Good morning team, This week’s topic: small tools and consumables. 1. From the Field Nobody calls an emergency meeting because the project bought another box of cutting wheels. Small purchases rarely look concerning one at a time. Over several months, though, the job may go through far more blades, filters, hoses, batteries, PPE, and other consumables than the estimate allowed. Some small tools will also disappear into gang boxes, service trucks, and whatever mysterious place tape measures go...
6 days ago • 1 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: equipment cost exposure. 1. From the Field Equipment costs don’t wait for someone to notice them. A rented excavator can be fueled, inspected, parked in exactly the right spot, and accomplish absolutely nothing while the rental clock keeps running. Sometimes the delay can’t be avoided. An approval may still be pending, the work area might not be ready, or the sequence may have changed. The trouble starts when “we’ll probably need it later” becomes the...
13 days ago • 2 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: labor hours. 1. From the Field Knowing that a project used 500 labor hours does not tell you much by itself. You need to know what those hours accomplished. That is where labor tracking becomes more useful. If 500 hours produced 1,000 units one week and the same 500 hours produced 650 the next, something changed. The reason could be completely legitimate, but the project team should understand it. I’ve found that labor discussions become much more useful...
20 days ago • 1 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: production rates. 1. From the Field Production gives the project team an early way to compare what was expected against what is actually happening. If the estimate assumed twenty truckloads per day and the project is consistently completing twelve, that difference deserves attention even before the cost report shows a problem. The same applies to demolition quantities, excavation, waste loading, concrete removal, equipment production, or almost any...
27 days ago • 1 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: schedule slippage. 1. From the Field Major schedule problems rarely arrive as a single dramatic event. More often, the project gives you a series of smaller signals first. An activity takes two days longer than planned. The next crew mobilizes a little later. A delivery moves from Tuesday to Thursday. The team adjusts around each issue, and individually none of them seems serious enough to change the overall outlook. That is where paying attention to...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: schedule float. 1. From the Field When an activity has float, it can be tempting to think of those days as extra time. I think that is a dangerous way to look at it. Float gives the schedule some flexibility, but using it still changes the project’s ability to absorb another problem later. An activity that slips five days without affecting the final completion date may technically be within its available float, but those five days are no longer available...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: look-ahead schedules. 1. From the Field A look-ahead should represent what the project team actually believes is going to happen over the next few weeks. That sounds obvious, but I’ve seen look-aheads continue showing activities that everyone onsite already knows are not going to start on the dates listed. At that point, the document stops being a planning tool and becomes an exercise in updating dates. A useful look-ahead should reflect current field...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
Good morning team, This week’s topic: project schedules. 1. From the Field A project schedule is obviously a planning tool, but I’ve found that its real value comes from how well it helps people understand what is supposed to happen next. A schedule can be technically correct and still be difficult to use. If the field team cannot tell what areas should be available, when subcontractors are needed, or what activities are driving the next few weeks of work, the schedule is not doing much to...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
FRIDAY FIELD NOTES #12 Submittals Protect the Work Good morning team, This week’s topic: submittals. 1. From the Field Submittals are sometimes treated as an administrative requirement that must be cleared before the work can begin. In practice, they serve a much more important purpose. A submittal gives the project team an opportunity to confirm that a proposed material, procedure, supplier, plan, or piece of equipment meets the contract requirements before it is incorporated into the work....
2 months ago • 1 min read