiction of project task sequence. Its purpose is to
allocate resources over time in an optimal manner and in a way that allows effective reallocation
and schedule control after the project starts. One of the most important feature of CPM is the
logical diagram. The logical diagram graphically portrays the relationships between project
activities.
Another method of scheduling projects that is particularly useful if the major activities must be
conducted sequentially is linear scheduling. Linear scheduling is a planning method that seeks to
ensure that the work can proceed continuously, that there are no idle resources, and that
activities do not interfere with one another. A linear schedule helps management ensure that
equipment and labor are not trying to occupy the same physical space at the same time.
Significance of Scheduling
The success of a project heavily depends on how effective the scheduling is and how tightly the
project can be controlled.
Poor scheduling can easily result in completion delays and cost overruns. There, in turn, result in
claims and counter-claims, disagreements and disputes.
Project schedule is the basis of extracting other information.
Projects schedules are helpful for contractors as well as owners. For the contractors, project
schedules help in timely mobilization of the required resources and help in identification of
bottlenecks in the early stages of project duration. They also act as reference for comparison
with actual progress, cost of construction, and profit margins at any given time during the course
of monitoring. For the owner also, project schedule helps in understanding the requirement of
finance. Also with the project schedule in place, it is easy for the owner/client to monitor the
project accordingly.
Significance of Scheduling
A comparison of actual progress to scheduled progress helps the project manager identify
problems early and permits development of revised plans to maintain the proper course toward
the objective.
The total project scope is finally brought down into work packages and activities. This
breakdown into smaller activities helps the planner in estimating resource requirement and
duration for completing the activities. The productivity norms as well as the experience of the
planner are utilized to arrive at the estimates of duration and resource requirement for these
activities.
Historical Perspective
Frederick Taylor (1856-1915) gave concept of breaking work into elementary parts: the work
breakdown structure used for scheduling and cost control.
Henry L. Gantt, an associate of Taylor’s, developed Gantt chart, a visual tool for scheduling and
planning work tasks. The Gantt chart is used for scheduling multiple overlapping tasks.
In the 1950s, two major scheduling methods were developed: (1) the program evaluation and
review technique (PERT) by Willard Frazar, and (2) the critical path method (CPM) by Morgan R.
Walker and James E. Kelly.
Activity
An activity can be defined as an identifiable, quantifiable, measurable, cost able, assignable, and
controllable lowest level, element of work, which must be performed during the course of a
project for achieving the project mission.
Each activity is a discrete task.
Activity descriptions should be concise and unambiguous. The description communicates the
scope and location of the activity.
Characteristics of an Activity
The Associated General Contractors of America (AGC) asserts that activities have five
characteristics:
Activities consume time: To be classified as an activity, a project task must consume time.
Activities usually consume physical resources: A project activity usually consumes labor,
material, or equipment resources.
Activities have definable start and finish points: An activity represents a definable scope of
work, that work has a starting point in time and, when all of the completed, an ending point in
time.
Activities are assignable: Each activity is to be accomplished by a particular member of the
construction team. This characteristics of an activity facilitates management of the work.
Activities are measurable: The progress toward completion of the activity’s scope of work must
be measurable.
Activity Duration
One of the most important steps in planning a project is estimating the time required to complete
each activity.
The duration of an activity is a function of the quantity of work to be accomplished and the work
production rate.
Production rate= work done/unit of time
Production rate: is the relationship of work done and the time required to accomplished that work. It
can be cubic yards per hour, tons per shift (also indicate the duration of the shift), or feet of trench
per hour.
Unit of work done: this denotes the unit of production accomplished. It can be volume or weight of
the material moved, the number of pieces of material cut, the distance traveled, or any similar
measurement of production.
Unit of time: This denotes an arbitrary time unit such as a minute, an hour, a 10-hour shift, or any
other convenient duration on which the unit of work done is accomplished.
All activities in the schedule must have their duration expressed to the same unit of time.
Bar Charts
In 1917, Gantt invented a chart scheduling method.
A Gantt chart presents planned activities as stacked horizontal bands against a background of
dates (along the horizontal axis). It is easy with a bar chart to compare planned production
against actual production.
The Gantt, or bar chart is commonly used project planning and control tool. The bar chart is
widely used as a construction-scheduling tool because of its simplicity, ease of preparation, and
graphical format.
The advantage of using a bar chart is that field personnel can easily understand the information.
Additionally, it is a very useful tool for preliminary planning and scheduling. If cost, equipment,
or personnel requirements are superimposed on the activities, the total resources required at
any time can be computed.
Bar Charts
If bar chart is not generated from a critical path method diagram, the major disadvantage is that
the user must have detailed knowledge of the particular project and of construction techniques.
Other disadvantages of planning solely with a bar chart are:
1. It does not clearly show the detailed sequence of the activities
2. It does not show which activities are critical to the successful, timely completion of the
project
Critical Path Method
Critical path method is an activity relationship representation of the project.
The evaluation of critical tasks, those that control project duration, allows for the determination
of project duration.
The CPM calls attention to which activities must be completed before other activities can begin.
The critical path method overcomes the disadvantages of bar chart and provides an accurate,
timely, and easily understood graphic of the project.
One of the most important features of the CPM is the logic diagram. The logic diagram graphically
portrays the relationships between project activities.
 Critical Path Method
The advantages of using a CPM logic network are:
1. Reduce the risk of overlooking essential tasks and provides a blueprint for long range planning and
coordination of the project.
2. Provide a clear graphic of the interrelationships between project activities (tasks)
3. Focuses the project manager’s attention by identifying the critical tasks that control project duration
4. Generates information about the project so that the manager can make rational and timely decisions of
complications develop during the progression of the work
5. Enables the PM to easily determine what resources are needed to accomplish the project and when
these resources should be made available
6. Allows the PM to quickly determine what additional resources will be needed if the project must be
completed earlier than originally planned
7. Provides feedback about a completed project that empowers the project manager and the estimator to
improve techniques and assure the best use of resources on future projects
Critical Path Method
The greatest danger or disadvantage of a CPM is that with modern scheduling software it is
possible for anyone with computer proficiency to construct a schedule that appears to be
reasonable. It is easy to input various project activities into the software and to create
relationships in such a way that when looking at a bar chart of the schedule, the work seems to
flow in an entirely sensible manner. Unfortunately, there is no way to tell by looking at the
plotted schedule whether this is a true picture of physical construction relationships or simply
an attractive bar chart. Very often, there is no internal schedule logic, and, therefore, the
schedule is essentially useless from the standpoint of monitoring and analyzing progress. The
creation of these schedules can be the result of a lack of construction knowledge or
inexperience.
Critical Path Method
Purpose/Utilization:
Schedules are produced to aid in managing the work, and the information contained in the
schedule must be conveyed to many project participants e.g. subcontractors, suppliers, and
crew foremen. In the case of a large complex project, this is a huge information flow.
Activity Logic Diagram
The activity logic network supports the project manager by providing a graphical picture of the
sequence of construction tasks.
The manager should ask following questions for each activity on the activity list:
1. Can this activity start at the beginning of the project? (start activities)
2. Which activities must be finished before this one begins-predecessor activity(ies)?
(Precedence)
3. Which activities may either start or finish at the same time this one does? (Concurrence)
4. Which activities cannot begin until this one is finished-successor activity(ies)? (Succession)
Predecessor Activity: an activity that must be completed before an activity can be started.
Successor Activity: an activity that cannot start until a given activity is completed.
Activity Logic Diagram
One way to determine these relationships is to list all activities in a columnar format with a
second column to the right of activities list entitled “Preceded Immediately By (PIB)”. For each
activity, use the second column to list all other activity number (identifier codes) that must
immediately precede the activity in question. If the activity can begin at the beginning of the
entire project, write “None”.
It is common practice and a necessity for the CPM algorithm to work that a network have only
one start and one finish activity. Therefore, in the case of a network with multiple activities that
have no predecessor, a dummy “start” activity can be inserted at the beginning of the network.
Similarly, a dummy “finished” activity is placed at the end of a network and all activities that
have no successor activity are tied to this final activity.
Activity Logic Diagram: Example
Our schedule to build a concrete slab on grade has seven activities: excavate, build forms,
procure reinforcing steel, find grade, set forms, place reinforcing steel, and place and finish
concrete. Use the preceded immediately by (PIB) method to organize these activities for a CPM
schedule.
Activity PIB
A. Excavate None
B. Build forms None
C. Procure Reinforcing Steel None
D. Fine grade A
E. Set forms A and B
F. Place reinforcing steel C, D and E
G. Place and finish concrete F
 Types of Activity Logic Network Diagram
There are two CPM logic-diagramming formats:
1. activity on the arrow and
2. activity on the node
Activity on the arrow:
The arrows of the diagram represent the activities of the logic diagram
The nodes on an AOA diagram serves only as connecting points for activities
When using AOA it is often necessary to use dummy activities (arrows) to denote dependencies. Dummy
activities consume no resources.
Node: On an activity on arrow schedule, the nodes mark the start and end point of an activity. With
precedence diagramming the nodes represent the activities of the schedule.
Dummy activity: A pseudo activity with duration of zero. A dummy is a dotted line arrow and used solely
to indicate sequence.
Activity on Node
AOA logic diagram was once the most popular CPM method. Today, however, most CPM users
employ Activity on Node (AON) format.
In AON, each node represent an activity.
This is sometimes referred to as “precedence diagramming”.
The two basic logic symbols on the precedence diagram are the node and precedence arrow, but
what they represent is reversed from the AOA case.
Node: a node is simply a parallelogram that represents an activity, and each activity on the
activities list is represented by a node on the logic diagram. The node is of a standard shape and
format, and contains all the necessary activity information. Notation on each node indicate the
activity’s alphanumeric identifier (ID code) and duration. Sometimes additional information,
such as early and late start times, early and late finish times, and required resources, is also
included on the node. Each activity I a network should have a unique identifier.
Activity on Node
Precedence Arrow:
The precedence arrows show the order, sequence, and relationship between activities (such as
what activities must precede and follow another activity). The configuration of the diagram’s
nodes and arrows is the result of the PIB list (or the answers to the five questions that were
previously asked concerning each activity). The logic behind the diagram is such that an activity
cannot begin until all preceding activities are complete.
It displays the relationships among activities, provides project understanding, and improves
communications. Once the logic network has been developed, the manager then assigns activity
duration and resources requirements to each activity.
Schedule Calculations
The next step in the CPM development process is to calculate the earliest and latest times for
each activity. These times are computed such that the network logic is not violated and the
project’s overall duration is held to a minimum. This provides the manager with a time frame for
each activity. Within this time frame the activity must be completed, or other activities will be
delayed and then there is the possibility of creating a ripple effect that delays the entire project.
Once the activity times are calculated, the manager will be able to identify those tasks that are
on critical path-the sequence of linked activities that controls the project duration. By carefully
managing these critical activities, it is possible to reduce the time to complete the project. An
activity cannot begin until all activities previous to it (arrows leading to it in the logic node) are
completed.
Thank you!