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1 – 10 of over 35000Carlos M. Alvarado, Robert P. Silverman and David S. Wilson
There are many potential measures of performance for evaluating the success of a construction project. All address performance in three key areas: scope, schedule and budget. In a…
Abstract
There are many potential measures of performance for evaluating the success of a construction project. All address performance in three key areas: scope, schedule and budget. In a performance measurement framework where senior management wishes to minimise the numberof performance measures it employs, while ensuring maximal coverage or visibility into the programme, having a tool that captures each of the three areas would be ideal. Project managers have used Earned Value Management (EVM) for over 40 years to track actual schedule progress and actual costs against project plans. Earned Value Management has traditionally been applied to individual projects on which the manager is accountable for both schedule and cost variances. This paper proposes methods to apply EVM principles to allow: (1) analysis of portfolios of construction projects; (2) incorporation of the analysis into an innovative pay‐for‐performance human resources practice; and (3) use of regression analysis to develop baseline earned value curves. These extensions fit the needs of many government managers, who oversee a range of projects by multiple contractors, and whose cost risk is primarily due to schedule slips and change orders. Earned Value Management is described in the context of project oversight, and a dashboard system of performance measures is proposed for quickly assessing individual projects and portfolios. A method of generating standardised planned value curves is then specified, based on data from previous and ongoing projects. The paper concludes by showing how the US General Services Administration’s Public Buildings Service is using these methods to analyse and oversee its portfolio of new construction and major repair and alteration projects.
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J. Art Gowan, Richard G. Mathieu and Mark B. Hey
Sets out to examine earned value management (EVM), a project management technique that relates resource planning to schedules, technical costs and schedule requirements.
Abstract
Purpose
Sets out to examine earned value management (EVM), a project management technique that relates resource planning to schedules, technical costs and schedule requirements.
Design/methodology/approach
Provides an example of how EVM can be implemented in a data warehouse project and how it can be used as a tool to diagnose and solve problems.
Findings
EVM is based on the belief that the value of the project increases as tasks are completed and therefore the earned value of a project is a measure of the real progress of that project.
Originality/value
Offers a significant analysis of EVM, its benefits and pitfalls.
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Sahar Jawad, Ann Ledwith and Rashid Khan
There is growing recognition that effective project control systems (PCS) are critical to the success of projects. The relationship between the individual elements of PCS and…
Abstract
Purpose
There is growing recognition that effective project control systems (PCS) are critical to the success of projects. The relationship between the individual elements of PCS and successfully achieving project objectives has yet to be explored. This research investigates the enablers and barriers that influence the elements of PCS success and drive project objectives.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts a mixed approach of descriptive analysis and regression models to explore the impact of six PCS elements on project outcomes. Petroleum and chemical projects in Saudi Arabia were selected as a case study to validate the research model.
Findings
Data from a survey of 400 project managers in Saudi’s petroleum and chemical industry reveal that successful PCS are the key to achieving all project outcomes, but they are particularly critical for meeting project cost objectives. Project Governance was identified as the most important of the six PCS elements for meeting project objectives. A lack of standard processes emerged as the most significant barrier to achieving effective project governance, while having skilled and experienced project team members was the most significant enabler for implementing earned value.
Practical implications
The study offers a direction for implementing and developing PCS as a strategic tool and focuses on the PCS elements that can improve project outcomes.
Originality/value
This research contributes to project management knowledge and differs from previous attempts in two ways. Firstly, it investigates the elements of PCS that are critical to achieving project scope, schedule and cost objectives; secondly, enablers and barriers of PCS success are examined to see how they influence each element independently.
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Vartenie Aramali, George Edward Gibson, Hala Sanboskani and Mounir El Asmar
Earned value management systems (EVMS), also called integrated project and program management systems, have been greatly examined in the literature, which has typically focused on…
Abstract
Purpose
Earned value management systems (EVMS), also called integrated project and program management systems, have been greatly examined in the literature, which has typically focused on their technical aspects rather than social. This study aims to hypothesize that improving both the technical maturity of EVMS and the social environment elements of EVMS applications together will significantly impact project performance outcomes. For the first time, empirical evidence supports a strong relationship between EVMS maturity and environment.
Design/methodology/approach
Data was collected from 35 projects through four workshops, attended by 31 industry practitioners with an average of 19 years of EVMS experience. These experts, representing 23 organizations, provided over 2,800 data points on sociotechnical integration and performance outcomes, covering projects totaling $21.8 billion. Statistical analyses were performed to derive findings on the impact of technical maturity and social environment on project success.
Findings
The results show statistically significant differences in cost growth, compliance, meeting project objectives and business drivers and customer satisfaction, between projects with high EVMS maturity and environment and projects with poor EVMS maturity and environment. Moreover, the technical and social dimensions were found to be significantly correlated.
Originality/value
Key contributions include a novel and tested performance-driven framework to support integrated project management using EVMS. The adoption of this detailed assessment framework by government and industry is driving a paradigm shift in project management of some of the largest and most complex projects in the U.S.; specifically transitioning from a project assessment based upon a binary approach for EVMS technical maturity (i.e. compliant/noncompliant to standards) to a wide-ranging scale (i.e. 0–1,000) across two dimensions.
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Jacob L. Petter, Jonathan D. Ritschel and Edward D. White
Delineating where stability occurs in a contract provides the window of opportunity for procurement officials to positively affect cost and schedule outcomes. While the concept of…
Abstract
Delineating where stability occurs in a contract provides the window of opportunity for procurement officials to positively affect cost and schedule outcomes. While the concept of a Cost Performance Index (CPI) "stability rule" has been routinely cited by Earned Value Management (EVM) authors since the early 1990's, more recent research questions the veracity of this stability rule. This paper resolves the controversy by demonstrating that the definition of stability matters. We find a morphing of the stability definition over time, with three separate definitions permeating the literature. Next, an analysis of Department of Defense contracts for both cost and schedule stability properties finds that the veracity of the stability rule is intricately tied to the definition used.
Alberto De Marco and Timur Narbaev
The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the diffusion of earned value management (EVM) as a practicable methodology to monitor facility construction and renovation projects…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the diffusion of earned value management (EVM) as a practicable methodology to monitor facility construction and renovation projects in the context of the European industry.
Design/methodology/approach
First, a review of the literature reveals how EVM evolved as a tool for facility construction project monitoring together with specific concerns for its application. Then, a review of EVM practice and trends in Europe is provided and finally, applicability and viability of the method is proved through a case demonstration.
Findings
EVM practice in the European construction industry is found to be lagging behind other experienced countries and industries, despite EVM having been found to be applicable, adaptable, and predictive of integrated final cost and schedule of facility construction projects. In particular, cost estimate at completion is forecasted by a simple cost performance index (CPI), while for the time estimate at completion, the earned schedule concept is revealed as an accurate predictor.
Research limitations/implications
The paper urges the need for research of a European standard as a primary factor for successful diffusion of EVM usage in architecture, engineering and construction projects.
Practical implications
This paper helps practitioners to understand the adaptability of EVM practice in the European construction industry and to apply EV tools for effective monitoring of the performance of their projects.
Originality/value
Current trends of EVM practice in the European construction context are presented and suggestions for sustaining the diffusion of EVM are given.
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Hafiz Zahoor, Rashid Mehmood Khan, Ahsan Nawaz, Muhammad Ayaz and Ahsen Maqsoom
Earned Value Management (EVM) is widely used as a project performance measurement and forecasting technique. Nonetheless, it has not been fully explored in Pakistani construction…
Abstract
Purpose
Earned Value Management (EVM) is widely used as a project performance measurement and forecasting technique. Nonetheless, it has not been fully explored in Pakistani construction industry; where conventional progress reporting methodology (CPRM) is being followed having certain confines. It reports only the financial progress of a project, expresses feeble association between the duration and cost of activities, and forecasts flawed schedule and completion cost. This research implements EVM on under-construction building projects in Pakistan, and compares its upshots with the projects' actual records and with the outcomes of CPRM.
Design/methodology/approach
To assess the implementation of EVM on building projects, a set of specific criteria was established. Work Breakdown Structure, Organization Breakdown Structure and Control Points were established. The study has compared the EVM metrics with CPRM outcomes on three under-study building projects, and has deliberated on their mutual differences as well as their relationship with actual cost and schedule performance. Monthly figures of actual spending and completed activities were periodically recorded and compared with planned values for status indication. The graphs were generated to observe the correlation between the results of EVM and CPRM. The data was then extrapolated to forecast the schedule and cost values at completion.
Findings
The study discovered that trends of EVM in quantifying the project's cost and schedule performance were strongly correlated and were closer to the actual progress. It has also verified the EVM's soundness in forecasting the cost and schedule, required for project's completion. Contrarily, CPRM metrics could not precisely visualize the current and future, cost and schedule performance.
Originality/value
The case study concludes that EVM's incorporation in progress reporting regime can revolutionize the assessment procedures in Pakistan by rightly indicating the project's current status as well as visualizing the future performance. The study's methodology can also be extrapolated in other countries having similar work environment and economic conditions.
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Tahereh Khesal, Abbas Saghaei, Mohammad Khalilzadeh, Masoud Rahiminezhad Galankashi and Roya Soltani
The purpose of this paper is to propose an integrated earned value management (EVM) approach to control quality, cost, schedule and risk of projects.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to propose an integrated earned value management (EVM) approach to control quality, cost, schedule and risk of projects.
Design/methodology/approach
This study represents a new EVM framework by considering a quality control index. Particularly, some control indices and cumulative buffers are defined by two proposed, methods, namely the linear- and Taguchi-based methods. These methods are implemented in three different projects in different industries.
Findings
According to the results, integration of the quality index creates a better control situation by providing more accurate information. Hence, project managers could comprehensively monitor the status of important factors to make more precise decisions while maintaining the simplicity of their analysis.
Originality/value
From the methodological and theoretical features, this paper offers new visions because, to the best of authors’ knowledge, no comparable study has been conducted before.
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Alexis Barrientos-Orellana, Pablo Ballesteros-Pérez, Daniel Mora-Melia, Maria Carmen González-Cruz and Mario Vanhoucke
Earned Value Management (EVM) is a project monitoring and control technique that enables the forecasting of a project's duration. Many EVM metrics and project duration forecasting…
Abstract
Purpose
Earned Value Management (EVM) is a project monitoring and control technique that enables the forecasting of a project's duration. Many EVM metrics and project duration forecasting methods have been proposed. However, very few studies have compared their accuracy and stability.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper presents an exhaustive stability and accuracy analysis of 27 deterministic EVM project duration forecasting methods. Stability is measured via Pearson's, Spearman's and Kendall's correlation coefficients while accuracy is measured by Mean Squared and Mean Absolute Percentage Errors. These parameters are determined at ten percentile intervals to track a given project's progress across 4,100 artificial project networks with varied topologies.
Findings
Findings support that stability and accuracy are inversely correlated for most forecasting methods, and also suggest that both significantly worsen as project networks become increasingly parallel. However, the AT + PD-ESmin forecasting method stands out as being the most accurate and reliable.
Practical implications
Implications of this study will allow construction project managers to resort to the simplest, most accurate and most stable EVM metrics when forecasting project duration. They will also be able to anticipate how the project topology (i.e., the network of activity predecessors) and the stage of project progress can condition their accuracy and stability.
Originality/value
Unlike previous research comparing EVM forecasting methods, this one includes all deterministic methods (classical and recent alike) and measures their performance in accordance with several parameters. Activity durations and costs are also modelled akin to those of construction projects.
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Maan Nihad Ibrahim, David Thorpe and Muhammad Nateque Mahmood
The purpose of this paper is to investigate a set of risk-related factors influencing the earned value management (EVM) concept as an assessment technique in evaluating the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate a set of risk-related factors influencing the earned value management (EVM) concept as an assessment technique in evaluating the progress of modern sustainable infrastructure construction projects.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative research approach has been adopted for identifying risk-related factors influencing EVM concept from a literature review and through interviewing industry personnel, followed by an inductive process to form sets of key factors and their measuring items.
Findings
EVM is a common method for assessing project performance. A weakness of this approach is that EVM assessment in its current form does not measure the impact of a number of project performance factors that result from the complexity of modern infrastructure construction projects, and thus does not accurately assess their impact in this performance. This paper discusses and explains a range of potential risk factors to evaluating project performance such as sustainability, stakeholder requirements, communication, procurement strategy, weather, experience of staff, site condition, design issues, financial risk, subcontractor, government requirements and material. In addition, their measuring items were identified.
Practical implications
This research assists projects managers to improve the evaluation process of infrastructure construction performance by incorporating a range of factors likely to impact on that performance and which are not included in current EVM calculations.
Originality/value
This research addresses the need to include in the EVM calculation a range of risk factors affecting the performance of infrastructure projects in Australia and therefore makes this calculation a more reliable tool for assessing project performance.
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