Showing % complete on baselines

[Bill Fitz-Holland]

We are trying to update progress in MS Project. What we want to do is have
both the task bar and the baseline for the task visible. We have done this
successfully, and our baseline is a hollow block. We want to be able to fill
in the baseline according to the percentage completion of the task,
regardless of any changes we may make to the actual task duration, start, or
finish dates. This requires another bar style and originally this was done,
with the bar starting at the baseline start and ending at the physical
percentage completion. This only works correctly if the baseline and the
task bar have the same start and end dates. As soon as dates, or durations
are altered, it no longer does what we want it to. If we have 25% of the
work complete for a task, we want 25% of the baseline to be filled in,
regardless of whether the durations, or dates are of baseline and current
plan are the same.
The only way we seem to be able to this, is by customising fields to
calculate the percentage complete as a duration of the baseline and then
adding it to the baseline start date.

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Yes.

 

[Bill Fitz-Holland]

Is there a simpler way, and pls descibe it, to show & complete on baselines
other than creating the custom fields as per my question?

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

My Yes meant you are right, this is the only way.

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

What if your baseline was, say 10 days. Now you've begun work and after 5
days you realize that it will take another 15 days before you finish it. In
other words your original schedule was off and it really should have been 20
days. As of this point your task is 25% complete. But 5 days represents
50% of your baseline. Are you saying you want the baseline taskbar to show
that the task is 50% complete, not the 25% it really is????

 

[Bill Fitz-Holland]

First, thanks Jan De M for advice custon field is only way to achieve %
complete on baselines, from which the gantt showing all can be drawn.

Second to Steve H, in your example I would be saying that the task is 25%
complete - its an "achieved" measure, not an "expended" that forms the basis
of the percent complete.
Clients, and internally, generally want to see on one piece of paper, or view:
1.where you're supposed to be at - the baseline unchanged
2.where you are at on that baseline - hence my mark-up on the baseline
3.where you're going - the current plan brought up to date for current
logic, status and durations. You dont need % complete on the current plan
because thats broadly in a vertical line with the status date anyhow and
shows nothing of value.

In suretrak we can put that on one chart easily. The ability to do it in
MSP, reasonably easily once the custom fields are set up, keeps MSP
equivalent for that purpose.

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

FYI - "% Complete" in MSP refers to duration worked versus duration
scheduled and ignores the dates when you did the work, ie the status date,
and so it really doesn't tell you if you're on schedule or not. I could
have a task that got moved up, running for 5 days this week, that was
baselined as running for 5 days *next* week, the original schedule. If I've
worked 2 days (pretend today is next Wednesday), I'm 40% complete even
though we haven't even gotten to the baseline dates as yet. We're a week
ahead of schedule. Similarly, if the baseline was for 5 days last week and
we've been delayed a week started Monday of this week and worked for 2 days
we're also 40% complete even though according to our baseline we're supposed
to be 100% complete by the start of this week and we're a week behind
schedule. By itself, % complete, even the % complete todays date should
reflect according to the baseline. really doesn't tell us much about
schedule performance.

I have to differ that % Complete of the current plan doesn't show anything
of value because it is completely possible that you have not done the work
that you scheduled to do before today. I had a task last week lasting 5
days. It should have been done by Friday. The resource worked on it Mon
and Tue and then called in sick. We are 40% complete, work that was
scheduled for last Mon and Tue has been done. But work that was scheduled
for last Wed, Thu, and Fri has not been done. Just looking at the vertical
line representing the current date while not recording in the plan itself
the work done versus the work not done doesn't show us that fact .

I'd suggest you investigate the Earned Value metrics as they do show actual
performance against baseline over time. You might find it to be a more
reliable indicator of progress for your clients than the graphic you
proposed. It sounds like you're trying to get to an equivalent of the SPI,
which is an earned value schedule indicator available right on of the box
without having to do anything special but simply showing what % complete you
should have achieved by today doesn't show the whole picture by a long shot.
Just a suggestion ....

--
Steve House [MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs

 

[Bill Fitz-Holland]

Thanks Steve,
I think you overcomplicate what I need to achieve. We are a 2$B/yr
Construction Company and everything is mostly subcontracts. We dont use
Actual Costs or workhours etc within our plans, its mostly just the dates.
SPI etc is unnecessary to us.
In my custom fields which generate the % complete on baseline gantt I use
"Physical % complete" not "% complete". The definitions of each seem
confusing, but the bottom line is "Physical % complete" works, the other is
not stable, perhaps for the reasons you mention.
My "current plan" does not show work achieved ahead of the status date
because i update it to be correct in timing, reflecting the situation "now",
not last week. Its the baseline reflecting the other information I wished to
show, and where the "Physical % complete" is drawn. I dont mind at all if
that is not "date correct". The correct reflection of tasks past, and
future, is in my "current plan".
I do not generally utilise the "todays date" or allow the software to
"update" tasks automatically, such as moving uncompleted tasks after the
"as-of date", or completed ones before it. This is achieved by updating the
plan manually as I go for status, duration & logic. The "as-of date" can
stay back in the past, before the project starts for that matter. Otherwise
as you record progress the past dates tend to be just "ink on paper" and the
logic is overwritten, and the historical critical path is lost. As such the
"as-built" is not a useable tool for claims analysis. So I keep it alive by
keeping the whole plan "in the future", and reasonably accurately reflecting
the past, and as best we can the future. If you had an accessible email i'd
send you what I required and am satisfied with.
Bill

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

SPI is Schedule Performance Index and in a nutshell it gives you a
comparison of where you are on a certain date versus where you're supposed
to be. Isn't that what you're wanting to get at in your initial question?
It measures the total amount of work actually done by the status date and
compares it to the total amount of work the baseline says you were supposed
to do by that date and shows if you're getting the work done faster or
slower than planned, expressed as a decimal ratio (which of course is merely
a percentage without the multiplying by 100 step). While it does use
resource costs as a common unit of measure, if you're not tracking costs
just assign $1.00 per hour as the resource standard rate across the board
and then you'll be really computing it based on raw man-hours of work and it
will be equally valid.

There are actually 3 different "% completes" in Project. % Complete
measures the amount of duration over which work took place versus the
duration planned. % Work Complete measures the number of man-hours of work
accomplished compared to the number of man-hours scheduled. % Physical
Complete is an estimate of the actual percentage of the physical deliverable
that has been completed. To compare them, we have Joe painter starting in a
room at 8am on Monday and planned to finish at 5pm on Friday. He'll spend
an hour on Monday putting on a primer coat, a 2nd primer coat on Tuesday, a
1st colour coat for an hour Wed, a 2nd colour coat on Thur, and then a full
8 hours doing a final colour coat and all the finishing on Friday. The
duration is 40 hours. The work is 12 man-hours. We are at 5pm Thur and
work proceeded as planned as far as time, BUT we got tied up somehow and
Thursdays colour coat hasn't been put on, it took longer on Wed for the 1st
coat than we thought and we only got half of it on, having to do the 2nd
half today and we can't do the coat planned for today until the 1st coat has
dried for at least 24 hours. Our % Complete is 80% (32 hours working time
elapsed/40 hours total planned) - we may have to revise that to take into
account we won't be able to do all the work planned for tomorrow either.
Our % Work Complete is 33% (4 man-hours/12 man-hours). Our % Physical
Complete is ~ 60 % (estimated based on 3 coats of paint applied/5 coats to
be applied).

The problem with using % Physical Complete is it's so loosey-goosey in its
definition. If I'm paving a walkway it not too bad - 100 metres of walk to
pave, I've got 50 metres done, so I'm 50% complete. But is that true?
Suppose I've got all 100 metres of bedding prepared for it, 50 metres of
pavement down, and the decorative edging done on the first 10 metres?
What's my physical complete there? Or I'm designing an engine, what would
"50% Physical Complete" mean in that case? Half the drawings? The block
but not the cylinder head? Half the systems?

You said you don't update the plan with actuals and reschedule uncompleted
work because it screws up your original plan. That it does, in a sense.
But the working "plan" really is a dynamic thing and should reflect a
history of what has happened up to now and a forecast of what will happen in
the future driven by actual performance including deviations from the
original plan in what has been done so far. If it's Friday, I was supposed
to work on Task X all this week, but my Gantt chart is showing only work
being done on it last Monday, only one of two possible things can explain
that. Either we really did work on it on Tues Wed and Thu and are behind in
posting out paperwork with timecards etc still to be put in. When we get
caught up it will show work on those days. Or it's Friday evening, our
paperwork is up to date and we really did miss doing the work we were
supposed to do on that task on Tue, Wed, Thur, and today. If that's the
case we simply can't hop into a time machine and go back to Tuesday to do
the work we missed (which is what ignoring rescheduling implies we can do).
All we can do is bring the work we should have done but didn't get around to
forward and reschedule it for the first available time we can do it. For
the plan to be valid, we must split that task, shift everything scheduled
after last Monday forward and reschedule it for whenever we'll be able to
get back to it. Your progress indicators should always reflect physical
reality. So how can we monitor deviations from the original plan if our
working plan is constantly changing? By comparing the working plan against
the baseline, the static snapshot of our original intentions we saved before
beginning work. Our baseline tells us where we should be. Our plan tells
us where we are and where we are headed.

Would love to see your example file - my email is sjhouse dot remove dot
this at hotmail dot com - phrased as such to try to keep down the spam
harvesters. Translation should be obvious <grin>.