Project Management Professional Lectures

CE 5101
PROJECT PLANNING AND MANAGEMENT
Dr.T.P.Tezeswi
Assistant Professor
Dept. of Civil Engineering
Ph: 8332969423
Email: tezeswi@nitw.ac.in

Introduction
Project Planning and Management (PPM)
Construction Planning
Introduction
• Construction planning is a fundamental and challenging activity in the management and
execution of construction projects.
– It involves the choice of technology, the definition of work tasks, the estimation of the required resources and
durations for individual tasks, and the identification of any interactions among the different work tasks.
– A good construction plan is the basis for developing the budget and the schedule for work. Developing the
construction plan is a critical task in the management of construction, even if the plan is not written or otherwise
formally recorded.
– In addition to these technical aspects of construction planning, it may also be necessary to make organizational
decisions about the relationships between project participants and even which organizations to include in a project.
– For example, the extent to which sub-contractors will be used on a project is often determined during construction
planning.
– Like a detective, a planner begins with a result (i.e. a facility design) and must synthesize the steps required to yield
this result.
– Essential aspects of construction planning include the generation of required activities, analysis of the implications of
these activities, and choice among the various alternative means of performing activities.
– In contrast to a detective discovering a single train of events, however, construction planners also face the normative
problem of choosing the best among numerous alternative plans. Moreover, a detective is faced with an observable
result, whereas a planner must imagine the final facility as described in the plans and specifications.
– In developing a construction plan, it is common to adopt a primary emphasis on either cost control or on schedule
control
Ref: PMBOK; Antill and Woodhead, 1990, p. 8; Callahan, Quackenbush, and Rowings, 1992, p. 2

Introduction

Introduction
• Consider the functional requirements for construction
planning :
– technology choice
– work breakdown
– Scheduling
– budgeting.
• Construction planning is not an activity which is restricted
to the period after the award of a contract for construction.
• It should be an essential activity during the facility design.
• Also, if problems arise during construction, re-planning is
required.

Introduction
Technology choice
• Choices of appropriate technology and methods for construction
are often ill-structured yet critical ingredients in the success of the
project.
• For example, a decision whether to pump or to transport concrete
in buckets will directly affect the cost and duration of tasks involved
in building construction.
• A decision between these two alternatives should consider the
relative costs, reliabilities, and availability of equipment for the two
transport methods.
• Unfortunately, the exact implications of different methods depend
upon numerous considerations for which information may be
sketchy during the planning phase, such as the experience and
expertise of workers or the particular underground condition at a
site.

Introduction
Technology choice
• In selecting among alternative methods and technologies, it may be
necessary to formulate a number of construction plans based on
alternative methods or assumptions.
• Once the full plan is available, then the cost, time and reliability
impacts of the alternative approaches can be reviewed.
• This examination of several alternatives is often made explicit in
bidding competitions in which several alternative designs may be
proposed or value engineering for alternative construction methods
may be permitted.
• In this case, potential constructors may wish to prepare plans for
each alternative design using the suggested construction method as
well as to prepare plans for alternative construction methods which
would be proposed as part of the value engineering process.

Introduction
Technology choice
• In forming a construction plan, a useful approach is to simulate the
construction process either in the imagination of the planner or with a
formal computer based simulation technique.
• By observing the result, comparisons among different plans or problems
with the existing plan can be identified.
• For example, a decision to use a particular piece of equipment for an
operation immediately leads to the question of whether or not there is
sufficient access space for the equipment.
• Three dimensional geometric models in a computer aided design (CAD)
system may be helpful in simulating space requirements for operations
and for identifying any interferences.
• Similarly, problems in resource availability identified during the simulation
of the construction process might be effectively forestalled by providing
additional resources as part of the construction plan.

Introduction
Technology choice
• Example 1: A roadway rehabilitation
• An example from a roadway rehabilitation project can serve to illustrate the
importance of good construction planning and the effect of technology choice.
• In this project, the decks on overpass bridges as well as the pavement on the
highway itself were to be replaced.
• The initial construction plan was to work outward from each end of the overpass
bridges while the highway surface was replaced below the bridges.
• As a result, access of equipment and concrete trucks to the overpass bridges was a
considerable problem.
• However, the highway work could be staged so that each overpass bridge was
accessible from below at prescribed times.
• By pumping concrete up to the overpass bridge deck from the highway below,
costs were reduced and the work was accomplished much more quickly.

Introduction
Technology choice
• Example 2:Laser Leveling
• An example of technology choice is the use of laser leveling equipment to improve the productivity of
excavation and grading. In these systems, laser surveying equipment is erected on a site so that the
relative height of mobile equipment is known exactly.
• This height measurement is accomplished by flashing a rotating laser light on a level plane across the
construction site and observing exactly where the light shines on receptors on mobile equipment such as
graders.
• Since laser light does not disperse appreciably, the height at which the laser shines anywhere on the
construction site gives an accurate indication of the height of a receptor on a piece of mobile equipment.
• In turn, the receptor height can be used to measure the height of a blade, excavator bucket or other piece
of equipment.
• Combined with electro-hydraulic control systems mounted on mobile equipment such as bulldozers,
graders and scrapers, the height of excavation and grading blades can be precisely and automatically
controlled in these systems.
• This automation of blade heights has reduced costs in some cases by over 80% and improved quality in the
finished product, as measured by the desired amount of excavation or the extent to which a final grade
achieves the desired angle.
• These systems also permit the use of smaller machines and less skilled operators.
• However, the use of these semi-automated systems require investments in the laser surveying equipment
as well as modification to equipment to permit electronic feedback control units.
• Still, laser leveling appears to be an excellent technological choice in many instances.

Introduction
Work Breakdown Schedule
• At the same time that the choice of technology and general method are
considered, a parallel step in the planning process is to define the various work
tasks that must be accomplished.
• These work tasks represent the necessary framework to permit scheduling of
construction activities, along with estimating the resources required by the
individual work tasks, and any necessary precedences or required sequence among
the tasks.
• The scheduling problem is to determine an appropriate set of activity start time,
resource allocations and completion times that will result in completion of the
project in a timely and efficient fashion.
• Construction planning is the necessary fore-runner to scheduling. In this planning,
defining work tasks, technology and construction method is typically done either
simultaneously or in a series of iterations.
• WBS is a hierarchical and incremental decomposition of the project into phases,
deliverables and work packages. It is a tree structure, which shows a subdivision of
effort required to achieve an objective.

Introduction
• The definition of appropriate work tasks can be a laborious and tedious process,
yet it represents the necessary information for application of formal scheduling
procedures.
• Since construction projects can involve thousands of individual work tasks, this
definition phase can also be expensive and time consuming.
• Fortunately, many tasks may be repeated in different parts of the facility or past
facility construction plans can be used as general models for new projects.
• For example, the tasks involved in the construction of a building floor may be
repeated with only minor differences for each of the floors in the building. Also,
standard definitions and nomenclatures for most tasks exist.
• While repetition of activities in different locations or reproduction of activities
from past projects reduces the work involved, there are very few computer aids for
the process of defining activities. Databases and information systems can assist in
the storage and recall of the activities associated with past projects
• As a result, the individual planner defining work tasks does not have to approach
each facet of the project entirely from scratch.

Introduction
• An activity is any subdivision of project tasks. The set of activities defined for a
project should be comprehensive or completely exhaustive so that all necessary
work tasks are included in one or more activities.
• Typically, each design element in the planned facility will have one or more
associated project activities.
• Execution of an activity requires time and resources, including manpower and
equipment, as described in the next section.
• The time required to perform an activity is called the duration of the activity.
• The beginning and the end of activities are signposts or milestones, indicating the
progress of the project.
• It is useful to define activities which have no duration to mark important events.
• For example, receipt of equipment on the construction site may be defined as an
activity since other activities would depend upon the equipment availability and
the project manager might appreciate formal notice of the arrival.
• Similarly, receipt of regulatory approvals would also be specially marked in the
project plan.

Introduction
Construction Planning: WBS

100% rule
• The 100% rule states that the WBS includes 100% of the work defined by the
project scope and captures all deliverables – internal, external, interim – in terms
of the work to be completed, including project management.
• The 100% rule is one of the most important principles guiding the development,
decomposition and evaluation of the WBS.
• The rule applies at all levels within the hierarchy: the sum of the work at the
"child" level must equal 100% of the work represented by the "parent" and the
WBS should not include any work that falls outside the actual scope of the project,
that is, it cannot include more than 100% of the work…
• It is important to remember that the 100% rule also applies to the activity level.
The work represented by the activities in each work package must add up to 100%
of the work necessary to complete the work package.

Mutually exclusive elements
• In addition to the 100% rule, it is important that there is no overlap in
scope definition between different elements of a work breakdown
structure. This ambiguity could result in duplicated work or
miscommunications about responsibility and authority. Such overlap could
also cause confusion regarding project cost accounting.
Plan outcomes, not actions
• If the work breakdown structure designer attempts to capture any action-
oriented details in the WBS, s/he will likely include either too many
actions or too few actions. Too many actions will exceed 100% of the
parent's scope and too few will fall short of 100% of the parent's scope.
The best way to adhere to the 100% rule is to define WBS elements in
terms of outcomes or results, not actions. This also ensures that the WBS
is not overly prescriptive of methods, allowing for greater ingenuity and
creative thinking on the part of the project participants.

Level of detail
• One must decide when to stop dividing work into smaller elements. This
will assist in determining the duration of activities necessary to produce a
deliverable defined by the WBS. There are several heuristics or "rules of
thumb" used when determining the appropriate duration of an activity or
group of activities necessary to produce a specific deliverable defined by
the WBS.
– The first is the "80 hour rule" which means that no single activity or group of
activities at the lowest level of detail of the WBS to produce a single
deliverable should be more than 80 hours of effort.
– The second rule of thumb is that no activity or group of activities at the lowest
level of detail of the WBS should be longer than a single reporting period.
Thus if the project team is reporting progress monthly, then no single activity
or series of activities should be longer than one month long.
– The last heuristic is the "if it makes sense" rule. Applying this rule of thumb,
one can apply "common sense" when creating the duration of a single activity
or group of activities necessary to produce a deliverable defined by the WBS.

A WBS is not an exhaustive list of work. It is
instead a comprehensive classification of
project scope.
A WBS is neither a project plan, a schedule, nor
a chronological listing. It specifies what will be
done, not how or when.
A WBS is not an organizational hierarchy,
although it may be used when assigning
responsibilities.

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