Ways to evaluate and mitigate errors and risks with Risk Analysis

Whatever your project or role in a company is, it is very likely that you would have to make decisions that draw-in risks at some point of the project progress.  Risks, in totality, can be classified into two types, viz. Negatives and Probabilities. A negative consequence is based on the probability that a risk may move in the wrong direction.  If a risk is not calculated, it can be a harbinger of serious damage to the project and organization, let alone we need to stay prepared for it and manage it wisely if something were to go actually go wrong with it. Thus, organizations require robust Risk Analysis tools and software to identify risk at very early stages of the project. This mitigates unnecessary costs and time wasted to solve the implications of the risk at a later stage of any project or task. Risk analysis tools can positively identify and manage various risk factors to actually avoid the risk, all this can be done behind a desk on a machine.

Source : Pixabay

When is Risk Analysis Important?

Let’s make it easy to understand the point in time when Risk Analysis is highly important:

• Risk Analysis is highly imperative in the initial stages of the project planning phase to anticipate and mitigate possible issues- Deploy Risk Analysis early in the Project Timeline
• It also proves to be very helpful in making decisions that relate to project progress – To move along or not to move along with the project in the present and future
• Risk Analysis is a proven tool to manage any kind of risk that could prove fatal after a negative consequence has taken place – A good way to stay sharp and ready for anything
• If a project requires new parameters to be added into its lifecycle, then it is highly critical for organizations to add in Risk Analysis after those factors are added. It shows users the impact of new factors on existing systems- Extremely intuitive to new parameters

Now, as we are familiar with when Risk Analysis is important, let us understand how it can be deployed and where.

Analyze your Threat with Threat Analysis

A good way to start your Risk Analysis is by means of identifying threats that might come along at every step of the project.  There are various touch points that need to be identified to classify threats, it could be based on –

• Operations failure – access failure to vital assets required for operations
• Project delays – tasks or projects taking too long for completion or going over budget. It also includes product quality problems that could delay the entire project progress
• Force majeure – failures that could arise with natural disasters or an unforeseen human ailment
• Financial setbacks – financial setbacks can cause serious damage to organizations, this could be two-fold- underfunding or overfunding

There are many other touch points viz. Procedures, Reputation, etc. that could be a part of the threat for threat analysis.

Risk Factor Analysis

Risk analysis needs to be done through various actions, this can include processes and software that need to be integrated into project management to mitigate risks. Primavera P6 provides point-to-point perceptible risk analysis solutions that integrate risk management scheduling and costs to evaluate risk possibilities for positive project outcomes. This software delivers a suite of tools to run simulation possibilities to determine actions that can mitigate risks through various simulation techniques for project scheduling.

Project & Portfolio Risk Management

A portfolio risk can be clearly defined as a risk that is caused due to a failure of financial objectives through various assets or units that were supposed to cover those financial objectives. Portfolio risks can be differentiated into various types, viz. Structural, Overall, and Component.

• A structural risk is a risk that takes place in the composition of the portfolio, simply meaning the composition is not strong enough to meet financial requirements
• A component risk is a risk that takes place due to the failure of each component that is used to make up a portfolio
• An overall risk can be defined as an integration of multiple risk components involved in the project

A risk in project management can be simply defined as various changes in the development of the project or product that could influence the progress of the development. Robust planning can reduce the risk of project management failures.

For example, if we take a bidding process for a complex project. It needs comprehensive Risk Assessment to create bids and garner higher Return On Investment(ROI) from it. Bid viability is an important feature wherein risks need to be analyzed for companies to grow and gain a strategic advantage over the bid. The significance of these decisions can enhance the performance of the Strategic Business.  The ability of a project to generate revenue in a high-risk environment can be determined by project opportunities and data intelligence through the entire life-cycle of the bid.

There are many factors that come into play whilst bidding viz. Long-Term Revenue Potential, Type of Contract, and Capacity Planning.

Revenue Potential

Evaluating the potential risks of corporate revenue is vital.  Individual components or strategic business units (SBU) can pose a threat and are considered key risk drivers in a bid for a project. Winning a project bid cannot be absolutely guaranteed, but the probability of success can be higher if Revenue Potentials are evaluated early in the bidding process. Organizations can leverage a better chance to win a bid by evaluating the revenue capacity of a portfolio.

Contract Constraints

The decision-making process is also driven by contract conditions that are set forth by the company. As a part of the bidding process, it is imperative that various stakeholders like owners and contractors come to an understanding of the liabilities and risks that can affect the project.  Work that can carry liabilities needs to be evaluated through Risk Analysis for better project visibility.

Portfolio Liabilities

A project can have a two-way run- it could have extremely high gains or it could go down badly due to poor project execution. A good project has a greater possibility of completion than an average or under the average project, but for an organization, an external third party winning a bid still serves as an obligation for the owner as the fate of the project is undecided until it is completely handed over to the respective owner. Schedule uncertainty is a driving force for capacity planning, and it needs to be done to forecast resource allocation, finances, skills, and more.  Project timelines based on strategic business units is one of the most vital concepts to chart out cost and time overruns.

Closing in on precision, we can conclude that –

Risks are a part of every business and organization. Risk Analysis provides highly accurate identification and assessing of factors that could impact the project progress negatively. It forecasts various important parameters that could avoid risk threats and move the project positively to its outcome. Software and tools like Primavera are extensively used by project management professionals to quantify all the information to make informed decisions and implement the best solutions for a project. To Know more about Oracle Primavera P6 Click Here.

Significant Things To Know About Primavera P6 Calendars

With the rapid evolution of construction technologies, many software’s and innovative told have been introduced to perform better work and efficient project management.

Primavera p6 is a professional Project Management tool which is a robust yet comfortable solution for planning, scheduling, managing and executing projects and programs.

Primavera P6 is a smart built-in scheduling engine widely used in the BIM (Building Information Modeling). But it is not that smart enough to let you know what time to tell the electricians to start the work or when to take a break.

That’s where Primavera P6 Calendars comes in. You cannot build a proper schedule in Primavera P6 without at least one calendar. Therefore, to help you master P6’s calendar, its features and working with the scheduling engine, here are some of the fundamental things you will want to learn.

Let us know what Primavera P6 Calendars is

Primavera P6 Calendars: Check the real heck here

The calendars allow you to define available workdays as well as work-hours on a particular day. In a calendar, you can also specify public holidays, company holidays, working days, non-working days. You can also establish an unlimited number of patterns to accommodate different work patterns.

The Primavera P6 Calendars can help you out to assign the tasks to each resource and the activity to determine time constraints uniformly. P6 also uses the calendar assignments for leveling resources, scheduling and tracking activities.

The calendars hopefully have become central to the entire scheduling. If you do not have at least one calendar created, you may not be able to generate schedules in Primavera P6. Here is the quick overview of the calendar features which you need to learn to use it to your advantage efficiently.

Primavera P6 Scheduling

Primavera P6 Calendar Features:

1.The calendars are assigned to activities and not to projects

The new Primavera P6 calendars are associated with the activities and not the projects. It allows you to add more responsiveness to your scheduling part and use multiple calendars for one project. You can also use several calendars on more complex projects which involves a lot of occupations to avoid the unnecessary mess. Moreover, you can still use one schedule for the entire project if it seems a more feasible option for you.

2.Calendars boss around the Primavera P6 Scheduling

While working, if you create a calendar where Saturdays are non-working days and assign that calendar to your project, then you shouldn’t be surprised that Primavera P6 will never-ever schedule activity work on Saturday. Primavera P6 scheduling engine strictly implements the work and the non-work rules you set in a calendar.

3.The Primavera P6 Calendars have three different time-levels to work with

Time levels here are:

• Hours of the Day
• Days of week
• Days of the Month/Year

When you create a Primavera P6 Calendar, you can also set some rules at each time of level, following are the rules you can set:

• Define how many hours in a day are workable and non-workable.
• Set how many days of the week are working and non-working.
• Also, can pick what Days of Month/year are working and non-working.
• You can also select the office timings, the starting and the ending hours of work.

4.Calendars and Primavera P6 Scheduling

There are different working time zones and working days in various part of the world. For example, in UAE the typical working week starts on Sunday and ends on Thursday with Friday and Saturday off. These types of situations may arise when a project has special time zones to deal with. Primavera P6 will undoubtedly helpful in this scenario. Create a calendar with the Friday and Saturday off; Primavera P6 will never allow scheduling of any activity on these two days. In the Primavera P6 Calendars, all the work and the non0work rules can remain set.

5.Changing Activities

Changing the activities in Primavera P6 can be tricky. Mostly, a new calendar requires assigning to an operation. One must be careful while assigning a new calendar because the newly allocated time might add up to increase total duration needed to complete the work in given timeframe. The addition of the time happens when the time levels are set in hours per day.

Thus, using Primavera P6 calendars are a lot more comprehensive. Using the rich calendaring features will help you build robust schedules for the projects in any organization. Although you need to learn the Primavera P6 Calendar that can work for your team efficiently.

Source: https://blog.nibt.education/2017/12/things-to-know-about-primavera-p6-calendars/

4 Tricks To Grasp A Primavera P6 Schedule You Didn’t Build

You just step into work and rush to a meeting; only to hear that you will have to handle the whole project plan of someone else and its Primavera P6 Schedule.

Well, you don’t have any option other than accepting this project plan and continuing it forward.

So what you can do now!? Before freaking out, relax and take the primary steps of understanding the Primavera P6 project plan which you’ve just been given.

Here we list out 4 tricks that you can implement to avoid getting tensed when taking over someone else’s Primavera P6 project plan, whether it is simple or complex.

Primavera P6 Schedule

1. Trace Out The Project Plan Creation Method By Documentation

Ask for the related documentation before you try to uncover the new Primavera P6 schedule which you have handed.

Here’s a list to inquire about:

• Request for the Project Plan/Charter
• Ask for the accepted Work Schedule
• Ask about the Scoping documents
• Seek for any relevant Drawings of the Project Plan
• Seek all the Specification documents of Primavera P6
• Find also read any relevant Contractual documents
• Search for the local Document Repository and also learn the related aspects of Primavera P6
  

2. Have A Glance At Major Things of Project Plan– Durations, Dates, and Deadlines

Don’t follow the petty details which will serve you no good.

Find the below 4 essential project dates and examine them:

• Scheduled Finish Date in the Project Plan
• Scheduled Start Date in the Project
• Data Date of Primavera P6 schedule
• Project’s Deadline in Primavera P6

Don’t forget the alignments and as well as the relationship between dates. For example: check that the ‘Data Date’ is within the limits of the Scheduled Start and Finish Dates.

3. Do An Analysis of the Project Plan With Your Project Manager

Go and ask your project manager regarding a thorough analysis of the Primavera P6 schedule which will also help you to understand the aims, key dates, improvement, etc.

You can also ask questions like below for clarity:

• Which things worked well, and which did not?
• What is the process of reporting or status updating?
• Does the project plan have some gaps? Is the scope missing?
• What areas should be addressed first in the Primavera P6 schedule?
• Is the plan up to date and does it represent proper progress?
• Which things can further impact the project plan?

4. Evaluating the Project Plan

The project’s size must be known so that tackling it and taking steps can become easy.

The Primavera P6 also has 2 features that can help in determining the size of the project.

We will check the following:

• Inquire about the overall duration of the project plan?
• The total number of activities which make up the schedule?

The Count of Activities in Primavera P6

Add the field “Activity Count” to the Activity layout. There is a value of “1” in each field. You can also tally the number of activities on the screen.

Don’t forget to turn off the Group and Filters by WBS.

Check the column “Activity Count” of the project and for each phase or WBS level.

What You Should Look For:

• What is the length of the schedule/ project plan?
• Can the schedule be divided into multiple ones?
• Which activities comprise the schedule?
• Are the number of activities enough to show the timeline of the project?
• Can you merge too many activities or optimize the project design by deducting unnecessary activities?

These all were the steps or tricks for getting the hang of the Primavera P6 schedule which someone else has built.

Also, read Tracking Changes Made in Primavera P6 Schedule

Source: https://blog.nibt.education/2018/05/4-tricks-primavera-p6-schedule/

The ‘As Late As Possible’ Project Constraint in Primavera P6

Primavera P6 has many unique project constraints that you can utilize to an activity. Out of these, you can view them as either hard or delicate project constraints. As we’ve examined some of them recently.

There’s one Primavera P6 constraint nevertheless that can be truly helpful in certain circumstances. Yet it doesn’t appear to fit into either of the groups. How about, if we investigate the ‘As Late As Possible’ constraint?

Setting project constraints like an ‘As Late As Possible’ (ALAP) on the action can utilize to keep project away from the delay between the end of a task. And the start of its subsequent functions.

• If taken a chance that an action has project constraints as an ‘As Late As Possible’ constraint in Primavera P6, it will carry on in the behavior in the following way:
• The ‘As Late As Possible’ constraint in Primavera P6 will plan the activity to begin as late as possible. This condition implies if the action has a positive free float.
  i.e., (an inevitable delay between the action’s end and the start date of its successor, not a slack). Primavera P6 will compel the free float deferral to be 0.
• The ‘As Late As Possible’ project constraints of Primavera P6 won’t influence the beginning or end dates of succeeding tasks. There’s a chance that succeeding tasks go in reverse/forward in the arrangement with the ‘As Late As Possible’ project constraints. It will consequently plan itself to begin as late as possible.

‘As Late As Possible’ project constraints work contrastingly in MS Project. The venture will delay the beginning of successors when an ‘As Late As Possible’ constraint gets connected.

For example, consider that I applied the ‘As Late As Possible’ constraint (with a slack of 10d). You can observe on the Gantt Chart the shift of Delivery milestone is quite far into the future so that it can start 10 days before the Drywall activity.

The case of “Acquirement” Activities-

An example of the ‘As Late As Possible’ project constraints in Primavera P6 is a task that has acquirement of materials. The acquisition of materials needs to go before the task that they required for.

Typically ventures are not driven by the procurement tasks. Therefore, there will be a postponement of the end date of the obtainment. And also the beginning date of the task that requires the materials (not a preferable circumstance).

By including ‘As Late As Possible’ project constraints of Primavera P6, into the acquirement tasks they push ahead until the point when they complete the start of the task that requires them.

This will have a positive cash-out stream. And materials won’t stay nearby until the point that they require (Be mindful that they are not late! You should provide some buffer).

The case of “Pictures required by” Activities-

Before something can get developed, illustrations regularly require it. These figures frequently need a predefined timeframe before the actual initiation of the task that requires those pictures.

Utilizing the ALAP project constraints of Primavera P6 will enable the task planned. And it will set some days preceding the start of this task. These connected tasks together can do with a finish-to-start relationship and can apply to a 30 day slack.

At that point assign an ‘As Late As Possible’ constraint of Primavera P6 to the necessities of illustrations task.

Utilizing ‘As Late As Possible’ project constraints in Primavera P6 can help you all the more to precisely display the situations in a task. Run and try different things with them.

This was all about the Primavera P6 and its project constraints.

Source: https://blog.nibt.education/2017/12/project-constraint-in-primavera-p6/

Understand the conflict in Critical path analysis vs. longest path

There are several topics more valuable to your client when it comes to your project’s critical chain, critical path analysis in  Primavera  P6.

And the expectation is only YOU. A dear scheduler is an expert. So, YOU had entirely known your project’s Critical Chain/Path inside and out. And can do Critical path analysis.

But wait! ……Is it the Critical chain you should be reporting on, or the Longest Path?

In Primavera P6 the terms Critical Path, Critical Chain, and Longest Path are often used conversely when discussing on project’s super-high-priority sequence of work to deliver on time. It is very confusing to many. Also, there are some significant disputes about the differences.

The great news is that there is an important distinction between in Primavera P6 project’s Critical Path & the Longest Path, which is explained here.

What is Primavera P6 project’s Critical Path?

“It is the path of 0(Zero) Total Float through the project.”

The above description for Primavera P6 Critical Chain/Path is accurate but only in under a stringent set of conditions.

When is it true?

1. No Project Deadline

When a deadline is set for a project (i.e., Project Need to Finish By date in Primavera P6), then it results in the form of Total negative Float if you are late. It shows positive float if you are early. Hence, the path of 0(zero)-float activities disappears.

2. No Constraints

Primavera P6 Constraints affect an activity’s Total Float value. Constrained actions can show Total negative Float and can make a negative float to their successors or ancestors. Implementing constraints throughout a project will affect what activities are Critical. And therefore, again the path of 0-total float through the project escapes you.

3. No Actuals

In Primavera P6 a project with actuals may not show a path of 0-float. The actuals & the order of execution can influence the activities’ Total Float also.

Hence, it shows that the age-old “path of 0 Total Float” description doesn’t fit in our complex project environments.

And if you consider doing some digging online, you will find that our attempts to clear up the concept of “Critical Path” has led to infinite different ways to explain the term “Critical” for a project. Search, and you are expected to run into terms like:

• Criticality
• Near-Critical
• Critical Chain
• Critical Risk

What will be your Primavera P6 project’s Critical Path depends on and how you end up interpreting the term “Critical” and defining what activities are “Critical” according to you. You may have activities that you think “Critical” although the Primavera P6 software says their Total Float values. There’s a chance that you have activities that have positive Total Float but are Critical according to the clients. You may want to trace a specific path of operations through a project. This is called real-world project controls.

“Critical Path is a pathway through your project which has activities that YOU consider critical.”

What is a Primavera P6 project’s Longest Path?

There’s further clarity to be found here. The longest path is THE LONGEST path when there’s no disputing the term “longest.”

The Longest Path is the path through which a Primavera P6 project network from start to end where the Total Span is higher than any other path.

It makes sense to focus on a Primavera P6 project’s Longest Path as it is undoubtedly the path where variations from the plan will influence the project’s end date.

In Primavera P6 the overlap within Longest Path and Critical Path is possible?

The Longest Path is a Critical Path, but not all Critical Paths are Longest paths.

Because Primavera P6 we can modify Critical Path through actuals, constraints, deadlines and other mechanisms, usually we end up with a path that has many more Critical path activities that would be on the Longest Path.

If you begin with a baseline schedule that has no actuals, no constraints, and no deadline, and you perform some CPM scheduling on it, then the path of 0(zero) Total Float will be the Longest Path. If you added up the duration of all activities on that 0-float path, it would have the longest Total Span.

If you calculate the Longest Path for a Primavera P6 project that does have actuals, constraints, and a deadline, etc., then you will come up with a path of activities that are “important,” need I say “small-c critical” to the timely completion of the project.

Which one should be in use?

I would strongly recommend you get to know your Primavera P6 project’s Longest Path and monitor it. What the client wants to see might be something different, but the timely completion of Longest Path activities leads to your project ending on time.

Most software packages let you track both Critical Path and Longest Path.

Finally, I would promote educating yourself on how the Primavera P6 software that you use determines Critical Path analysis and what kind of things (constraints, relationships, lag, etc.) will alter an activity’s Total Float.

GET THE EXACT PRIMAVERA TRAINING WHICH YOU DESIRE

Primavera P6 is the in-boom software for Project Planning and Scheduling. Making a decent project plan gets troublesome if we don’t have the proper primavera training. Regardless of whether you're familiar with Primavera P6 or you need to advance your previous knowledge, we will share everything about utilizing this software in this Primavera P6 Training so that you get satisfactory command over it.

What’s it about?

By undergoing this Primavera training course, you'll begin figuring out how to develop project plans. There are numerous things to find out about Primavera P6, and this is the place you'll learn the skill to build the Primavera P6 schedules, starting from the earliest stage. We will provide the guidance for adding WBS, Activities and finally packing them all into a bundle. 

Objective

The aim of this course:

• To increase skills in handling Primavera P6 and making project plans
• To understand planning, controlling, and scheduling of projects
• To learn to minimize risks, costs and time to deliver proper results
• To develop, design, and maintain the project schedules in detail
• To manage orders, teams, and set user privileges

Who is this course designed for?

• Architecture students
• Engineering students
• Construction professionals
• Construction consultants
• Project Managers
• Project Coordinators
• Business Owners

Technology

Primavera P6 software

Opportunities

Who can I be after this course?

After this Primavera training, you will get better at handling the software and project management which in turn will open lots of opportunities in your career.