PLANNING TOOLS

&TECHNIQUES

Plan your work first…..then work your plan

Project Planning Techniques
Planning is essential to the successful execution of any
project.
It involves hard thinking about the project, what it is to
achieve and how the team will go about it.
There is ample evidence to show that investment in
improved planning usually pays off in terms of better
projects &direct savings(Mikkelsen,2005).
What are planning techniques?
Instruments or tools used to facilitate the planning
process.
They make planning easier and they are to be viewed
as means to an end.
Enables us to
communicate,reason,persuade,argue,enforce,destroy.
They also ensure replicability
Logical Framework Approach
It is an objectives-oriented planning tool.
LFA is a way of structuring the main elements in a
planning process of a project or programme
highlighting logical linkages between inputs, planned
activities and expected process.
It also includes external factors, assumptions and risks
into the planning process.
It gives a prominent role to problem identification and
analysis.
Elements of LFA
Goal: The higher level objective towards which the
project/intervention is expected to contribute.
Purpose: The effect which is expected to be achieved
as the result of the project.
Outputs: The results that the project /intervention
should be able to guarantee.
Activities: The tasks that have to be undertaken by the
project in order to produce the outputs.
LFA Cont’d
Inputs: Goods &services necessary to undertake the
activities.
Indicators: Objectively Verifiable
Indicators(OVI).Quantitative or Qualitative.
Means of Verification:(MOV),information or data
required to assess progress.
Assumptions: What kind of environment is conducive
to permit progress.
Example
INTEVERTI OBJECTIVE Means Assumptions
ON LOGIC LY /source of
VERIVIABL VERIFICATI
E indicators ON
Overall Infant Mortality rates Ministry of
Objective &maternal reduced for Health
mortality rates the under statistics
reduced 5,pregnant
&nursing
mothers from
x% to y% by
year z
Purpose Health status Incidences of Hospital/clinic Incidences of
of pregnant post-partum & records infectious
&nursing neo-natal diseases in
mothers, infection household
infants & within health reduced
babies centers
improved reduced from
x to y by year
Cont’d
INTEVERTI OBJECTIVE Means Assumptions
ON LOGIC LY /source of
VERIVIABL VERIFICATI
E indicators ON
Results Functioning Number of Clinic Mothers
primary health villages attendance willing to
care services provided with records attend
established at regular PHC
district level Services
increased from
x to y by year
z
Activities Rehabilitate Technical Lump sum MoH
mobile clinic assistance costs maintains
vehicles. Equipment level of
Reimbursable funding at
Design and Medical pre– project
implement supplies levels in real
mobile clinic terms.
programmes
Advantages of LFA
It ensures that fundamental questions are asked and
weaknesses are analyzed in order to provide decision
makers with more relevant information.
Guides systematic and logical analysis of the
interrelated key elements & thus improves planning.
Provides a basis for systematic monitoring and
analysis.
Facilitates common understanding &better
communication between decision makers.
Cont’d
Management benefit from standardized procedures for
collecting and assessing information.
It makes it easier to undertake both sectorial studies
and comparative studies.
What are the Limitations of LFA?
GANTT CHART
Visual aids that are useful in planning and scheduling.
It is a graphical representation of the duration of tasks
against the progression of time.
It is used to plan how long a project should take. It
lays out the order in which the tasks need to be carried
out.
It illustrates the start and finish dates of activities
Advantages of GC
It presents a graphical recording for the
planning ,scheduling and chart of progress on a single
sheet.
It is a simple and effective tool depicting the status of
the project.
It facilitates management by exception.
An efficient tool for resource scheduling.
Indicates milestones
Cont’d
Used as a measure of progress.
It is easily understood.
It is easily created and maintained.
Etc.
Disadvantages of GC
Estimates must be completed before the chart can be
drawn.
Does not effectively address the dependencies between
tasks.
Changes to the schedule require a redrawing of the
chart.
Several scheduling possibilities cannot be shown in the
same chart
Networks in projects
The weaknesses of Gant charts can be dealt with by
using network diagrams.
They clearly show interdependencies among activities
and enable planning and scheduling functions to be
performed separately.
Network diagrams describe a project in terms of
sequences of activities and events.
Cont’d
An activity is a work task-something to be done, it
requires time and utilizes resources.
An event on the other hand is an announcement that
something has or will happen. It signifies the start or
finish of an activity.
Before activities can be included in a network, their
relationships to each other must be known.
Cont’d
Some Questions to be asked;
1. What activities are its predecessors?
2. What activities are its successors?
3. What activities can be done at the same time as it?
NB: The first activity has no predecessor.
 PERT/CPM Network
Each event has two important times associated with it :
 Earliest time , Te , which is a calendar time when a event can
occur when all the predecessor events completed at the earliest
possible times
 Latest time , TL , which is the latest time the event can occur with
out delaying the subsequent events and completion of project.

Difference between the latest time and the earliest time of an event
is the slack time for that event

Positive slack : Slack is the amount of time an event can be

delayed without delaying the project completion
Scope Activity
Planning Sequencing

Activity
Schedule
Definition
Development

Scope Duration
Definition Estimating
Cost
Budgeting

Resource
Planning

Plan
Cost
Development
Estimating
Critical Path
Is that the sequence of activities and events where
there is no “slack” i.e.. Zero slack
Longest path through a network
Minimum project completion time
Advantages of PERT/CPM
Useful at many stages of project management
Mathematically simple
Give critical path and slack time
Provide project documentation
Useful in monitoring costs
Answers the following Questions
Completion date?
On Schedule?
Within Budget?
Critical Activities?
How can the project be finished early at the least cost?
Limitations of the method
Clearly defined, independent and stable activities
Specified precedence relationships
Over emphasis on critical paths
Projects Knowledge Areas
Scope Management
Time Management
Cost Management
Quality Management
Human Resources Management
Communications Management
Risk Management
Procurement Management
Integration Management
Thank you!!!