Primavera Project Planning and administration Video Tutorial 2

www.aboutcivil.com Primavera Project Planning and management Video Tutorial 2



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What Are The Common Problems Encountered On Project Management Work-Civil And Structural Engineer?

Reading Level: Intermediate

One of the tasks of civil engineer is the project management. Wherever a project commence, it is starting of 'live' of project problem until it has been completed build. Below are some of common problems that civil engineer may faced:

1. Project commenced without acknowledgment of civil engineer. It is common especially for small scale of project; such as single unit of structure like bungalow. Engineer will only alert whenever problem is happened at site; and problem is unable to resolve it by contractor. Contractor will like to build it without interruption of engineer.

2. Even though civil engineer aware about the construction work, some of un- responsible contractor will try to do some work in the time that engineer is unable to present. As for example; contractor carry out the concreting work after office hour especially in the evening, nighttime and public holiday. Once concreted, engineer is unable to inspect it.

3. Whenever construction started, un-experience contractor will do work by referring to civil engineering drawings without read in-conjunction with other professional drawing such as architecture, mechanical and electrical drawings. As a result, there will be a number of hacking during or after completion of structural works. It incurred a number of arguments and costs.

4. Even though an inexperience contractor is read engineering drawings, somehow contractor is build to their own knowledge; especially from contractor previous project. If previously contractor had been built a number of pad footing foundation, contractor obtain a piling foundation project. The contractor will try to change it to pad footing foundation by his own knowledge. Or even in pad footing foundation, contractor will change pad footing to smaller size. It will end up with structural problem.

5. Some irresponsible contractor will ignore engineer instruction. Contractor will build to his own knowledge. Contractor will always persuade client that contractor is builder. Contractor tells client that he is more site experience than civil engineer. Engineer has not much site building experience. Most of the time, client will agree with contractor because contractor shown client with physical construction works and engineer without much of physical product. These will continue until problem happened and unable to resolve by contractor. Finally, they will seek for engineer advice.

6. Contractor perform cost cutting on project work. Now days, project cost is very competitive. In order to obtain a project by bidding, some contractor may lower down the bidding cost to below the cost. When project is awarded, contractor will perform unnecessary cost cutting. This will endanger client.

7. When client is contractor and contractor is client, civil engineer will be in difficult position on dealing with client and contractor. There will be always in conflict of interest.

These problems may faced by civil engineer. How to overcome them will mainly base on engineer experience. Junior engineer shall not advice to send them to resolve these matters. Anyway, junior engineer shall be in guidance of senior engineer whenever problems are being solved.

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Inner Harbor Navigation Canal (IHNC) Project New Orleans Louisiana

The Inner Harbor Navigation Canal (IHNC) Project will be the largest Civil Engineering Works ever performed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers. The objective of the IHNP is to protect the lives and property of the citizens of New Orleans, Louisiana. As a Civil Engineer, one cannot aspire to a loftier objective than to serve precisely that function in every project. This project is also very special to practitioners and students of Civil Engineering in that design and construction works are being concurrently performed. This latter feat is presently requiring tremendous knowledge, dedication, and coordination by the Civil Engineers, scientists, and other specialists at the Corps of Engineers (New Orleans) and those serving within the ranks of the successful contractor for the IHNC project: Shaw Environmental and Infrastructure. For simplicity, the IHNC Project may be classified as the design and construction of a surge barrier and similar to a floodwall. Nevertheless, it will be a very long barrier (2 miles or 3.2 km) across the canal and will have to resist the tremendous impact of a water surge from Lake Borgne and/or the Gulf of Mexico during a hurricane. The surge barrier will be constructed near the confluence of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway (GIWW) and the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO). Since these are navigable waters, navigation gates will be constructed where the barrier crosses the GIWW and Bayou Bienvenue to reduce the risk of storm surge. A ...



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Project Management: The 3 Major Project Types

1. Civil engineering, construction, petrochemical, mining, and quarrying

Projects in this category are those which spring to mind most readily whenever industrial projects are mentioned. Once common feature is that the fulfillment phase must be conducted on a site that is exposed to the elements, and usually remote from the contractor's main office.

These projects incur special risks and problems of organization. They often require massive capital investment, and they deserve (but do not always get) rigorous management of progress, finance, and quality.

For very large industrial projects the funding and resources needed are often too great for one contractor to risk or even find. The organization and communications are therefore likely to be complicated by the participation of many different specialists and contractors, with the main players possibly acting together as a consortium or joint venture company.

2. Manufacturing projects

Manufacturing projects aim to produce a piece of equipment or machinery, ship, aircraft, land vehicle or some other item of specially designed hardware. The finished product might be purpose-built for a single customer, or the project could be generated and funded from within a company for the design and development of a new product intended for subsequent manufacture and sale in quantity.

Manufacturing projects are usually conducted in a factory or other home-based environment, where the company should be able to exercise on-the-spot management and provide an optimum environment.

Of course, these ideal conditions do not always apply. Some manufacturing projects can involve work away from the home base, for example in installation, commissioning and start-up, initial customer training and subsequent service and maintenance. More difficult is the case of a complex product (such as an aircraft) that is developed and manufactured by a consortium of companies, very possibly overlapping international borders, with all the consequent problems of risk, contractual difficulties, communication, coordination, and control.

3. Management projects

This class of projects proves the point that every company, whatever its size, can expect to need project management expertise at least once in its lifetime. These are the projects that arise when companies relocate their headquarters, develop and introduce a new computer system, launch a marketing campaign, prepare for a trade exhibition, produce feasibility or other study report, restructure the organization, mount a stage show, or generally engage in any operation that involves the management and coordination of activities to produce an end result that is not identifiable principally as an item of hardware or construction.

Although management projects might not result in a visible, tangible creation, much often depends on their successful outcome. There are well-known cases, for instance, where failure to implement a new computer system correctly has caused serious operational breakdown and has exposed the managers responsible to public discredit. Effective project management is at least as important for these projects as it is for the largest construction or manufacturing project.

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Dealing With Multiple Activities in Civil Engineering Project Management

Project engineers have to deal with multiple tasks at once. It may seem overwhelming at times, especially when you may have 10 to 20 active projects under your control.

It is imperative that project managers understand the status of each project, their urgency and deliverables. It also seems the better you are as a project manager, the more projects you have to handle at once.

When you manage multiple projects it is vitally important that you understand the final time deadline (the delivery date) and the overall budget.

Ultimately, the client is interested in two things, when can I have it, and how much will it cost. If you can satisfy time and budget constraints, milestones (as per the client's expectations), you will be 'held in high esteem' by your client.

In order to manage and juggle this many projects, it is vitally important that you understand 5 things ...

The final deadline and budget (
The importance and priority of the project
The overall tasks - High Payoff Activities, and Low Payoff activities.
Activities that can be delegated or outsourced.
Your role as a project Engineer / manager.

1. In order to effectively manage multiple projects, you need to understand your total workload , and compare the projects deliverables. This is usually done using a project planner, or project management tools such as Microsoft Project. Once all projects are considered, hopefully not all deadlines and deliverables are NOT due at the same time. The Tip is to find out the REAL deliverable date. Often when a client is asked when they need to project completed, they have a buffer built in so they can 'sit on it' for a short while. If you establish the real activities that will follow the 'deadline', you may be able to safely extend the final date with the client - with no detriment. If this is not the case, at the least you will find out the importance of the final date.

2. Not all projects are as important as each other. Some projects have other consequences, and tasks that cannot be achieved without the delivery of the initial project. Without sounding callus, you definitely want to look after your most important clients who have constant work flow and pay well and on time. In most cases, it is these most valued clients that should be looked after as priority number 1, as they are your 'bread and butter'. . Keep them happy and your business should continue to motor along. At the same time you need to take good care of new clients who may have millions of dollars in future work for you depending on your performance. They will usually not display all of their cards to you, so the best thing is to make sure you look after them and meet your deadlines. Ultimately you don't want to spend 100 hours on a project that is only worth 50 hours payment. It is fine balance between current and potential future work. The trick is to recognise project importance early , and their future work potential.

3. Within many projects there high payoff activities and low payoff activities. High payoff activities are those that will get the most benefit out of there completion, and low payoff activities don't generate too much benefit at their completion. The tip is to recognise which activities / tasks are high payoff activities right at the start of the project. It is these activities that should be given the priority and attention they deserve. Low payoff activities could be either tackled later, or delegated to others (it is important however to monitor the progress of low payoff activities otherwise they may be forgotten until the end - or at a critical time). Constant updates to the overall task schedule is a great way to stay on track and monitor your progress on each project.

4. You don't want to spend your valuable time on low payoff activities that can be done by others. Project management is also about delegating or outsourcing activities that are better completed by someone else. Sometimes it is better to outsource a 'time consuming complex design' to an expert in the field, while you manage the process and the overall project. The old saying "if you want something done right you have to do it yourself" is not always the case in engineering and project management. You need to recognise and do a cost analysis on your time and cost on their cost (and delivery time). While they are completing the task, you could be working on or managing another high payoff activity, which will ultimately allow an overall timely delivery of the project.

5. As a project manager, you should be generally 'managing' the project, and should not be 'in the trenches digging the holes'. That is the job for the 'soldiers' or workers under your control. It is however important that you understand their skills and what they should be delivering for you. By 'staying on top' of this element (periodic meetings and minor milestones), reduces the frustration of you having to 'check and change' their progress. It is your responsibility to deliver , so you should ensure all things are moving ahead in a timely manner, and communicate effectively and regularly with your team, and your client.

Utilising each of these 5 areas will help organise your 'juggling act'. Hopefully all of this makes sense, and you are able to apply it in your role. Even if you are not yet project managing, you can still apply some of these principles in your engineering career.

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Integrated Project Delivery Could Be the New Way to Build

In the economic climate that we find ourselves at the moment, it seems that the only projects out there are public jobs where bids are solicited and any warm-blooded creature with a pulse and a remote ability to read plans can submit a price on the job. The municipalities are required by law to accept the lowest responsible bid. Of course words like responsible can be interpreted in many ways, so the public entity reserves the right to exclude bids from companies that they feel are not capable of performing the work. However, when tax dollars are in the mix, I would think that it is difficult to justify not taking the low bid especially if they can provide the bonding and insurance requirements.

I've been doing a lot of hard bidding lately with only very limited success. Last week I bid a $4 million animal sanctuary where there were at least ten other bidders. Of course I didn't get the job, and not only was I frustrated at wasting nearly a week putting this bid together, I was also frustrated by wasted the time of 50 or so subcontractors that delivered bids to me. If we think about all the time wasted on this bidding process from all ten bidders and potentially hundreds of subs, the man hours begin to hit the stratosphere. Sometime I think that there has go to be a better way.

Well, there probably is, and it is call Integrated Project Delivery (IPD). IPD is a negotiated form of project delivery where risk and reward are shared among the owner, architect, prime contractor, and sometimes even subcontractors. IPD emphasizes early involvement of contractors and collaboration of team members throughout the project. Interestingly, trade contractors are considered the most crucial element of early project collaboration because their input will have significant impact on design and project cost.

Jonathan Cohen with Integrated Project Resources recently published six case studies of IPD projects through the American Institute of Architects. Cohen defines IPD by projects having the following characteristics:

o Early Involvement of Key Participants
o Shared Risk and Reward
o Multi-Party Contract
o Collaborative Decision Making and Control
o Liability Waivers Among Key Participants
o Jointly Developed and Validated Project Goals

Cohen goes into analysis about each individual project but sums up the study by writing:

In every case these projects met or exceeded the owner's expectations with respect to budget, schedule, design quality, and sustainability and also met the financial expectations of designers and builders. Every participant interviewed was enthusiastic about IPD and eager to try it again.

I think IPD is certainly the method of project delivery that makes the most sense, but will certainly involve more upfront investment of time and money in a project. Will owners be able to stomach this release of monies early in the construction project in hopes of delivering a better product? Evidently they have and will hopefully continue to do so.

It will at least cut down on the hours of wasted bidding time.

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