Developing project schedules is one of the critical activities that all project manager must be able to perform. Without a clearly defined project schedule, the project team will not be aligned in terms of what it needs to do and by when. Below is a list of steps and considerations that you should take when developing a project schedule:
1. Start with the end in mind.
When developing a project schedule, first take some time to review the Statement of Work to understand the scope and deliverables. Deliverables can vary; for example, deliverables may include documents or solutions being produced as the end product. Check out our article on why project scope is important here. When you know what the final outcomes of the project are, it will be easier to develop the activities and phases within the project schedule. List out these deliverables in your project plan; work products are required to be produced.
2. Capture activities that need to be performed to complete the deliverables.
After reviewing the list of deliverables, develop the task list. As a project manager, you may not know all of the tasks that need to be performed. However, you can start by writing down the tasks that are required to be performed in order to have completed deliverables. Once you have the initial list of tasks, involve the other stakeholders. Have the stakeholders look at the task list and provide their inputs of what tasks are needed at various phases of a project. Part of the project manager role is to facilitate the process and coordinate with others in an organized manner.
3. Determine length of time required for each task.
A critical component of developing project schedules is to know how long each task will take. Some tasks may be as short as half day of work and some can be longer. A good rule of thumb with task length is that it should not exceed 40 hours (1 week). Tasks exceeding this length can be broken down into smaller tasks that are more “bite sized” for project tracking purposes.
4. Place the tasks in order and list out the dependencies between and among tasks.
Steps require organization and need to follow an appropriate order. It is important place these tasks in chronological order. If you want more details on this, check out our article on why organizing tasks in order is important here. Additionally, the project manager needs to establish dependencies between and among tasks in the project schedule. You can learn more about project dependencies in one of our other articles here.
5. Assign resources to tasks.
The final step involves assigning the appropriate resources to each task. This helps the project manager determine which resources will have additional load or less load and can make the necessary adjustments to the resource assignments.
I hope you enjoyed this post! What approach do you take to create project plans? Leave us a comment below!