PTM Phase 6 – Controlling a schedule

Controlling the schedule includes monitoring identified project risks. Risk identification and monitoring are also steps in project and project risk management.

Potential risks should be identified and documented as part of preparing the initial scope statement, including estimating the possible impact of risks. Risks can change, so their impact should be confirmed in Phase 6 of PTM.

Key project risk management documents to review are the project’s risk register (or risk log), the risk management plan and the TOR.

Watch

Watch the following two videos to recap the main points of project risk management.

‘RiskX: The Risk Management Process’ by RiskX: Risk Management for Projects on YouTube.

‘Project Risk Management – How to Manage Project Risk’ by Online PM Courses - Mike Clayton on YouTube

Project controls are processes and tools for tracking and analysing a project’s schedule and costs to help keep them on track. A project control system includes the people, processes and software to monitor a project.

The project manager may act as the project control manager (PCM) on small- to medium-sized projects. On a large project, there may be a project control group, led by a PCM, working alongside the project manager. 

Project control involves communication and gathering and analysing data. Its functions include:

• Setting and monitoring measurement targets
• Analysing work performance by collecting and managing data
• Reporting on progress
• Identifying and anticipating inefficiencies and issues
• Implementing preventative and remedial actions.

Project control for an agile project 

For a software project, for example, where Agile methodology is being used, the project control process should:

• Compare work completed with work planned
• Review work methods after each iteration and look for improvements for the next round of work
• Re-prioritise work tasks after each iteration
• Confirm which software features have been implemented during each iteration
• Manage any changes needed to the schedule and create another schedule baseline (obtain approval).

Resource

To learn more about project control and how it applies in Agile projects, visit the following link:

• ‘How to Control Your Project Schedule’ from PMExamSmartNotes

A schedule management plan describes the process, procedures and tools to be used by the project control team to control the schedule. It is a part of the main project plan.

Components of the schedule management plan can include:

• Roles and responsibilities for the project control functions:
  • Schedule owner – usually the project manager
  • Who can update the schedule – usually, the project manager
  • Who can read the schedule – usually, all stakeholders
• Frequency of schedule updates – when and how frequently the schedule should be updated
• Progress feedback – how the feedback will be delivered to team members
• Schedule change review and approval – the process for evaluating and approving proposed schedule changes, which includes establishing authority for accepting and approving changes
• Tools – which scheduling tools are to be used and who will use them
• Reports – types and names of reports, recipients, frequency, etc.
• Schedule integration – combining and integrating schedules into a higher-level program or portfolio schedule (done only if possible and necessary).

Resource

Learn more about schedule management plans from the following detailed sources:

• ‘A Complete Guide to Schedule Management Plans’ from Wrike
• ‘Schedule Management Plan’ (plan template) from the University of California

Monitoring the status of project activities provides the data required to update project progress and manage changes to the schedule baseline (the approved schedule).

Several documents contain information about requirements for monitoring items defined earlier for the project. These documents provide inputs for monitoring project activities and include:

• Project management plan
• Risk register or log
• Project schedule
• Work performance data
• Project calendars
• Schedule data
• Relevant organisational processes, procedures and preferences.

Work performance data and information 

‘Work performance data’ is the term for raw data before it is analysed by the project manager and project control team. It can be gathered via manual or electronic time sheets or automated time-tracking software. It is essential that team members provide work performance data on time and that the data is accurate.

After this data has been analysed, it is called ‘work performance information’. This information is used when reviewing project quality and work status and making decisions about workflow.

Work performance information includes:

• Status on schedule progress
• Deliverables’ completion status
• Start and finish status of scheduled activities
• Quality standards expectation results
• Authorised costs versus costs incurred to date
• Percentage of physical completion of in-progress scheduled activities
• Estimated completion time for in-progress scheduled activities
• Details of resources used.

Resource

Read the following articles to learn more about work performance data and information:

• ‘Work Performance Data’ from Project Management Knowledge
• ‘Work Performance Information’ from Project Management Knowledge

The methods used to measure project progress differ across industries and organisations. The following table describes six commonly used methods:

Resource

The following article includes more information on the six methods mentioned:

• ‘Measuring Project Progress: 6 Methods You Should Know’ from Plan Academy

A project’s variance baseline is set by identifying the project's cost, schedule and scope. These areas are also called the project’s ‘triple constraints’.

Schedule variance (SV) indicates how much ahead or behind schedule a project is in one or more of these areas. As part of routine progress monitoring, work performance information is used to calculate actual progress against expected progress. This gives the variance against the schedule baseline.

Four aspects or criteria of schedule variance are commonly used. These are:

• Dollar amount of costed work (some projects may also include future work that is not yet costed)
• Work percentages
• Level of efficiency of work time so far
• Level of efficiency of work time needed for remaining work.

Qualitative and quantitative approaches 

Qualitative and quantitative approaches can be used for project risk and time analysis.

A qualitative approach is typically more subjective. In risk analysis, it focuses on measuring the likelihood of a risk occurring during the project life cycle and the impact it will have on the overall schedule if it happens.

A quantitative approach is more objective. Risk impact is analysed using only data that has been confirmed or verified. The impact can be assessed for work delays, resources used and unplanned increases in scope and costs.

For project time analysis, a qualitative approach relates to the experience/opinion method of measuring project progress discussed in section 7.5. A quantitative approach emphasises the accuracy of time sheets and other work performance data, which is important for larger projects.

Root cause analysis 

When SV occurs, it is your responsibility as project manager to investigate how and why it happened.

When a variance has been identified, you should find out which task or group of tasks are involved and what the cause might be, for example:

• A task started late, changing its end date and duration
• The task was bigger than expected, changing its time and duration
• The end date for a dependent task changed, impacting other tasks
• New tasks were added to the schedule, and the task with the variance is dependent on these.

You may want to talk to team members about why these things happened. As project manager, you usually know the high-level detail of the reason, but team members may have more information.

Positive variances should also be investigated. When work is ahead of schedule, there may be opportunities to bring forward the delivery date of key milestones or offset negative variances.

Resource

Learn more about SV and its analysis at the following links:

• ‘Earned Value Management’ from AcqNotes
• ‘Variance Analysis | The Basics of Monitoring & Controlling for New Project Managers’ from Stakeholdermap.com
• ‘Variance Analysis in Project Management’ from MilestoneTask Knowledge

When you have identified an SV and understood why it happened, you can decide if corrective action should be taken or if a change request should be raised through the change control process. This is a formal request to change the project schedule. If the request is approved, the schedule baseline for the project will be changed.

Questions to consider when deciding between corrective action and making a change request include:

• Is the variance a one-off, permanent or likely to reoccur?
• Does it impact a significant milestone for the project sponsor, owner or other stakeholders?
• If it does impact one of these milestones, does that milestone have a contingency or reserve assigned to it? If so, you could use part or all of this to offset the variance rather than have the milestone be impacted.
• Can you adjust the schedule to another way to recover the time lost by the variance?

If the decision is to raise a change request, you would initiate the change control steps discussed in section 7.10.

Corrective action 

If your investigation of the tasks involved in the variance shows that corrective action is needed, your options may involve:

• Reassigning a task
• Modifying the task if initial requirements were found to be unrealistic
• Modifying the expenditure
• Coaching or training staff or providing performance counselling
• Adding lead or lag time to a task
• Fast-tracking or crashing a task.

After implementing the action, you need to monitor the variance and the outcomes of the corrective action as part of ongoing schedule analysis. This will confirm if a decision to take corrective action instead of raising a change request still holds.

Schedule performance is reported regularly to the project owner, sponsor and key stakeholders as a component of routine project status reports. It is also usually an agenda item for project steering committee updates.

• Your report content should include the following for each major activity or key milestone being reported: Planned (baseline) versus projected (current) finish date of the major activity or key milestone
• Reported SV in terms of days and as a percentage of the total duration
• Trend (comparison of the variance to previous reporting periods) – is the trend positive or negative, and is it steady?
• Comments, including an explanation of the variance, the next steps planned to manage and monitor it, and whether it is being treated as a ‘project impact’, causing a change request to be raised.

Most of this data should be available from the schedule and be accessible using your project management software.

When you make scheduled performance reports, ensure that the level of information you give is appropriate to the audience to which you are reporting. Variances deemed project impacts and requiring a change request are reported separately to the project owner and sponsor through the change control process, as discussed in section 7.10.

Schedule performance reporting should include analysing time management issues and recommended improvements and seeking approval by the project sponsor or owner as necessary. These improvements may need to be incorporated into the change management or change control processes.

Adjustments to documentation 

You will need to make updates or adjustments to the schedule for several reasons, including:

• To reflect actions taken to manage variances
• Following clarification of required work at the start of a task
• Following identification of a change needed to a deliverable
• Following identification of additional risks or issues.

Other project documentation may also need to be updated alongside the schedule, for example, the risk register or log and project management plan.

The following table details actions that should be considered when making these adjustments:

Updating documentation 

The following are the best practices for updating documentation:

• Establish a process for updating all documentation, but especially the schedule.
• Ensure project team members know when schedule updates will be made and when the updated schedule will be available (so team members look at the most current data).
• Ensure the update process is efficient for you as the project manager and the rest of the team. Use team meetings, timesheets, personal status reports, etc., to assist with communication.
• Ensure the updating schedule process reminds you to regularly review the schedule, identify current or potential problems and take appropriate corrective action.

A structured change management process helps everyone connected with a project know how to react to change and remain on track to achieve project goals. A healthy respect for change management increases the likelihood of project success.

Change management entails managing any changes required as part of or outside a project. Such changes may involve project team members and other staff in an organisation.

If your organisation has no dedicated change management team, a change management process is needed to give direction. Most organisations will have this process, or the project plan may include a change management component.

Change management responses 

Change management may be needed in response to situations within the project or the organisation. There are four commonly used types of change management response:

Resource

Read more about change management at the following links:

• ‘Managing Change: How Companies Can Help Employees Embrace New Ideas’ from the Wall Street Journal
• ‘What Is Change Management in Project Management?’ from Wrike

Change control is one component of change management used to handle requests for changes to the project’s schedule baseline. Change control involves:

• Receiving and logging all requests
• Evaluating each request
• Approving, rejecting or deferring each request.

Change control is critical for any project, but especially if it is part of a larger program or portfolio, where the unmanaged change to one project schedule may have a flow-on effect and impact the whole program.

As project manager, you may be responsible for managing change control and keeping a change register, which involves the following steps:

• Log change request in change register (or log).
• Conduct an initial evaluation of the request.
• Conduct a detailed evaluation to consider the impact on project success criteria, benefits, scope, quality, time, resources, costs, risks, stakeholder engagement, etc.
• Make a recommendation to the project owner or sponsor to approve, reject or defer the change.
• Ensure the schedule and related documents are updated if a change is approved.
• Carry out the required implementation actions and monitor them.

Watch

Watch the following video to learn more about change control:

‘What Is Change Control? Project Management in Under 5’ by Online PM Courses - Mike Clayton on YouTube.

Agile projects and change control 

Because Agile projects are not fully defined at the start, change during the project is treated in the same way as the original project requirements.

Characteristics of an Agile project that assist change control:

• Projects tend to be shorter overall, and products are built in short bursts of time (iterations).
• There is an emphasis on communication between project team members and the project owner.
• There is an emphasis on collaboration within the project team.
• Project team estimates change, and the owner prioritises changes against the remaining work.
• Changes become part of the project plan and are not treated as extra work.
• Project team members define the completion of work packages (called ‘work chunks’). The same standards are applied to changes as to all other work.
• The status of changes is tracked as rigorously as any other work.
• All changes are subject to project owner acceptance as with other work requirements.

Resource

Read the following articles to learn more about change control and the difference between change control and change management:

• ‘What Is Change Control?’ from the Association for Project Management
• ‘Change Management Is Not Change Control’ from CMCrossroads

Activity 7A: Controlling a schedule for FF

Read the case study ‘Families First Relocation Project – Part 7’. In a separate document or on a piece of paper:

• detail the action you need to take in response to this variance
• list the project documents you will need to update.

Activity 7B: Controlling a schedule for your project 

Consider your project from previous Learning Activities and think about the environment in which your project would be carried out in your organisation.

In a separate document or on a piece of paper, identify THREE possible events that could cause schedule variance and describe how you would handle these variances if they happened.