Levelling - where tasks are complete, allow other tasks to fill in

Question

In my projects, tasks are levelled and are therefore scheduled in sequence. In practice, tasks can be worked on in any order. I would like the levelling to fill in where parts of later tasks have been done early.

For example, if resource A is working on tasks X,Y,Z, each 4 days, and I then mark task Y as 50% complete, it means that task Z can start 2 days earlier as there are only 2 days of remaining work on task Y.

But what happens is that task Z stays where it is and the project is held up unnecessarily due to work which has already been done.

Is there some way to achieve this?

Answer 1

The developer can start on task Z when task Y is done. If you mark this task Y as 50% complete that doesn't necessarily mean they only need to work two days on the remaining parts, in fact, assertions claiming "this task is 50% complete" are wrong quite often, so you shouldn't base planning on that.

If the developer working on Y states that it's easier and less time consuming than initially estimated, you can update your estimate for the completion of Z in coordination with them. Don't increase schedule pressure just because work flows smoothly. You may be glad that the slack gained comes in handy when there are unforeseen complications.

Answer 2

I think you're asking the tool to be smarter than our current technology allows. If you place FS constraints on X, then Y, and then Z, the tool cannot know that you have some play in starting a successor task early. It is just not that smart.

If X, Y, and Z do not have hard dependencies and have, instead, resource dependencies, then the solution I would use is NOT to create FS constraints between the three tasks but rather have a SS constraint on them against whatever task proceeded, allowing all three tasks available to start. Then, I would actively manage the schedule (which is the PM job) and instruct whomever to start one of those three tasks as I desired and whatever make the most sense at that time. The schedule would exhibit properly when resources and employees are ready to go and I, as the PM, would air traffic control them.

Whatever task(s) succeeded X, Y, and Z would move left or right based on the progress I entered on X, Y, and Z. So the fidelity of the schedule will be appropriate and protected and the variances would reflect reality to a reasonable degree.