PROJECT PLANNING, SCHEDULING & CONTROLLING

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PROJECT PLANNING

  In planning phase, plan is made and strategies are set, taking into consideration the company policies, procedures and rules Planning provides direction, unifying frame work, performance standards, and helps to reveal future opportunities and threats In Planning, the following steps are followed.

• The Objectives of the projects in definite words
• Goals and stages intermediate to attain the final target
• Forecast and means of achieving goals i.e., activities.
• Organization resources-financial, managerial and operational-to carry out activities and to determine what is feasible and what is not.
• Alternatives-individual courses of action that will allow accomplishing goals.
• For consistency with company’s policies
• An alternative which is not only consistent with its goals and concept but also one that can be accomplished with the evaluated resources.
• Decision on a Plan

Forward Planning

• Planner starts from the initial event and builds up the events and activities logically and sequentially until the end event is reached.
• What event comes next?
• What are dependent events?
• What events can take place concurrently?

Backward Planning

• The planner starts with the end event, and arranges the events and activities until the initial event is reached.
• The planner asks himself “if we want to achieve this, what events or activities should have taken place?

Combined Planning

• Combination of both forward planning and backward planning.
• At any stage the planner may need to traverse the network back and forth several times until it is found to be satisfactory.
• Questions of the Planner
• What event or events must be completed before the particular event can start?
• What event or events follow this?
• What activities can be accomplished simultaneously

Resource Classification

• Manpower
• Material
• Machine
• Time
• Money

PROJECT SCHEDULING

• Scheduling is the allocation of resources
• Resources in conceptual sense are time & energy but in practical sense are the time, manpower, equipment applied to material.
• Scheduling is the process of formalizing the planned functions, assigning the starting and completion dates to each activity which proceeds in a logical sequence and in an orderly and systematic manner.

In Scheduling, the following steps are followed.

• Detailed control information is to be calculated.
• Timings to events & activities are assigned
• Consideration must be given to resources generally concerned with those resources whose availability is limited and which there by impose a constraint on the project. Important ones are skilled, technical and supervisory manpower and capital investment
• Resource Allocation

PROJECT CONTROLLING

   

• This phase is carried during the execution of the project.
• The difference between the scheduled performance and actual performance are reviewed once the project starts.
• Project control is established to determine deviations from the basic plan, to determine the precise effect of these deviations on the plan, and to replan and reschedule to compensate for the deviations.
• Controlling, the following steps are followed.
• The Standards and targets are established and targets are generally exposed in terms of time.
• Performance is measured against the standards set down in the first step.
• The Deviations from the standard are identified