Monday, November 5, 2012

W2_MaryKentebe_Scheduling best practices vs. Industry standards: oil and gas sector



W2_MaryKentebe_Scheduling best practices vs. Industry standards: oil and gas sector

Problem Statement
Over the years, the devastating state of schedule overruns in the oil and gas industry has become a chronic menace in the industry. Essentially, the issue is that most standard form construction contracts neither promote nor encourage efficient time management. More so, because the project controls discipline is relatively new to the industry, it is still a trouble finding the footing of what works best for the planning and scheduling practice. Hence the need for the comparison between what is referred to as scheduling best practices and industry standards.

Alternative Solutions
In tackling the issue of standardization on planning and scheduling practices, I shall be comparing the Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge 4th Edition1 (PMBOK® Guide) and the PMI Practice Standard for Scheduling with the Capital scheduling and schedule Management Project guide 04 (company’s standard). This comparison will be done using basically the SWOT analysis tool. Hence three derivates can be the outcome of this comparison. These are:
·         The company is doing better than best practice
·         The company is complying to best practice
·         The company falls short of best practice.
Depending therefore on what the outcome is, the conclusion may be a recommendation to review best practice, a recommendation to review company standards, or just a conclusion that company is in alignment with GAO best practices.


Selection Criteria
Three essential parts of the schedule shall be evaluated in this comparison.
·         The Application
·         The Schedule Organization and Plan
·         The scheduling and schedule control activities

Conclusion
The point is for as long as the menace of schedule overruns still persists in the oil and gas sector there is a need to get it right and review what is acceptable as best practice in the discipline. This should then be closely followed by correct implementation of these practices and adherence to them.
References:
1.    Warren Buffet (2012)Project Planning and Scheduling extracts  from: http://www.mosaicprojects.com.au/Planning.html
http://www.mosaicprojects.com.au/PDF/CIOB_TM_report_full.pdf

1 comment:

  1. MARY....!!!! I loved your problem statement. It is excellent.

    BUT, are you aware that AACE and PMI are in fact COMPETITORS? My best advice would be to not be using PMI standards unless you also include AACE as well.

    So what I recommend would be to compare the GAO "best practices" which I sent out to you as they are a combination of PMI plus AACE plus other organizations. Compare the GAO standards against what your company is doing and that will have a LOT more credibility in the eyes of the AACE reviewers than if you use the PMI standards. (Many of the "regulars" in AACE don't have much respect for PMI, myself included) PMI is dominated by IT and Telecommunications people not so much oil and gas. AACE on the other hand is dominated by oil, gas and heavy chemical process plants.

    Now to the bad news...... Because you didn't follow the Step By Step process provided in my blog template, nor did you provide a minimum of 3 references and those references were not in the appropriate format, I have no choice but to REJECT your W2 posting and urge you to seek out the advice and guidance of one of the people who received and AWESOME or EXCELLENT review from me.

    Ask one of them to help you out in drafting your revised W2.1 blog posting.

    BR,
    Dr. PDG, Jakarta

    ReplyDelete