Staffing projects........

[lacajun]

If you had a large capital project and didn't have your project team assembled for several months after the kick off meeting with your customer, would you expect to maintain your schedule? You, as the engineering firm, lacked engineers for power, instrumentation, controls, and project management for several months after the kick off meeting. You only had an Engineering Manager working those disciplines for several months. Would you expect to maintain your schedule?

In my experience, not having the entire team assembled and at the kick off meeting is not normal. So I am curious about what others have experienced.

 

[IRstuff]

I'm a bit unclear about your question. You should, at the start of your program, have the personnel you need to proceed. There is no need to have everyone that MIGHT be involved at a later date to be there at the beginning, since that would be mostly a waste of money.

The exception would classical Design for Manufacturability or Testablity, in which case, you'd have a production or test guy in on the preliminary design to ensure that when he actually got the finished design, the product is manufacturable or testable.

In any case, if you can't staff your program according to plan, then you must slip schedule, unless it was heavily padded, or you simply have gobs of slack.

TTFN

FAQ731-376
Chinese prisoner wins Nobel Peace Prize

 

[eyec]

normally, staffing for a project is staggered from the get-go and is usually figured into the schedule, therefore there should be no slip in schedule or you miscalculated your schedules.

 

[Yjoshi]

There is no way to answer that without a project schedule (and % complete), you have to focus on measuring Earned Schedule (which is independent of how many resources have been placed).

 

[lacajun]

Like I said, I've always been assigned and present at kick off meetings and I am simply interested in what others have experienced. I've been on projects where my work was delayed some but I was still assigned and present at all meetings relevant to the project but not discipline work that didn't relate to my work.

If you are ready to start on the work, why not have them hired, assigned, and present at the kick off meeting? Why delay for several months to over a year for some of these functions to even get hired?

 

[IRstuff]

There are some possible reasons, depending on whether the body actually exists, or not:

> They're busy doing other, productive tasks

> Tightwad PM; 10 guys for 8 hrs is about $20K down the rathole (at our rates ;-)) with nothing produced, other than a minor amount of good will. By the time they're supposed to work on the project, they're doing something else

> There's nothing else for them to do. There amy not be enough business to hire a guy who'll then wind up sitting around on overhead, waiting to get assigned his task on the project.

My company tends to run on the lean side, which allows us to deal with business contractions with minimal layoffs and attrition. Because we generate gobs of cash most of the time, our GM is given more leeway during slack times, since he's saved the other divisions' bacon A LOT.

Other companies tend to the opposite, and they'll have people during busywork in the meantime. But when the business contracts, massive layoffs result.

Many businesses, beyond just lawyers and the like, run on billable hours. So if you've got bodies that can't be billed to a customer or a sanctioned internal project, then you've got both an overhead problem and a profitability problem.

TTFN

FAQ731-376
Chinese prisoner wins Nobel Peace Prize

 

[beejohnny]

In every project, I always see to it that the set schedule is followed. That's why there has to be someone to monitor the different tasks.

The schedule has to prepared thoroughly including the meetings. I have to start immediately as possible though. One delay could actually ruin every thing.

Break down the tasks and make sure each of them are doing it properly. Use a monitoring tool if necessary.

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