Don’t Get Caught With Your P6 Down

You read the bid specs for a highly desirable job and find out, that to be the successful bidder, the project schedule must be done in P6 and, on top of that, the schedule is to be resource loaded.  Your team is very proficient using Project as a scheduling tool but have never used P6.  It is important that your Construction Company gets this job…so you consider your options.

• Contract someone to create and manage the P6 schedule? (one time short term benefit with no option for an internal future P6 plan)
• Contract someone to create the P6 schedule, install P6 and quickly train the Project Team how to manage a schedule in Primavera? ( risky since the internal folks will have very little practical experience )
• Bring in a consultant to install the P6 software, train your project managers, set up the database environment for future scheduling needs and let your internal folks create and manage the schedule? ( probable the best option under the circumstances but not ideal as the time needed to effectively plan out how to utilize the P6 product may not be available…Good pre-planning is always one of the  keys to success)
• Use your time machine to go back in the past and implement P6 using a well thought out plan now that you have the necessary time to do it right?  (the best option if only….)

Of course, you don’t have connections with the late H.G. Wells so the Time Machine is not an option.  What you do have is the knowledge that more and more project owners are requiring the use of P6 as the scheduling tool.  So don’t you get caught with your P6 down.  Take the initiative now to make the investment in your team to successfully meet the current P6 scheduling needs of today’s project owners.