Unit 1

Introduction: Planning and scheduling, Planning Techniques, Bar charts,

Limitations of Bar charts, Milestone charts.
Project Management through Networks: Objectives of Network Techniques;
Events; Activities; Time Estimates; Float and Slack; Critical Path; near Critical
Path.
Project
•Project is defined as a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique
product/service/results .
•Construction projects involve varying manpower and their duration can
range from a few weeks to more than five years.
•Each construction project is unique and temporary in nature and so is the
management involved.
•Temporary means that every project has a definite beginning and a definite
end.
•Unique means that the product or service is different in some distinguishing
way from all others products or services
Product
•The product in case of a construction project is the constructed facility such
as a building, a bridge, a highway, a dam, a canal, a factory etc.
Phases of a construction project
•Briefing stage
•Designing stage
•Tendering stage
•Construction stage
•Commissioning stage
 Briefing stage
•This stage is also called the 'Report stage'.
•It is the stage where ideas originated by individuals are studied with regard
to cost and benefits so as to establish the economic viability/social utility of a
project.
Purpose
The purpose of the briefing stage is to enable the client to specify project
functions and permissible costs.
Activities (Briefing stage)
•To appoint a project committee, if necessary.
•To appoint a project manager who will have a continuing responsibility to
the client through out the construction project.
•To carry out technical and-non-technical investigation so that alternative
proposals may be given due consideration.
•To study the various alternatives and identify the most feasible one.
•To prepare the project report which is the outcome of the first stage.
 Designing stage
•It is a very important stage in the field of construction because any modification of
the project after this stage would prove expensive.
•A realistic and detailed cost estimate of the project can be prepared during the
design stage.
Purpose
The purpose of this stage is to complete the project summary and determine the
method of construction and estimated costs so as to obtain necessary approvals
from the client.
Activities (Designing stage)
•To develop the project summary for the final adoption of the most suitable
alternative.
•To carry out technical investigations such as,
– Soil investigation
– Topographic investigation
– Materials surveys
– Market surveys
• To prepare detailed design , working drawings, specifications, bill of
quantities, final cost estimate and preliminary construction programme.
 Tendering stage
•During this stage tenders are invited and the contract is awarded at the best
available terms agreed mutually between the owner's team and the contractors.
Purpose
The purpose of the tendering stage is to appoint a contractor who will undertake
the construction work on the most suitable terms and conditions of quality, cost
and completion time.
Activities (Tendering stage)
•To invite tenders from the contractors for the construction work and to award the
contract.
•Pre-qualification of contractors involves an investigation of the potential of
contractor's financial, managerial and physical resources, contractor's experience
of handling similar projects, etc.
•To prepare contract documents, to be signed by the client and the contractor.
•Holding a pre-bid conference and providing the necessary information.
•Negotiating contract price with qualified contractor.
•Reviewing documents submitted by contractor.
 Construction stage
•The construction stage involves the execution of construction work as per
the design, drawing and within agreed limits of time, cost and specified
quality.
•Construction Planning Activities
– Construction schedule
– Manpower schedule
– Material schedule
– Plant and equipment schedule
• Control of site operations Activities
• Supply of materials and equipment
• Supervision for quality control
• Co-ordination among sub-contractors
• Supervision for quality control
• Supply of necessary drawings
 Commissioning stage
•It is the stage in which the performance of the structure is evaluated and the
proposed nature of maintenance and repair are considered.
Purpose
The purpose of this stage is to ensure that the construction work has been
carried out as per the drawing and specifications and all the facilities
developed function properly envisaged in the design.
Activities (Commissioning stage)
•To keep various records of actual work.
•To inspect the construction work thoroughly and have any defects rectifies.
•To prepare operating instructions and maintenance manuals.
•To carry out tests for performance, such as water tightness, strength etc.
 CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT
Project Management is the art and science of managing people, materials,
equipment and money to complete the assigned project work on time, within
budgeted costs and specified technical performance standards.
Construction Management may be defined as the management in which
group of people of different categories works together, to execute the
project economically without affecting the quality in a well planned and
organised manner.
 OBJECTIVES OF CONSTRUCTION
MANAGEMENT
1) The work can be executed most economically
2) The work can be executed as per specifications
3) To maintain good quality and workmanship of the work
4) The work can be planned and organized properly
5) The work can be properly supervised by qualified and trained staff
6) Completing the work within estimated budget and specified time
7) Taking sound decisions at the lowest practical management level
through delegation of authority
8) Developing an organization that works as a team.
 PHASES/FUNCTION OF
CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT
The function of management provides a useful structure for organizing
management knowledge.
There are seven functions of management
1) Planning
2) Scheduling
3) Organizing
4) Staffing
5) Directing
6) Controlling
7) Coordinating
 Planning
•Planning involves formulation of a number of alternative of realistic work
plans for achieving specified objectives and finally selecting a plan which is
best suited from the standpoint of available resources and constraints
imposed upon the project.
•Planning is the administrative process which translates the policy into a
method of achieving the objectives.
•How a project will be carried out?
•What materials will be used?
•What equipment and machineries will be utilized?
•What men and staff will be employed?
'What to do?' and 'How to do?‘
Importance of planning:
• Planning helps to minimize the cost by optimum utilization of available
resources.
• Planning reduces irrational approaches, duplication of works and inter
departmental conflicts.
• Planning encourages innovation and creativity among the construction
managers.
• Planning imparts competitive strength to the enterprise.

Scheduling
• Scheduling is the fitting of the final work plan to a time scale.
• It shows the duration and order of various construction activities.
• It deals with the aspect of ‘when to do it’.
 Organizing
• Organizing is concerned with division of the total construction work into
manageable departments/sections and systematically managing various
operations by delegating specific tasks to individuals.
Ex: What task to be done, who is to do the task, how the task is to be
grouped, who report to whom, where the decision is to be made and etc

Staffing
• Organizing involve the division of the project work into sections and
staffing is the provision of right people to each section/department
created for successful completion of a construction project.
• Staffing functions – recruiting the right people, arranging staff training
courses, carrying out proper staff assessment.
 Directing
• The directing function is concerned with training sub-ordinates to carry out
assigned tasks, supervising their work and guiding their efforts.
• The essence of directing lies in the ability to motivate people individually
and as groups to utilize their creative efforts in achieving specified
objectives.
Controlling
• Controlling is necessary for ensuring effective and efficient working.
• It involves a constant review of the work plan to check on actual
achievements and to discover and rectify deviations through appropriate
corrective measures.
Coordinating
• It involves bringing together and coordinating the work of various
departments and sections so as to have good communication.
• It is necessary for each section to aware of its role and the assistance to be
expected from others.
 Importance of Construction
Management
• Construction management practices invariably lead to maximum
production at least cost.
• Construction management provides importance for optimum utilization of
resources. In other words, it results in completion of a construction
project with judicious use of available resources.
• Construction management provides necessary leadership, motivates
employees to complete the difficult tasks well in time and extracts
potential talents of its employees.
• Construction management is beneficial to society as the effective and
efficient management of construction projects will avoid, escalation of
costs, time over run, wastage of resources, unlawful exploitation of labor
and pollution of environment.
 Project
• A project is composed of jobs, activities, functions or tasks that are related
one to the other in some manner, and all of these should be completed in
order to complete the project.
• Every project has one specific purpose.
• It starts at some specific moment and it is finished when its objective have
been fulfilled.
• For completion of a project, two basic things are required:
– Material resources
– Manpower resources
• Many countries, rich in material resources are exceedingly poor in
terms of level of production or plan achievement, while there are
other countries which have very limited natural resources but have
achieved higher level of productivity mainly because of talents, skills,
experience and know-how of their people.
• Availability, quality and use of human resources is a single determinant
factor in accomplishing project objectives.
• Here comes the role of management.
• While technology deals with material things, management deals with both
material things as well as human beings.
• Management increases the productivity through technological innovation
taking into account human factors involved in these advances.
• Each project, whether big or small has three objectives:
– The project should be completed with a minimum of elapsed time.
– It should use available manpower and other resources as sparingly as
possible , without delay.
– It should be completed with a minimum of capital investment,
without delay.
• Project management is a highly specialized job, to achieve the above
objectives.
• Project management involves, the following three phases:
– Project planning
– Project scheduling
– Project controlling
• Out of the above three phases of project management, the first two
phases are accomplished before the actual project starts.
• Third phase is operative during the execution of the project, and its
aim is to recognize the difficulties during execution and to apply
measures to deal with these difficulties.
Planning and scheduling
 Planning
• Planning is the most important technique of the management
• Planning means “looking ahead”
• This is mental process requiring the use of
• Intellectual faculties
• Imagination
• Foresight and Sound judgment
• To decide in advance (what, how and where it is to be done, who
will do it and how the results are to be evaluated)
• It is a course of action to achieve the desired goals
• Planning team for a project should take into consideration of past,
present and future-the past failures, the present needs and the future
utilities are all given due weightages in the planning process
• Planning is necessary to ensure proper utilization of human and material
resources to achieve the objectives of the project
• Since planning involves future, it has to be flexible.
• If at any stage of the project, the achieved results are not proceeding
according to the early planning, then revised planning approach is to be
adopted.
• Rethinking is an important feature of planning.
• In any project, the plan includes the estimates, the budget and time
schedule and sequences of completion of each part of the project,
manpower planning and the plant and equipment's.
• Planning involves defining objectives of the project, listing of tasks or jobs
that must be performed, determining gross requirements for material,
equipment and manpower and preparing estimates of costs and durations
for the various jobs or activities to bring about the satisfactory completion
of the project.
• Planning is important because:
– It provides direction
– It provides unifying frame-work
– It helps to reveal future opportunities and threats
– It provides performance standards.
 Steps involved in planning
•Crystallizing the opportunity or problem
– First step in planning would be to find out the problem or identify the
opportunity to be seized.
•Securing and analyzing necessary information
– Adequate information is required on course of action.
– It is necessary to determine the nature of the information required
and where the information is available.
– This information must be analysed to establish the relationship and
tabulate them for adequate interpretation
•Establishing planning premises and constraints
– By analysis of collected data will result to formulate certain
assumptions on the basis of which the plan will be made through a
process forecasting
– Constraints such as government control will also exist.
– Planning will be in backdrop of such premises and constraints which
must be watched to detect changes and their effect on the plan
• Ascertaining alternative course of action or plan
– Based on above analysis, possible alternative course of action will be
identified and examined.
– In general every situation will have more than one course of action.
Exploitation of the right course will depend to a large extent on
experience, imagination of the planner
• Selecting optimum plan
– By evaluating of the above course of action can be carried out either
by judgment or with the help of quantitative techniques and staff
assistants, to best suit the interest of organization
• Determining derivative plan
– The above selected plan will form the basic plan from which other
plans will develop to support it.
• Fixing the timing of introduction
– The question of timing – who will do, what will have to be decided and
an appropriate time schedule drawn up with the details of
construction work for communication.
• Arranging future evaluation of effectiveness of the plan
– Ultimate aim is to achieve the objective, result or goal
– Cross check or evaluate the adequacy of cost and time and
determining whether the planned objectives are reached as desired
 Objectives of planning
Main objective is to execute the project most economically both in terms of
money and time. Effective planning includes following factors.
• Proper design of each element of the project
• Proper selection of equipment and machinery; in big projects, the use of
larger capacity plants are found economical
• Proper arrangements of repair of equipment's and machinery near the
site of work to keep them ready to work.
• Procurement of material well in advance
• Employment of trained and experienced staff on the project.
• To provide welfare schemes for the staff and workers such as medical and
recreational facilities
• To provide incentive for good workers
• To arrange constant flow of funds for the completion of the project
• To provide proper safety measures such as proper ventilation, proper
arrangements of water and lights
• Proper arrangements of means of communications and feedback etc..
 Principles of planning
•The plan should provide information in a readily understandable form,
however, complex the situation it may describe
•Plan should be realistic.
•Plan should be flexible
•Plan should serve as a basis for project monitoring and control
•Plan should be comprehensive
 Scheduling
• Construction scheduling is a graphical representation which shows the
phasing rate of construction activities with the starting and completion
dates and the sequential relationship among the various activities or
operations in a project so that work can be carried out in an orderly and
effective manner.
Preparation of construction schedules
• The project is divided into number of operations and the sequences of
these operations can be derived after knowing their relationship properly.
• The quantity of work involved in each operation has to be calculated.
• Time required to complete the project as well as different activities are to
be calculated. This can be done from the quantity of work involved and
rate of performing each work.
Uses / Advantages of scheduling
•Gives the quantity of work involved, labour, materials and equipment for
each stage of work.
•The actual progress of the work can be checked
•The project can be carried out in a systematic manner using scheduling.
•By studying the schedule of any work and the many alternative methods of
execution, we can select the best one.
•Resource utilization is optimized
•Actual progress of the work is monitored with the actual plan. If there is any
delay, proper remedial measures can be taken to avoid such delays.
• Inter relationship of various activities at different stages are known, thus we
will be able to fix them according to their priority.
•Total duration of the project is known
•It gives a clear idea regarding the required men, materials, equipment at
different stages of the work.
•Since the starting time of each work is known, proper arrangements and
requirements can be done prior to the starting of the work.
Classification of scheduling
Scheduling can be classified into different types according to the requirement
for which it is to be done, such as
• Material Scheduling
• Labour scheduling
• Equipment scheduling
• Financial scheduling and etc.,
Methods of scheduling
• Depending on the size of the project, scheduling can be done by different
methods
– Bar charts or Gantt charts
– Milestone charts
– Network analysis
 Bar charts
• It is introduced by Henry Gantt around 1900 A.D
• It is also called as Gantt chart.
• In general bar chart consists of two co-ordinate axes, one(usually
horizontal axis) representing the time elapsed and the other (the vertical
axis) represent jobs or activities to be performed.
• Each bar representing one specific job or activity of the project.
• The beginning and end of each bar represents the time of start and time
of finish of that activity and the length of the bar represents the time
required to complete that job or activity.
• Following steps are involved in preparing the bar chart
– Divide the project into many activities
– List out the activities
– Find the inter relationship among these activities
– Arrange the activities in a systematic way
– Calculate the quantity of work and time required
– Draw it according to scale
Fig shows the bar chart for project which has seven distinct jobs or
activities(P, Q, R, S, T, U, V) to be performed for its completion. The time
durations required for the completion of theses activities are 10, 5, 10, 7,
5, 8 and 15unit days respectively.
From the chart, we conclude the following:
i. Activities P and Q can start simultaneously, at zero time. Both the
activities are independent. However, activity Q is completed much earlier
than activity P.
ii. Activity r starts only when activity Q is completed..
iii. However, activity S is independent of activity R. It starts earlier than R and
is completed earlier.
iv. Activity T starts only when activity S is completed.
v. Activities U and R can start simultaneously, when activity Q is completed.
vi. Activity V can start when activity P and S are completed. End of activity V
marks the completion of the project.
Figure shows another bar chart for the project related to purchase and
installation of a lathe. The complete project consists of five distinct
activities. Each activity cannot be started unless the previous actvity is
finished.
Figure shows a bar chart for a project which has seven distinct activities (A, B,
C, D, E, F and G) which are to be performed for its timely and successful
completion. The time required for the completion of these activities are
11, 6, 11, 8, 6, 9 and 16 units of time respectively.
From the above bar chart, we conclude that
i. Activities A and B can start simultaneously, since they are independent of
each other.
ii. Activity C can start only when activity B is completed.
iii. Activity D is independent of C. it starts earlier than C and is also
completed earlier.
iv. Activity E starts only when D is completed.
v. Activity F starts when B is completed.
vi. Activity G is the last activity and is dependent on the completion of D.
vii. The total duration of the project is 28 days.
Example 1:
For the construction of a guest house, certain activities are to be performed
which are as given below:
Activity 2 and 3 can be performed simultaneously and can start only when
activity 1 is completed.
Activity 4 can start only after activity 2 ends.
Activity 5 cannot begin until activities 2 and 3 are completed.
Activity 6 can start only after activities 4 and 5 are completed.
Activity 7 is the last activity and this can commence only after the completion
of activity 5.
i. Prepare a bar chart for the project
ii. What is the total time taken for the completion of the project?

Activity No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Duration (in weeks) 2 3 5 4 2 3 5
Example 2:
Draw bar chart for the following activities and find out the total time required
to complete the project.

Activity Time for completion

A 4 weeks
B 6 weeks
C 3 weeks
D 2 weeks
E 4 weeks
F 1 week
G 1 week

Activity A and B can start simultaneously. Activity C can start only after
activity A is completed. Activity D can start only after activity B is
completed. Activity E can be started only when activity D is complete.
Activities E, F and G are to be completed in sequential order.
Example 3:
The activity breakdown for a certain project is as under.
Activity Duration (weeks)
1 1
2 2
3 4
4 3
5 1
6 2
7 4

Activity 2 and 3 can be done concurrently, and both must follow activity 1.
activity 2 must precede activity 4. activity 5 cannot begin until both
activities 2 and 3 are completed. Activity 6 can be started only after
activities 4 and 5 are completed. Activity 7 is the last activity which can be
started only after completion of activity 5. Prepare the bar chart for the
project.
 Shortcomings of bar charts and
remedial measures
Bar charts have the following shortcomings. These shortcomings can be
partly overcome by the following suggested remedial measures.
1. Lack of Degree of Details
On bar chart, only major activities are shown. If too many activities or tasks
are separately shown, it becomes clumsy. Due to this, bar charts are not
very useful for big projects. A particular activity, whether big or small, is
shown by one bar, without any details of sub-activities contained in it.
These sub-activities cannot be separated out. Due to this, effective control
over the activities cannot be achieved.
For example, consider the activity 'dispose of existing machine'. In the bar
chart prepared for the task of obtaining a new machine, this item will be
represented in the chart by one bar, though the following functions
control the completion time for the activity:
A. Dumping machine in store
B. Notice inviting bidding
C. Finalization of highest bid
D. Final disposal of the machine.
For effective completion of the main activity, these sub-activities should be
scheduled properly. The above information can be shown effectively by
marking stages (called ‘mile stones’) on the activity bar, shown in figure.
Similarly, sub-activities of other activities of each bar can be marked with
stages or mile stones 1, 2, 3 etc. A, B, C etc.
2. Review of Project Progress
A bar chart does not show the progress of work and hence it cannot be used
as a control device. For proper control of the project, information of the
progress made at a particular instant of time should be available.
'Controlling‘ is essential for re-scheduling the remaining activities.
However, an existing bar chart can be modified to depict the progress
made. This can be done by showing the progress of each activity, by
hatched lines along the corresponding bar of the activity. Generally,
hatching is done in half the width of the bar.
For example, let us mark the progress made on the bar chart of Fig., after 8
weeks of the start of the progress.
Activity 1 had a total time allocation of 6 weeks. At the end of 8th week,
only 4 week's work has been done; that means that activity 1 is 4 weeks
behind schedule. Activity 5 was wholly dependent on the completion of
activity 1; the beginning of activity 5 will now be delayed by 4 weeks.
Hence rescheduling of activity 5 is essential. Activities 2 and 3 are
perfectly as per schedule. However, activity 4 is 1 week ahead of the
schedule.
Sometimes, different colors are filled in the bars to show various 'control
information', as indicated below :
Control information Color
Anticipated progress black
Actual progress green
Progress behind schedule red
3. Activity Inter-relationships
As indicated earlier there are some activities of a project which are taken up
concurrently, while there are others which can be taken up only after the
completion of some other activity.
The concurrent activities are represented by bars which run parallel to each
other, or which overlap.
The activities whose start and end depend on other activities are shown
serially.
In a project, there may be large number of activities which can start with a
certain degree of concurrency.
By merely depicting them by parallel lines, the inter-relationships between
them cannot be clearly depicted.
One cannot draw the conclusion that if two activities are scheduled for
simultaneously or overlapping times, they are inter-dependent or
completely independent.
For example, take the project of laying a pipe-line, consisting of following
activities:
A. Excavating the trench 12 weeks
B. Laying and jointing the pipe 10 weeks
C. Refilling and compacting 6 weeks
Activity C is dependent on B and A, while activity B is dependent on activity A.
If all the activities are scheduled serially, it will take a very long time – 28
weeks for completion. However, the activities can be staggered as shown
in figure.
• From the bar chart, we find that if activity B is started 4 weeks after
activity A, activity B has 2 weeks left after completion of activity A.
• Similarly, activity C has 2 weeks works left after completion of activity B.
• Now, if due to some circumstances, time of completion of activity A is
delayed by 1 or 2 weeks, how will the activities B and C be affected?
• This is not clearly portrayed by the bar chart, since inter-dependencies of
the activities are not clearly indicated by bar charts.
• This difficulty can be partly overcome by breaking each activity into a
number of sections, so that the corresponding sections of various
activities are precisely depicted inter- dependently.
• For example, let the jobs be divided into 4 sections.
• Since activity B is faster than A, and activity C is still faster, the shifting or
staggering of these activities can be for more than 1 section.
• The modified bar chart is shown in Fig by depicting the completion of each
section by 'milestones' 1, 2, 3 and 4.
• For activity A (excavate), each section will require 3 weeks time. For
activity B, each section will require 2 ½ weeks time while for activity C,
each section will require 1 ½ weeks time of completion.
• If activity B is started 6 weeks after the start of activity A, it will mean that
activity B will start after section 2 of activity A is already complete, and
that activity B will require 4 weeks time after the completion of section 4
of activity A.
• Now the effects of delay in the work of any section of activity A on
activity B can be easily found, and necessary control measures can be
taken.
4. Time Uncertainties
Bar charts are not at all useful in those projects where there are
uncertainties in determination or estimation of time required for the
completion of various activities.
Such uncertainties are always there in all research and development projects
and for space vehicle launch projects.
Because of uncertainties in time determinations in these projects, some of
the activities may require rescheduling.
Such rescheduling flexibility cannot be reflected in the bar chart diagrams.
Hence bar chart diagrams are useful for only small size conventional projects,
specially construction and manufacturing projects, in which time
estimates can be made with fair degree of certainty.
 Limitations of bar charts
– They can be used only for small projects
– It does not show the interdependencies between various activities in
the project.
– Delays in the work cannot be detected
– It does not indicate the critical activities of the project
– It gives some idea about the physical progress of the project, but
financial aspect involved is not shown
– It cannot be used as a controlling device by the project manager to
take any timely action.
– It is suitable for small projects and where the number of activity is
limited
– When the project become complex, it is very difficult to do the
scheduling using the method, and moreover monitoring of the project
becomes difficult.
 Milestone chart
• Milestone chart is a modification over the original Gantt chart.
• Milestones are key events of a main activity represented by a bar : these
are specific points in time which mark the completion of certain portions
of the main activity.
• These points are those which can be easily identified over the main bar.
• We have already seen that when a particular activity, represented by a
bar on a bar-chart is very long, the details lack.
• If, however, the activity is broken or sub-divided into a number of sub-
activities, each one of which can be easily recognized during the progress
of the project, controlling can be easily done and inter relationships
between other similar activities can be easily established.
• The beginning and end of these sub-divided activities or tasks are termed
as milestones.
• For example, consider a bar chart diagram shown in Fig.(a)
• It consists of four jobs or tasks or activities—Task A, task B, task C and
task D.
• Fig. (b) shows some 'milestones' on each bar.
• Each main task contains some specific points in time which can be
recognized, and through which controlling can be achieved.
• Each milestone can be considered to be specific event along the main
activity or job or task.
• This chart is, therefore, called the milestone chart.
• Each milestone is represented either by a circle or by a square, and is
serially marked.
• Though controlling can be better achieved with the help of milestone
chart, it still possess the same deficiency contained by the bar chart—it
does not show the inter-dependencies between the events.
• Within a task, the relationship between two specific milestones is
revealed, but the relationship between and among milestones contained
in different task is not indicated on the chart.
• For example, Gantt milestone chart does not indicate whether milestone
6 can be started before milestone 2 has been completed, or whether
milestones of task C are at all dependent on milestones of task A.
Limitations of Mile stone charts:
– Though controlling can be better achieved with the help of the
milestone chart, still it possesses the some deficiency as the bar chart
• Interdependencies between the milestone is not shown.
– Within an activity, the relationship between two milestones revealed
by the milestone chart, but relationship between and among
milestones represented in different activities is not indicated.