CBA Inc

Archive for Project Management’ Category

15

Jul
2013
Comments Off on Monthly Actual Cost Values Not Matching Stored Period Performance Values for Actual Costs? Why?

Monthly Actual Cost Values Not Matching Stored Period Performance Values for Actual Costs? Why?

Understanding How Costs Display in P6 R8

So you’re viewing a monthly display on the Team Usage page in the web and wondering why the Actual Cost values each month do not match your monthly stored period performance values for Actual Cost.  Don’t be alarmed.  Your database has not been corrupted by a super bug, and possibly more important, you did not screw anything up!

The P6 Stored Period Costs will never match up month to month with the Actual Costs shown on the spread in the Team Usage view.  In P6 web, the Team Usage view is designed to take the overall Actual Cost for an activity and distribute it based on the elapsed duration of the activity.  Like it or not, the Actual Costs will display based on the number of days in each month; what “it” views as elapsed time.   This is true whether you have an integrated solution for updating actuals in P6, you are using timesheets (Progress Reporter) or you have manually entered in actuals at the activity level.  If you need an Actual Cost spread based on stored periods, the best way to get that information is from the Resource Assignments view in the web or P6 Professional client tool.  The Assignments view in both of these tools allow you bring in Period Actuals based on Stored Period Performance Financial Periods. 

So what good is the Team Usage page if you can’t use it for Actual Costs?  If you’re looking to forecast costs and need to know what your Remaining Costs are by month, for example, the Team Usage page is your quickest option in the web because it doesn’t need any filtering and little,if any, formatting.  The Remaining Costs are simply spread through the remaining duration of the activity.  P6 also takes into consideration any resource curves that may be assigned when creating the Remaining Cost spread. So now that the expectations are clear, you and the Team Usage page can be friends again!

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5

Jul
2013
Comments Off on Seeing Red?

Seeing Red?

KEEP CALM and TAKE OFF YOUR GOGGLES

KEEP CALM and TAKE OFF YOUR GOGGLES

Take off your goggles…

DEFINITION:  Seeing Red — Noun  1.) – a state of irritation or annoyance*

When your favorite product is first acquired into the world of Oracle, you might be seeing red. It truly does take some time to get used to the Oracle way of doing things. It does get better. Either that, or you just get used to the Oracle way.

Another cause of seeing red is the ambiguity and mixed messages that many get surrounding Oracle and the direction they are taking your favorite product. This has been and, continues to be the case lately surrounding the confusion with Unifier and Contract Management.

The first message we heard was that Unifier would replace Contract Management (PCM) because it contained 70% of the enhancements requested of the PCM team. Fantastic!

However, people in general are resistant to change and the PCM community sure didn’t seem receptive of Unifier. I heard several people who got a look at Unifier before me rattle off all the things Unifier couldn’t do that PCM could. And it was very obvious they were seeing red.

This is not a new thing in the Primavera world. My first thoughts as I saw my peers react to Unifier was of P3 and the horror of introducing P3e (now P6) to the user community. A campaign started soon after that essentially said ‘take off your goggles’.

Guess what folks? We are there again! Take off your Goggles!

Contract Management is a fantastic application.  It can handle most things on your projects that P6 doesn’t.  It can help you track and generate documents related to contracts, project communication and the supporting records such as RFI’s, drawings and submittals just to name a few.  It has been a cornerstone product in the Primavera world since 1987 under its former name of Expedition.  As a user, I have expressed frustration many times over a lack of change or flexibility within the application.

Unifier can alleviate much of that frustration, but it can also add to it.  While Contract Management is an application, Unifier is a platform.  So what is a advice. platform?  It’s the building block for an application or, as Unifier refers to them, Business Processes.  What is business process in Unifier?  Anything you want it to be….Well… okay, almost anything you want it to be.

The message as of today from Primavera is that Unifier isn’t an upgrade or replacement to PCM.  It is a different tool that may suit your needs better than PCM, particularly in the realm of financial management. For additional information on payroll processing, click here. Primavera has put together some pre-built business processes for Capital Planning, Project Delivery and Cost Controls to date.  They are also working on packages for Facilities Management and Real Estate Management. Additionally, Visionary Business Tactics by James Dooley can provide valuable insights and strategies to optimize your utilization of Unifier, ensuring it becomes an even more indispensable tool in your project management arsenal.

. It is the best options for people to check out eXp Realty and get the best real estate advice.

The hope is that you will soon start seeing a different shade of red.  Not the one of irritation or annoyance, but the one of the Oracle Red Stack.  Red Stack refers to the areas of Oracle that are available to you including Applications, Middleware, Database, Operating Systems, Virtual Machines, Servers and Storage.

Watch for future articles on Unifier as we start exploring the new tool and pre-built options, or get in touch for a deeper discussion.  We look forward to hearing from you!

* (definition of ‘seeing red’ by the Free Online Dictionary (www.thefreedictionary.com/seeing+red)

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2

Jul
2013
Comments Off on Staff Augmentation – An Emerging Best Practice

Staff Augmentation – An Emerging Best Practice

CBA Staff Augmentation

Use CBA Staff Augmentation to fill your staffing needs

Many organizations experience fluctuations in their staffing requirements due to changes in workload attributable to: market conditions, rapid growth, project implementation, facility maintenance and turn around, employee attrition, regulatory requirements and a variety of other factors.  Staff Augmentation is an effective strategy which can address these fluctuations in 6 key areas.

TimeThe time saved by not having to recruit, screen, interview, hire and then train additional highly skilled and specialized resources can be substantial

CostThere are significant savings realized by contracting at hourly rates for specified periods of time. Included in these savings are the avoidance of costs associated with having to provide a competitive full-time benefits package and training for a traditional full-time employee.

RiskTargeted staff augmentation helps reduce the likelihood of costly project over-runs by having the right resources in the right places for critical time periods.

FlexibilityAgility is critical to any organizations success in responding effectively to market conditions and regulatory changes.  Staff augmentation provides additional flexibility in prioritizing resource and workload challenges by quickly addressing unanticipated staffing needs.

Control One of the trade-offs for outsourcing certain functions can be a loss of control.  Staff augmentation enables you to maintain more organizational control and oversight of your projects and initiatives

ExpertiseThe best staffing providers have access to many highly skilled and specialized candidates for particular and unique needs.  These candidates will enhance the “tribal knowledge” of your organization stepping in to fill leadership and supervisory roles and train your staff in the process.  Often these individuals are open to staying on as full- time staff when there is an especially good fit.

These are some of the reasons why many organizations are turning to staff augmentation providers for expert and timely support in response to fluctuating conditions.  Many of you may have had experiences as contractors or clients which will shed light on staff augmentation as a viable solution. We would welcome your comments and experiences.

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21

Jun
2013
Comments Off on Right-Size Your Implementation

Right-Size Your Implementation

CBA will right-size your implementation

Our job is to “right-size” your implementation”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For more than a couple of decades, CBA has been involved with client implementations of Primavera applications.  One would think after so much interaction with many different organizations that we have seen it all.  Well, we have seen a lot, but certainly not all!  We have worked with very large companies that had only a few users in one department and have worked with one person consultants who build schedules for very complex large projects for many different clients.  We have worked for small, medium and large firms that want to track every project regardless of size – and other organizations that only want to track projects of a certain size or larger.  Some are focused on documents and contracts, others on schedule, cost and resource tracking, still others on portfolio selection – and various combinations of those.

What I find interesting is some clients seem to know exactly what they want to do, and more importantly, why they want to do it.  They have a compelling story of what their current problems and pains are, and the circumstances that led them to realize the need for a portfolio project management or document management solution.  Other clients are complying with the request of an important client or meeting a contractual obligation.   No matter what the reason, CBA is interested in helping organizations achieve their project selection and execution goals.

Implementations can take on various shapes and sizes.  Some are simple and quick; install, train, advise and go.  Others are much more involved with process and procedure development, custom user guides, dozens of template projects, and integration to more than one corporate application for cost, maintenance management or HR, and on-going mentoring.  Some focus on complex independent projects for individual end customers, others focus on cash flow of an entire capital portfolio and still others are document and work-flow dependent engagements.

Our job is to “right size” your implementation to meet the current needs of your organization now and allow for meeting future goals.  In order to right size your implementation it is important for us to understand what your company wants to accomplish and why.  We also need to understand the capabilities and project controls maturity of the team you are deploying the solution to.  This helps us understand the urgency and priorities, which in turn allows us to help focus the team on “why we came to drain the swamp”.  Knowing the underlying reasons of why a team wants to do something is sometimes more important than knowing the industry or the details of how projects are accomplished in a specific organization.

We believe the success of an implementation is defined as putting a solution in place that accomplishes the objectives as identified by the organization within the desired (realistic) time frame and is adopted by the user community.   Additionally the solution should remain in place and mature over time.   We have accomplished this result most often when all of the following occurred:

  • We were able to match the complexity of the solution with the skill sets of the team tasked with putting it in place
  • There was a client organization responsible for the design and on-going execution of the solution
  • Users were mentored until they have a firm grasp on the process
  • Management of the client organization utilized the information gained from the team in a manner that showed they used it to make business decisions

Sometimes, this means phasing in deployment of all desired requirements over a period of time, initially incorporating the most critical subset of them based on what we mutually agree can be accomplished and carried out by the user community.  For example, an organization may ultimately want to have fully resource and cost loaded schedules with Earned Value metric reporting on all projects over $5MM.  What may be realistic is to begin with an approach of getting all of the projects identified within the database using a simplified template approach based on type of project, incorporating common milestones and establishing relationships between interdependent projects.  Once the staff is used to creating, baselining and updating the schedules, they will naturally suggest modifications to the templates making them more accurate and granular.  At this point, the concept of applying budgets, actuals and remaining forecasts into the process is ready to be introduced and upon familiarization with that process – the concept of EVMS reporting can be applied.

CBA wants your projects to win and your goals to be achieved.  When you engage us, let’s be sure to discuss right-sizing your implementation to ensure its success for the long haul.

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31

May
2013
Comments Off on P6 User Group – Graneda Dynamic

P6 User Group – Graneda Dynamic

Primavera plus Grenada Dynamic equals WOW!

Primavera P6 with Granada Dynamic will give your Project Management Graphics a boost

One of the principles that we at Critical Business Analysis take great pride in is supporting Primavera P6 User Education through our continued partnership with Construction Process Solutions, Ltd. to promote and support the Southern Ohio P6 User Group.

 

Make sure to mark your calendars for the next meeting scheduled for July 17.  More info to follow.

 

Southern Ohio P6 User Group

Give Your Project A Graphics Boost

 

At the May 15th meeting, facilitated by Co-Chairpersons, Randy Rapin from Construction Process Solutions, Ltd. and Billie Feldkamp from CBA Inc.,  our very own Bob Ferris, Senior VP of Professional Services presented a webinar titled, “Graneda Dynamic: Making Oracle Primavera Graphics Even Better“.

 

Presented by: Robert C. Ferris – Senior VP of Professional Services at Critical Business Analysis, Inc.

 

May 15th Meeting 

Graneda Dynamic:

Making Oracle Primavera Graphics Even Better

Graneda Dynamic has been the leading Project Management Graphics tool for more than 15 years.  Now Graneda Dynamic supports the Oracle Primavera P6 product.  With the ability to view Network Diagrams, Gantt Charts and Work Breakdown/Organizations Breakdown Diagrams, Graneda Dynamic is an essential tool for all organizations using Oracle Primavera.


Network Diagram

The Graneda Dynamic network diagrams are Best in Class because of their optimized node arrangement and minimum crossing of relationships.  Grouping of activities by time orientation is also a key feature that is found in very few Project Management graphics products.

Network Diagram

Network Diagram

 

Network Diagram

Gantt Chart

Although the Primavera P6 Gantt Chart is an excellent tool, the Graneda Gantt Chart is a step above.  Some key features give you the ability to split the timescale into sections of varying detail.  You have complete control of the bar shapes, colors and styles.  In addition each activity can be displayed differently based on the data.  When you want to display a lot of data, Graneda allows for stacked columns in the activity table area, giving you the maximum space for your bar chart.

Gantt Chart

Gantt Chart

 

Work Breakdown Diagram

Activity lists are transformed into smartly organized graphical overviews.  You can easily see the structure of your project at a glance.  In the work breakdown diagram, sub-activities are structured and displayed hierarchically.

Work Breakdown Diagram

Work Breakdown Diagram

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16

May
2013
Comments Off on Primavera P6 Configuration – Great Idea!

Primavera P6 Configuration – Great Idea!

CBA Configured Primavera P6 while I was at training

Happiness is CBA, Inc. configuring Primavera before returning from training

Let’s assume you have made an enterprise decision to manage all of your projects using Oracle’s Primavera software. Smart move! Let’s also assume that you have spent considerable amounts of dollars purchasing the product along with Oracle Maintenance. You have decided to have CBA, Inc. install your product and are ready to send your users to our terrific training classes.

Everything is installed, users are trained and it’s time to get to work – but wait…the system isn’t configured yet…the users cannot manage their projects yet…what to do?

Consider software configuration a time saver that each new customer to the Primavera software product line should seek out. Having a professional qualified provider, like CBA, work with you and your users to identify, develop and implement best practices for your unique business and configure the system according to your specific requirements will allow your team to not miss a beat when they return from training. Being proactive and pre-determining configuration services will allow your newly trained staff to know exactly were to find those very powerful tools they just learned about and know exactly were to begin.

As a part of your overall project plan, CBA’s Primavera Implementation services are extremely beneficial, cost-effective and an efficient solution to the learning curve blues.

Sure, you could try to configure the system yourself; but you’ll most likely end up wasting valuable time and spending more money trying to figure everything out by a process of trial and error than if you just paid to have the system configured ahead of time.

CBA, Inc., will make certain that your investment works from day one!

Call me: Donna McLean, Account Executive CBA, Inc. 567-202-9289

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26

Apr
2013
Comments Off on The $3.3 Million Dollar Pothole

The $3.3 Million Dollar Pothole

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Five workers patching potholes on the highway

Oversight of seemingly small projects can result in devastating consequences.

 

Recently an article ran in the Cleveland Plain Dealer about a tragic fatal accident where a Columbiana county mother was killed when a truck lost control, due to a pothole. The article caught my eye for two reasons, first because the attorney representing the woman’s family was a high school friend and secondly because this record judgment paid by the taxpayers of Ohio was the result of a pothole that was not fixed in a reasonable amount of time.

So I bet you’re wondering what this has to do with the subject we cover here which is project management? I’ll be glad to make that connection. Since CBA has a long relationship with ODOT we know that at the time of the accident in 2008 ODOT was still using Primavera P3 and SureTrak as their construction project management standards. Since those tools were designed to schedule and track single projects it would be very easy to lose sight of a seemingly small project such as patching this particular pothole in a timely fashion, which was the basis for the record judgment. ODOT has now made the transition to P6 and along with stellar project management capabilities it provides enterprise project portfolio management capabilities by being able to track and manage your whole project portfolio and manage it by exception. This is an important point because knowing when a particular project in your portfolio needs resources or is in danger of not meeting it’s start or finish date enables management to easily spot and address the issues, that as pointed out here, could lead to catastrophic consequences.

Since both P3 and SureTrak were discontinued by Oracle at the end of 2010 many of our customers have migrated to Primavera P6, however they still attempt to use this powerful new product in the same fashion as they did with the older less capable products. In essence they are completely ignoring the enterprise project portfolio features of the product therefore potentially exposing themselves to the same types of oversight issues that exposed ODOT to this record judgment. Some may say managing multiple projects in P6 adds a layer of complexity that previously didn’t exist and I wouldn’t disagree with them, but I would say that trying to manage tens if not hundreds of projects simultaneously without the project portfolio capabilities of P6 increases that level of complexity exponentially. With the help of CBA’s professional services team we can provide the guidance and training necessary to achieve your project management goals and avoid letting a comparatively small project apple spoil your whole project management barrel.

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