Why Companies engage Consultants?

06 Apr Why Companies engage Consultants?

Because the companies know the team does not have capacity to provide adequate support during the execution phase!

Hence the consultancy team starts producing plans, schedules, reports, analysis, etc. When inquired the background / basis of the reports they usually state that they are experts and know how to do it?! Here is a typical conversation when we (khonopc) review a planning system that was developed by a consultant:

• How did you develop the S-Curve? We used a tool
• What is the input of the tool? We load all activities with their dates, then the tool generates the S-Curves
• What data does the tool use for distribution? No answer!
• The Schedule is not resource loaded or incorrectly loaded, so what is the basis of the S-Curve? The tool generates it and we don’t know
• If the schedule is not resource loaded then the tool uses the Durations, correct? Yesssss, we also use DUMMY resources!
• Is it correct to use Duration/DUMMY resources to generate an S-Curve? Not really but, the company’s planners do not know the resource loading techniques hence we had no choice!!
• If they knew the resource loading, then you (as consultant) wouldn’t be here, correct? Silence!!

• Where do you get the actual progress from that gets reported on? We get it from the Schedule after every update!
• What is the basis of the progresses in the schedule? Project team provides the progress then we update. The software calculates /rolls up
• How reliable are the provided progresses? Very high because the project team on top of everything!!
• Do they know all the details and activities scope of works? They should know!
• What is the basis for roll ups? we use Physical and Performance% Complete!
• How did Performance% Complete get utilized without a resource loaded schedule? As we said, we assigned the DUMMY resource then made Price/Unit=1. This is the only choice we have!
• Why didn’t you load resources? It’s not in our scope. Our scope is; developing S-Curves, progress reports and Dashboard!
• The company already had progress reports, dashboards and S-Curves, so what did you develop? We improved the format and the reliability?
• How could the reliability be improved with wrong basis or based on DUMMY resource?

These type of practices are unethical and completely wrong. So, if you are using a consultant, ask your team about what value they add. Also, you could use some of the above questions to identify whether they are adding any value or B.Sing the system.

If you require to review your planning and Project system (implemented by your own team or consultant), contact us now before you waste more money and still fail to deliver!

info@khonopc.com