Project Schedule Task Level are too far in the weeds
Elyse NielsenSenior Project Manager| Ascension Health Information ServicesHaines City, Fl, United States
I recently inherited a new program for which all the project scheduling and planning was completed a while ago. As I am revisiting the schedule and task dependencies, I’ve noticed we manage down to a grade of detail that is very far in the weeds. After talking with the technical team leadership, it is key that we have these tasks correctly completed and reported back however most take under 4 hours to complete, quite often 10 minutes. These tasks will have to be done at each location we are implementing the program, and since they are changing the infrastructure configuration a change record is necessary.
Just an example of a couple:
Disable UAC in Vista and Windows 7 workstations
Disable Windows XP Firewall or other port blocking apps to enable file and print sharing
Enable cross forest user policy GPO
Verify GPO Application Interval for source domains
Increase default event log size in target child domain to match source domain
Any suggestions or tactics you have utilized to roll these activities up into manageable tasks would be welcomed. Additionally which role had accountability for managing this level of detail? Was it the Program Manager, Project Manager, or technology engineer? How did you land on that role being responsible? Did you use a check and balance to assure settings were correctly established?
As always all suggestions are welcomed, and thanks for the help in advance,
Elyse Saving Changes...
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Russell GeakeProject Management Consultant| Deciduous Partners LtdLostwithiel, Cornwall, United Kingdom
Hi Elyse,
if you are drowning in the detail and falling behind, because you are managing so many tasks I would recommend the introduction of a task breakdown or work list, I've used better words in the past for this item, but I'm posting a quick response. Basically in the same way that you would create a Bill of Materials for something which is ordered regularly and made of several component parts. For example, the product "New HiFi" will come as a collection of Speakers (Front L&R, Back L&R, Radio Receiver, CD Deck, Record Player, Cable) so in your situation, you might have a checklist which records these indidual tasks, which forms part of the overall task.
I would recommend that the engineer on location then has ownership of the work checklist. If necessary, as it is checked off a site-representative can countersign (might be useful for covering "bases") The engineer is the one doing the work and can tick off each item, they would then submit that checklist signed and countersigned to you as PM, where it would go into the site-works folder for the archive. Always include a space for comments on each task as it may not go as smoothly as planned.
If that level of granularity really is required for the project plan, I'd be surprised, but perhaps it could be rolled up just a little. You can always remind the leadership team that this level of detail just takes up more of your time and may not add as much value. It could always just be that your predecessor liked to go into the finest details because they needed to feel in absolute control - take an 80:20 view and see which 20% you could take out into work checklist (or if it's really bad which 80%).
Hope this helps, or someone else comes up with a better answer. Saving Changes...
Sunando ChaudhuriDirector - PMO & Governance| ModonDist: Burdwan, West Bengal, India
Hi Elyse,
I agree with Russell that some of the tasks or the individual tasks in the location needs to be managed by the location manager/ counterpart and not you. I have managed a program where I had implementation across 19 countries in Europe and SA and before even commencing the individual projects, I used to ask for a location PM who will look at the tasks locally.
I understand though your situation is slightly different as you have inherited the program and not had a chance to plan your way.
I would suggest though you pick up the activities which can be packaged and if you need to do it, I suggest you prepare a change log which gives you enough time to get CRs raised and your implementation does not suffer. I would still propose that the individual tasks should ideally be managed by the technical PM or individual location rep.
Hope this is of some help. Cheers Saving Changes...
Matt HillsConsultant| DQPD LtdBodmin, United Kingdom
I agree with what Sundano and Russell say on this. In simple terms a schedule is driven by dependencies between activities and the duration of those activities, and is used to plan, inform and control activities.
If you are scheduling activities that have no external dependencies then the activity should be rolled up to the level at which it has meaningful dependencies (ie those that can be used to plan, inform and control).
Low level, repeatable tasks which are carried out by the same resource add no value to the schedule and are best dealt with using checklists or work instructions.
In your position I would strip this level of detail from the schedule, but you'll have to judge for yourself what the effort/benefits of doing this are.
Hope this helps.
Matt Saving Changes...
I've often been in planning sessions with my team that go deep into the detail. I feel it's useful to let the team discuss the details of what they are going to do because it generates a much more accurate estimate, however it's also far to detailed for me as the PM.
Usually what I will do is let the team know that I am recording the steps so they can use them in their own schedules. Usually, later in the meeting & with their help, I'll roll them up into larger 'umbrella' tasks that I will track.
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