Project Risk Management

Schedule Identification and Development

Before a project can be executed well, it has to be planned well. Project managers often have to complete this crucial planning phase without having a fully staffed project team or a full picture of what activities their project plan should include. This can result in schedules that have incorrect logic or poorly defined interfaces between project sub-teams. These gaps introduce significant risk into the project early on, making it more difficult to execute well in later phases.

APS’s Schedule Identification and Development process leverages our dynamic schedule modeling software and our extensive project experience to help project teams navigate the crucial step of early schedule building. We lead this work in an interactive workshop environment, driving alignment of all the project team disciplines around the necessary activities to be completed. After we complete the planning sessions with the team, we apply Monte Carlo risk analysis techniques to the result, helping project teams identify early on the weaknesses in the schedules so we can iterate immediately and make on-the-spot improvements.

By incorporating this risked perspective into the early schedule development phase, the project team develops a more robust basis for executing the project work, and a better basis for managing risks proactively as the execution phase progresses.

We deliver:

  • Realistic Schedule – A project schedule with a realistic completion date supported by realistic milestones all firmly based on objective project realities that can be explained to management.
  • Identified Risks and Sensitivities – A clear understanding of the risk and sensitivities associated with key schedule drivers, including mitigations to support and opportunities to accelerate the schedule.
  • Aligned Functions – A high-level identification of the activities of the various functional areas involved in the project, with full project team alignment around these activities.
  • Strategic Schedule Integration – A broad, strategic view of the total scope of work through an integrated project schedule that will support the team's tactical, schedule-driven decisions.
  • Realistic, Aligned Expectations – Stakeholder expectations that are aligned with key project realities.