This document discusses using a project schedule in Primavera P6 to track progress on an engineering project. It recommends taking an activity-based approach where each deliverable is broken down into activities with assigned resources and durations. Key points include: - Define deliverables and required completion levels for design review packages. - Structure the work breakdown structure (WBS) and cost breakdown structure (CBS) to align with the deliverables. - Plan activities at the discipline level with input from leads. - Load budgets and set up placeholders to import actual hours and costs from a cost system. - Track physical percent completes by comparing budgeted to remaining hours. - Periodically export and import actuals to

1. REMINDER
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30% 60% 90% IFC Engineering
What is the Project Progress
Prepared by:
Trevor Watt
Project Controls Specialist
EPCM Solutions
Using P6 to Decipher
Session ID#: 15412

2. Introduction

3. Rules of Credit
■ Document Count
▪ Very accurate during drawing phase
▪ Lacks ability to progress 3d model / calculations
▪ Hard to identify analysis and design changes
— They don’t affect the document count
■ Review package 30 – 60 – 90 – IFC
▪ Inaccurate
▪ Leaves a lot of interpretation to the discipline lead engineers
▪ Hard to identify change

4. Rules of Credit
■ Activity Based
▪ Very Accurate through all phases
▪ Easily identifies changes and slippage in schedule
▪ Provides more insight to resource loading
▪ Can provide detailed historical information for future estimates
▪ Can be used for “What If” scenarios
▪ Clear defined information as to what will be provided and
expected in each review package
▪ Can provide cost, hour and schedule alignment.

5. What is required?
■ Level of completion of review packages
▪ A document specifying what deliverables are to be included, and
at what level are they to be completed too.
■ WBS that aligns with the Level of completion document
▪ Each deliverable has its own deliverable number
▪ This forms the bottom level of the WBS.
▪ The deliverable will be broken down further via activities
■ CBS which mimics the WBS

6. Level of Completion Document
■ Define the Detailed Engineering review stage gates
■ Define the required disciplines to complete the package
■ Define the Deliverables that are to be part of the complete
package
▪ Define the level of completion of each deliverable for each
review package

9. Defining the WBS
■ After the deliverables are defined a coding structure and
system needs to be derived
■ Typical structure for an engineering project would look like so:
▪ Project / Phase / Area / Sub Area / CWP Package / EWP
Package / Discipline / Deliverable / Activity
▪ Project to CWP section should be defined by owner / client
▪ The EWP to Activity should be defined by Engineering company
▪ Next the codes should be defined for each level of the skeleton
structure.
▪ Should be consistent through the project right through till the
end of construction.

11. WBS / CBS alignment
■ In the previous example the CBS or cost code used in the
financial system ends up as:
▪ 4.311.900.100
▪ 4 – Current Project (PS4) added to the CBS but is basically the
project schedule name, so not included in project WBS
▪ 3 – Detailed Design
▪ 1 – Area (W)
▪ 1 – Package
▪ 190 – Process
▪ 300 – Control Narrative

12. P6 Typical Settings
■ Fixed Durations and Units
■ Auto compute Actuals – Off
■ Calculate cost from Units – Off
■ Physical % Complete
■ Budgeted Values with planned dates
■ Recalculate Actual units and cost when duration % changes –
Off
■ Link Actual and Actual This period Units and Cost
■ P6 V7 requires costs to be loaded for performance %
complete to calculate.
■ Activity % complete should be used under Earned Value in
the Admin preferences.

13. Planning
■ After the structure is defined and entered within the schedule
activities can then be created
▪ The most important ones to identify first are the outside client
deliverables that will be required from the client.
▪ Then the internal discipline to discipline deliverables.
▪ These should all be presented as milestones within the
schedule.
■ Each discipline lead should be brought in to help define/plan
there own individual scope.
▪ I have seen mass planning sessions, and these do not work.
▪ Start with each discipline individually then work with the group
as whole to define interdisciplinary logic.

14. Planning
■ Define the activities within each WBS or deliverable bucket
▪ Define durations and Budgeted labour units for each activity
▪ Most logic within a particular bucket is FS
▪ Try to keep activities within a 10 day duration.
▪ And keep in mind the milestones deliverables that were defined.
■ Define the logic between the buckets
■ Define the logic from the outside deliverables client or
external discipline deliverable.
■ Review as a project team.

15. Planning
■ Check resource curves to make sure project is feasible.
■ Level as necessary.
■ Check early and late curves.
■ Add in any schedule risk required.
■ Verify the critical path.
▪ In engineering projects, the critical path can easily be defined
usually by the client and inter-discipline deliverables.
▪ If one deliverable isn’t met the particular discipline usually can’t
get much traction on the beginning of their design.
▪ Eg. Oil and gas pipeline detailed design
— Transients to stress to structural. (could be multiple iterations)

16. Loading Budgets
■ Once the schedule is fully activity loaded
▪ Budgets can be loaded via an excel import
▪ Important that all resources have calculate cost from units
turned off.
▪ Export Project to excel selecting Resource Assignments check
box
▪ Select Budgeted Units and Budgeted Cost
▪ Multiply your units by your wage rate within excel, and re-import
to P6.

17. Place holders for Actuals
■ Since we are not coding to the activity level we need to add in
place holders for uploading the actuals from the financial
system.
▪ Can be WBS summary or LOE activity type.
▪ Activtity ID must match the CBS code from the cost system.
▪ Assign applicable resource with no budgeted units or cost.
▪ One is required for each WBS bucket.

19. Progressing the schedule
■ What questions to ask?
▪ Actual Start?
▪ Actual Finish?
▪ Remaining Labour units
▪ Remaining Duration
■ Make a global change to calculate Physical % complete, The
calculation is as below, but UDF must be used to represent
this caluclation
▪ Physical % complete = (budget – remaining) / budget
■ Essentially the above formula will calculate the earned labour
units.

21. Uploading Actuals
■ Export to excel using resource assignments.
▪ Select Actual Units and Actual Costs columns
▪ Delete all activities that do not have an activity ID that is a CBS
code.
▪ Use Vlookup or some other format to populate excel sheet
▪ Reimport into P6.

22. What info does all this give you?
■ With this setup you now can apply all EV columns to your
layout.
■ The progress is measured at the individual activity level to
provide overall progress.
■ Full resource curves and leveling are available if required.
■ Cashflows can be represented in either excel or P6.
■ Changes are easily identified by the team during progress
meetings.
■ Most importantly you will not over claim progress.

23. Rolled up Earned Value from P6

24. Detailed view at WBS Level

25. Stacked Histogram from P6

26. Over Allocation represented in P6

27. S-Curve generated from P6 dump into Excel

28. Performance Indices from P6 Dump into
Excel

29. Earned Schedule from P6 Dump into Excel

30. Variances from P6 Dump into Excel

31. Summation
■ There are multiple ways to progress engineering, but the only
unit that really matters is hours.
■ Identification of changes is crucial to success
▪ This is achieved by a detailed schedule
■ With a proper set-up, execution and management of
resources becomes easier and more accurate
■ The bottom line is what ever happens during the engineering
phase, can affect construction two fold.

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