CPM Solutions Ltd. Newsletter

Transcription

1 CPM Solutions Ltd. Newsletter November, 2007 Volume 1, Number 2 In This Issue CPM Solutions in the Plant Maintenance and Turnaround Environments NEW course #CPM300 Primavera P6 Training for Plant Shutdowns and Turnarounds NEW course #CPM310 Workscope Optimization for Plant Shutdowns and Turnarounds Enterprise-Wide Project Management has come of age CPM Solutions in the Plant Maintenance and Turnaround Environments Project Management software is often used to plan and manage facility outage turnarounds and shutdowns. Unfortunately, effective software solutions like Primavera and Microsoft Project are underutilized and often misunderstood. Failure to understand the dynamics of your planning and scheduling software and the methods used to develop a dynamic work schedule often result in loss of execution management and control. Effective use of project management software in plant maintenance and turnaround and capital project environments has proven to improve effective worker wrench time from 3.5 to 5 hours per shift, an improvement of 43%. CPM Solutions has broadened its service offerings by adding Senior Maintenance and Turnaround consulting expertise. In addition to our Primavera and NavisWorks software training and implementation consulting services, we now offer experienced hands-on training, theory workshops and field coaching for executives, planners, schedulers and operational personnel in the Maintenance and Turnaround and Capital projects environments. Our first new related 5 day training course will start on February 4, 2008 in our Edmonton Training Centre. Following are the details. Enterprise Project and Portfolio Management Software Structure Centralized Project Management Contractor Coordination Primavera Software Tips and Tricks New Hires Training In The News Using Technology to Optimize Plant Outages and Maintenance An Owner s Success Story: Atlanta s New Runway Completed 11 Days Early and $102 Million Under Budget These articles are located in the Case Studies section of our Website Primavera P6 Training for Plant Maintenance and Turnarounds Core - Primavera P6 Theme Efficient Plant Maintenance / Turnaround Management This will be a 5 day intensive training course combining hands-on computer training with instructional presentations and workshop break-out sessions Workshop break-out sessions will focus on effective Planning, Scheduling and Execution Coordination Limit 10 per class This 5 day intensive training course is designed by Primavera and Turnaround Professionals for the individuals who are responsible for the planning, scheduling and execution coordination functions associated with plant shutdowns, turnarounds and capital projects. To maximize the effectiveness of Primavera P6 for managing these projects we ve designed a course that not only focuses on the ability to use the software effectively, it also focuses on providing best-practice management tools for effective estimating, schedule development and field execution to ensure your overall project meets your key performance targets associated with safety, cost, duration, worker efficiency and quality. Attendees will learn how to properly develop a plan based on realistic estimates, how to apply productivity factors and measure performance, how to develop and manage a dynamic schedule using the Primavera leveling capabilities, and how to get buy-in from field execution and operations coordinators during the outage. Who should attend: Field Planners / Estimators Schedulers Field Execution Coordinators (Operations and Maintenance) Facilities Engineers Project Controls Personnel Contact Us CPM Solutions Ltd Roberts Street Burnaby, BC V5G 4E1 Phone: (604) Fax: (604) Website:

2 Our second new course, Workscope Optimization for Plant Maintenance and Turnarounds, will be a two day course starting on February 18 th in Edmonton and February 20 th in Calgary. Core Risk/Cost Benefit Analysis Theme Best Practices for Effectiveness Attendees will learn how to evaluate and control the scope of work for a plant shutdown or turnaround using a defined risk/cost benefit analysis tool and worklist management tool. Attendees will learn how to establish a scope of work that will provide a safe and reliable process for a specified run duration while maintaining the lowest cost and outage duration for shutdown or turnaround projects. Attendees will learn how to establish a formalized approval process, establish a realistic worklist cut-off date and how to create a realistic budget based on a realistic scope of work. Understanding Operating, Turnaround, Capital and Inspection budgets is essential in managing budgets and approving expenditures. These days you can t afford to be adding opportunity work to a shutdown or turnaround. Take this opportunity to learn how to reduce the amount of work executed during an outage while saving thousands of dollars by minimizing lost production and execution overhead. Who should attend: QA/QC Inspectors Engineers Maintenance Managers Operations Managers Turnaround Managers Plant Managers Enterprise-Wide Project Management has come of age Over the past few years, early adopters of enterprise-wide project and portfolio management solutions have realized the benefits of these types of software solutions by seeing their operational efficiencies improve multifold. Now, with the availability of Windows and functionally rich web-based project and portfolio management solutions, many organizations have Crossed the Chasm as evidenced by the following selected sample of Primavera case studies: Omaha Public Power Scheduling for Utility Transmission and Distribution operations Nebraska Public Power: Saved over 100 man-hours per week in schedule development and maintenance time Reduced outage duration, minimizing costs and lost revenue Improved response time to unplanned outages Improved accuracy of schedules Eliminated duplicate data entry Maintained consistent dates and task relationships in Primavera and SAP Montgomery Watson Harza (MWH): Primavera used on over 400 Southern Water projects Enhanced scheduling and reporting provided managers with the most accurate field data Increased project and program visibility kept the MWH and Southern Water team up-to-date on program progress BE&K: Primavera used to collaborate and standardize project data and processes across the company Schedule creation time reduced by several hundred hours per year Less time spent in schedule creation; more time available for schedule analysis New employee ramp-up time drastically reduced 2

3 KBR: Service Primavera used to manage $11.9 Million IT project to help doctors manage patient data System facilitates collaboration between 10 contractors on 11 major IT programs Project reports produced quickly and easily as required by Parliament Primavera system scaled to manage dozens of years of projects Halliburton: Multiple applications used by multiple global locations based users accessing one centralized database Enterprise Project and Portfolio Management Software Structure Successful Enterprise-Wide Project and Portfolio Management Software solutions are based on a design structure that will accommodate multiple users who work on multiple projects within multiple programs for multiple divisions or subsidiaries. Visibility of summarized and/or detailed icon-highlighted data is provided to executives and mid-level managers allowing them to act on critical issues before they cause irreparable damage. The following graphic describes the design of Primavera s Enterprise Project Structure. Details from the lowest project level roll up to the Enterprise summary level. Executives can continuously monitor overall project and portfolio performance. 3

4 Centralized Project Management Primavera P6 project and portfolio management software combines the functional requirements of planning, scheduling, resource and cost management in one central database. The following screen captures describe how P6 provides visibility of data related to a multitude of projects. 4

5 Contractor Coordination Undoubtedly organizations managing large schedules receive schedule input from various sub contractors. As illustrated, Primavera P6 has import and export capabilities for a variety of scheduling solutions including Microsoft Project, Microsoft Excel and Primavera s own SureTrak, P3, Contractor, P5 and P6. This diverse file type import/export capability facilitates enterprise-wide project and portfolio environments. Contractor Coordination P6 J.V. Partners Concrete Steel Master Schedule Electrical P6 A Flexible Solution P3 SureTrak MS Project MS Excel HVAC Plumbing Primavera Software Tips and Tricks Tips 1 and 2 were provided in our July, 2007 e-newsletter. The entire e-newsletter can be viewed on our web site at Tip 3: How to accommodate resources working different hours per day on the same activity The Primavera P6 Windows Client Project Manager software module uses the Admin setting for hours/day, hours/week, hours/month, hours/year to convert all units and duration type fields from the internally-stored hours to the user's display format preference of hours, days, weeks, months, or years. Internally-stored hours are always stored as hours in the database. In most cases, Project Manager does not have a calendar to convert between these display formats, i.e. when there are multiple resources on an activity, or when Project Manager summarizes data at any level above resource assignments. It is important to use a consistent conversion factor between these display formats. To accommodate resources working various hours per day, you can setup assignments similar to the following example: Global Time Period is set to 8 hours per day. 1. Set the Activity Type to Resource Dependent. 2. Set the Activity Duration Type to Fixed Duration and UPT. 3. Assign standard calendar (i.e., 5 Day 8 Hour) to the activity. 4. Assign different resource calendars (i.e., 5 Day 6 Hours, or 5 Day 7 Hours, etc) to each resource. The Units/Time for each resource should be 100% (or 8 h/d). 5. During the planning, set the activity duration (NOT the Resource Assignment Duration) to the number of days you want, and the assignments' duration and units will be calculated correctly based on each individual resource calendar. In this example, the activity has "5 day 8 hour" calendar, one resource has "5 day 6 hour" calendar, another resource has "5 day 7 hour" calendar and the last resource has "5 day 8 hour" calendar. When setting the activity duration to 5 days, each assignment's duration and units are computed correctly according the each resource's calendar. 5

6 Tip 4: What are the Original Lag and Remaining Lag for a Resource in P6 Windows Client Project Management? The Original and Remaining lag fields are manually entered when it is known that a resource will not be available or is not needed when the activity starts. By typing in a lag, you delay the start of the resource by that amount of lag. Original Lag is what was typed in and is used when there is no progress on the activity. Remaining Lag is what lag is left after the activity has started. Remaining lag is automatically reduced once the activity is started and the Data Date is moved forward. New Hires CPM Solutions is pleased to announce the addition of two staff members since our last e-newsletter in July, We welcome Ted Lister as a Senior Consultant and Jim Li as Senior IT Consultant. Short Biography for Edmund (Ted) J. Lister Ted Lister is a Senior Consultant with over 25 years of combined hands-on experience and consulting in project management best-practices related to maintenance, turnarounds and capital projects. Ted has conducted numerous training workshops and seminars for a variety of companies in the oil & gas, energy, and manufacturing sectors at an international level. His ability to lead a team through successful implementation is highlighted in his published book: Successful Change Management. His capacity to assist clients with software solutions and best-practice management processes has enabled companies to enhance asset and human resource performance. Ted s background is in the instrumentation, electrical and rotating fields with a combined education of trade certificates, planning and scheduling accreditations, project management designations and college level human resource management training. As a CPM Solutions Ltd. Senior Consultant, Ted can assist companies manage major Engineering, Procurement, Construction (EPC) projects, establish effective project controls, manage turnarounds, and implement change improvement projects. Ted can provide companies with training and coaching of software and management process best-practices to ensure they achieve their desired results. He can work with your staff to help them configure the software to maximize the efficiency of its use in turnaround and capital projects environments. Ted can train your users on the effective use of project management software and act as an on-going mentor during the projects if necessary. Ted has extensive experience in both the Microsoft and Primavera project management software environments. Short Biography for Jim Li Jim Li is a Senior IT Consultant with over 15 years of experience in the Information Technology industry in both China and Canada. Jim is a results-oriented.net Developer with over 8 years of hands-on experience in enterprise database-driven applications development. His background encompasses extensive experience in.net framework, VB/VN/NET, ASP.NET, ADO, NET, C#, PHP, T-SQL, JavaScript, DHTML, and CSS. Jim also has expertise in IIS/ Apache, MS SQL Server, MS Access, MySQL, and web hosting. He is familiar with Visual Studio / Visual Studio.net and Dreamweaver IDE. Jim recently received his Oracle dba certification. Jim is actively involved with helping customers install Primavera software on their stand alone PC s and network environments, providing internal IT support for CPM s software training centres, staff PC s and CPM s IT networks. Jim s skill sets are also valuable regarding the customization of existing integration middleware solutions between Primavera and our customers back-end Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) financial solutions. Training With the addition of Ted Lister to our staff, we are able to complement our usual training courses by offering courses on the generic deployment of project management software solutions for maintenance, turnarounds and change management environments. 6

7 January March 2008 Schedule: Primavera v6 Basic Course #102: January 16-18, Edmonton Primavera Contract Manager, Course #202: January 22-24, Burnaby Primavera SureTrak Project Manager, Course #401: January 28-29, Burnaby Primavera v6 Basic Course #102: February 4-6, Burnaby Primavera v6 for Plant Maintenance and Turnarounds, Course #CPM300: February 4-8, Edmonton Primavera v6 Advanced Course #106: February 7-8, Burnaby Primavera Project Planner (P3): Planning and Scheduling, Course #601: February 13-15, Burnaby Workscope Optimization for Plant Maintenance and Turnarounds, Course #CPM310: February 18-19, Edmonton Workscope Optimization for Plant Maintenance and Turnarounds, Course #CPM310: February 20-21, Calgary Primavera v6 Web Access (MyPrimavera), Course #101: February 25-27, Burnaby Primavera v6 Basic Course #102: March 4-6, Calgary Course Registration: Contact Leanne Messina at (604) ext 117 or See our complete 2008 Training Schedule on our website - Have you found this issue useful? Got a great story idea? We want to hear your comments and suggestions. us at lmessina@cpmsolutions.ca. To unsubscribe to our newsletter, send an with the word unsubscribe in the subject line to lmessina@cpmsolutions.ca. 7