Instead of using separate examples in every book, I follow the same project throughout the series: Lakeshore Heights Tower, a 25-storey mixed-use condominium in Mississauga, Ontario.

The five books cover:

• Microsoft Project – GC coordination
• Primavera P6 – scheduling and project controls
• Development & Preconstruction – owner/developer perspective
• Construction Project Management – GC project management
• Construction Estimating – estimating and bid preparation

The project has a real-world feel, with a tight budget, urban site constraints, Canadian winter conditions, procurement issues, schedule problems, and a major delay that eventually requires a Time Impact Analysis.

My goal was to make the series practical, not just explain construction concepts, but show how they actually connect on the same project.

View the Lakeshore Heights Series on Amazon.ca

View the Lakeshore Heights Series on Amazon.com

If you’re involved in construction, estimating, scheduling, project controls, preconstruction, or project management, this series is for you.

One of the questions I have been asked many times in construction is:

“How do you come up with the price for a project like this?”

It sounds like a simple question.

For a small job, maybe it is.

For a large high-rise project, it is anything but simple.

A general contractor can receive hundreds of drawings, specifications, tender forms, schedules, reports, and other documents and then have only a few weeks to turn all of that information into one number.

That number eventually goes to the client.

But getting there is a long process.

That is the subject of my fifth book, Practical Learning of Construction Estimating: The General Contractor’s Take-Off, Bid Preparation, and Sub-Bid Validation on a Canadian High-Rise.

View the book on Amazon.ca

View the book on Amazon.com

I Wanted to Show the Process, Not Just the Math

When people hear “construction estimating,” they often think about quantity take-offs and unit prices.

Those are certainly part of it.

But estimating a major construction project is much more than measuring concrete and multiplying it by a price.

You need to understand the drawings.

You need to read the specifications.

You need to understand what the owner is asking for.

You need to know what the subcontractors are including.

You need to make assumptions when information is missing.

You need to identify risks.

And eventually, you have to decide how much the company is willing to bid.

That’s what I wanted to show in this book.

Instead of creating a series of small estimating examples, I use the Lakeshore Heights Tower, the fictional Canadian high-rise that appears throughout my series, and follow one tender from beginning to end.

The tender lasts six weeks.

There are four competing contractors.

And there is one bid that finally gets submitted.

Week One Looks Very Different From Week Six

I like this part of the estimating process because the estimate changes quite a lot as the tender progresses.

At the beginning, you are mostly trying to understand the opportunity.

What exactly is being built?

What are the major scopes?

What information is available?

What information is missing?

Is this even a project that the contractor should bid?

That last question is important.

A contractor doesn’t have unlimited estimating resources. Sometimes the right decision is not to bid.

The location might be wrong.

The project might not fit the company’s capabilities.

The schedule might be too aggressive.

The contract might carry too much risk.

Or the company may simply have enough work already.

So before the take-off even begins, there can be a bid/no-bid decision.

Then You Start Reading

Once the contractor decides to pursue the tender, the estimating team gets into the documents.

And there are usually a lot of them.

Drawings are only one piece of the puzzle.

Specifications can contain requirements that affect pricing.

Division 00 and Division 01 can contain important contractual and administrative requirements.

Addenda can change the tender documents after the estimating process has already started.

This is why I wanted to include the document-review side of estimating in the book.

A good estimator can’t just look at a floor plan and start measuring.

They need to understand the project as a whole.

Going to the Site

A site visit can also change the way you look at a project.

A drawing doesn’t always tell you what it feels like to work on the property.

Where are the neighbouring buildings?

How will trucks enter the site?

Where could materials be stored?

How will deliveries be handled?

What are the access restrictions?

What temporary works might be required?

These things can affect the estimate.

For a high-rise project, site logistics can become a major issue, and the estimator needs to think about those costs before the bid is submitted.

The Take-Off Is Only the Beginning

Eventually, the measuring starts.

Concrete.

Reinforcing steel.

Formwork.

Excavation.

Masonry.

Curtain wall.

Drywall.

Doors.

Flooring.

Ceilings.

And many other scopes.

The exact list depends on the project, of course.

But the principle is the same.

The estimator has to turn drawings into quantities.

This is where construction quantity take-off becomes one of the fundamental skills of estimating.

But even here, there is more to it than getting the quantities right.

You need to understand how the work will actually be performed.

A quantity on a drawing doesn’t tell you the whole cost.

What Does That Quantity Really Cost?

Suppose you’ve calculated the amount of concrete required.

Now what?

You need to consider material pricing.

Labour.

Productivity.

Equipment.

Pumping.

Waste.

Site conditions.

Potential escalation.

The construction sequence.

And the assumptions behind the work.

The same quantity can produce very different costs depending on how the project is going to be built.

This is why I included labour, productivity, equipment, material, waste and escalation in the estimating process.

The objective is to build an estimate that represents the actual project—not just a spreadsheet full of quantities.

Then the Subcontractor Quotes Start Coming In

This is probably one of the more interesting parts of general contractor estimating.

The GC usually doesn’t self-perform every trade.

So the estimating team needs to get prices from subcontractors.

Electrical.

Mechanical.

Plumbing.

Glazing.

Drywall.

Flooring.

Painting.

And many others.

Eventually, the quotes start coming in.

And they don’t always agree.

One subcontractor might be $2 million.

Another might be $2.4 million.

Another might be $1.7 million.

Now someone has to figure out why.

Maybe the $1.7 million contractor missed part of the scope.

Maybe they have a different interpretation.

Maybe they excluded something.

Maybe they have better productivity.

Or maybe they simply made a mistake.

This is where sub-bid leveling and validation become extremely important.

The Lowest Price Can Be the Most Dangerous

I’ve seen enough construction pricing to know that a very low number should sometimes make you more curious, not more excited.

If four subcontractors are around the same price and one is dramatically lower, there is probably a reason.

The estimator needs to find it.

That means comparing scope sheets, exclusions, qualifications, allowances, alternates and assumptions.

For mechanical and electrical work, this can become particularly complicated.

A subcontractor’s number may look attractive until you discover that an important part of the scope wasn’t included.

The book goes into subcontractor coverage, scope sheets, plugs, allowances and MEP bid validation because these are the things that can make a major difference to the final GC estimate.

There Are Costs Everywhere

The trades are only part of the estimate.

The contractor also needs to account for the costs of actually running the project.

Site supervision.

Temporary facilities.

Security.

Utilities.

Safety requirements.

Site logistics.

Temporary works.

Winter conditions.

Equipment.

Time-related costs.

These fall into areas such as general requirements and other project-specific costs.

And the longer the project takes, the more some of those costs can increase.

This is one reason estimating and scheduling are connected.

A contractor can’t look at the construction price without also thinking about how long it will take to build the project.

Canadian Winter Doesn’t Care About Your Estimate

Since the project in the book is a Canadian high-rise, I also wanted to deal with something that Canadian contractors have to think about every year:

Winter.

Cold weather can affect productivity.

Temporary heating can cost money.

Concrete work can require additional protection.

Site conditions can change.

Snow removal and temporary works can add costs.

None of these things are particularly surprising to a contractor working in Canada.

But they still need to be considered when the estimate is prepared.

If you don’t put the cost somewhere in the estimate, that doesn’t mean the cost won’t exist later.

And Then There Is Risk

No estimate is completely certain.

There will always be things that aren’t known at bid time.

Maybe the design isn’t completely developed.

Maybe a subcontractor’s scope isn’t perfectly clear.

Maybe material pricing is moving.

Maybe there are site conditions that haven’t been fully confirmed.

Maybe the schedule is aggressive.

The estimator has to decide how those risks should be treated.

That can involve contingency, allowances, insurance, bonding, overhead and profit.

At this point, the estimate starts becoming more than a technical calculation.

It becomes a business decision.

The Last Few Days Are Different

The first few weeks of a tender can feel relatively calm.

The last few days usually don’t.

Quotes are coming in.

People are chasing missing prices.

Addenda are being reviewed.

Numbers are changing.

Questions are being answered.

Something that looked complete yesterday suddenly isn’t.

The estimator is checking the estimate again.

And then again.

At some point, the team needs to stop changing things and decide what the bid will be.

Bid Day

Eventually, all the work comes down to one number.

The final estimate is reviewed.

Subcontractor coverage is checked.

Major risks are discussed.

General requirements are reviewed.

Overhead and profit are considered.

The bid spread is looked at.

The submission requirements are checked.

And then the bid goes in.

After six weeks of work, the actual submission can take only a few minutes.

That’s one of the strange things about construction estimating.

There is an enormous amount of work behind a number that can fit on one line.

What Happens After You Submit?

The story doesn’t necessarily end there.

The contractor may be asked questions.

There may be a post-bid interview.

Scopes may be clarified.

Numbers may be reviewed.

Negotiations may happen.

And if the contractor wins, the estimate eventually becomes the project budget.

This is an important transition.

The numbers that were developed during the tender now become the financial foundation for the project.

If something was missed during estimating, it may become a problem during construction.

That is why a good estimate needs to be more than competitive.

It needs to be defensible.

Why I Wrote This Book

I wanted to write a book that gives someone a feel for what it is actually like to prepare a major construction bid.

Not just:

“Calculate the quantity.”

“Multiply by the unit rate.”

“Add overhead.”

“Add profit.”

Done.

Real estimating isn’t that simple.

It involves judgment.

It involves incomplete information.

It involves asking questions.

It involves comparing people who are giving you different answers.

It involves understanding construction.

And sometimes it involves making a decision when you don’t have all the information you would like to have.

That’s what makes estimating interesting.

Who Is This Book For?

The book is aimed at people who want to learn more about the general contractor’s estimating process, including:

• Estimators and junior estimators
• Chief estimators
• Preconstruction professionals
• Project managers
• Project coordinators
• Construction managers
• Engineers
• Construction professionals moving into estimating
• Students entering the construction industry

If you’ve ever looked at a major construction project and wondered how the contractor arrived at the final bid price, this book is essentially a walk through that process.

From Drawings to Bid Day

At the beginning of the six-week tender, the estimator has a pile of documents and a lot of questions.

Six weeks later, there is a final number.

Between those two points are quantity take-offs, subcontractor pricing, bid leveling, general requirements, labour, materials, equipment, risk, contingency, overhead, profit, addenda, site conditions and hundreds of smaller decisions.

That is construction estimating.

And that is what I tried to put into Practical Learning of Construction Estimating.

View the book on Amazon.ca

View the book on Amazon.com

This is Book #5 in the Construction Project Management – The Lakeshore Heights Series.

The Lakeshore Heights Tower has now been through development, preconstruction, scheduling, construction management, and estimating.

Different books look at different parts of the same project.

This one looks at the part that happens before the contractor can put a price on the table—and ultimately asks the most important question in the tender:

What number are we willing to bid?

There is a point in every construction project when the planning is over and someone finally says:

“Okay, let’s start building.”

The construction contract has been signed. The Notice to Proceed has been issued. The contractor has been selected.

It sounds like the project is ready to go.

In reality, this is when a completely different kind of work begins.

The site has to be mobilized. The project team has to be organized. Temporary utilities need to be arranged. Hoarding goes up. Permits, surveys, site logistics and access need to be coordinated.

And then the emails start.

RFIs. Shop drawings. Submittals. Change requests. Meeting minutes. Progress claims. Procurement updates. Schedule updates.

Someone is always asking for something.

Someone is always waiting for something.

And somewhere in the middle of all of this, the project manager is expected to keep the project moving, control the budget, protect the schedule and make sure there is a proper record of what is happening.

This is the world I wanted to write about in my fourth book:

Practical Learning of Construction Project Management: Mobilization to Occupancy on a Canadian High-Rise.

View the book on Amazon.ca

View the book on Amazon.com

This Book Starts Where My Preconstruction Book Ends

My previous book, Practical Learning of Construction Development and Preconstruction, follows the Lakeshore Heights Tower from the early development stage through estimating, financing, procurement, tendering and contract award.

This book picks up from there.

The contractor has been selected.

The contract is signed.

Now we have to build the building.

I wanted to follow the project all the way through the construction phase rather than talk about construction management as a collection of theories.

So the Lakeshore Heights Tower continues as the main project throughout the book.

We start with mobilization and eventually reach closeout and occupancy.

Everything in between is where most of the interesting stuff happens.

The First Days on Site

The first few weeks of a project can be messy.

There are usually a lot of things happening at once, and not all of them are visible from the construction schedule.

The site needs to be prepared.

The project team needs to establish its procedures.

Meetings need to be scheduled.

Communication channels need to be established.

Temporary power and water may need to be arranged.

Surveying needs to be coordinated.

Site access and logistics need to be figured out.

Permits and inspections have to be tracked.

The project manager is already dealing with dozens of decisions before the first major construction activity is underway.

This is construction mobilization, and getting it right makes the rest of the project much easier.

Then the Drawings Start Coming

Once the project gets moving, documentation becomes a major part of the job.

There are drawings to review, shop drawings to submit, samples to approve, mock-ups to coordinate and questions to answer.

And then there are RFIs.

Anyone who has worked on a construction project knows how quickly the RFI log can grow.

One question may look harmless.

But if the answer is needed before concrete can be poured, or before a piece of equipment can be ordered, that one RFI can suddenly become very important.

This is why RFI management, submittal management and document control are not just administrative tasks.

They are part of managing the construction schedule.

Keeping Track of What Was Actually Said

Construction projects generate a huge amount of information.

A meeting happens.

Someone makes a decision.

A consultant provides an instruction.

A subcontractor raises a concern.

A material delivery is delayed.

A change is discussed.

Six months later, someone asks:

“What happened here?”

That is when the project records become important.

Meeting minutes, daily reports, correspondence, logs, approvals, drawings and other documents create the history of the project.

Good documentation doesn’t just protect the contractor or owner if there is a dispute.

It also helps the project team remember what was agreed and why a decision was made.

This is one of the reasons I included practical examples of daily reports, meeting minutes, project correspondence, logs and registers in the book.

Construction Changes Are Inevitable

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a major construction project where nothing changed.

A drawing changes.

An owner changes their mind.

A condition is discovered in the field.

A product becomes unavailable.

A consultant issues a revision.

A subcontractor proposes a different solution.

Whatever the reason, changes have to be dealt with.

And there is a big difference between simply saying “this is a change” and properly managing a change.

What caused it?

Who requested it?

What work is affected?

How much will it cost?

Will it affect the schedule?

What supporting documents are required?

What happens if the change is not approved?

These questions are part of everyday change management and change order management.

I wanted the book to deal with that practical side of the job.

Where Is the Money Going?

A construction project can have a very large contract value, but that doesn’t mean the project manager can simply look at the original contract and know how the project is doing financially.

There are commitments.

Subcontract awards.

Purchase orders.

Approved changes.

Pending changes.

Actual costs.

Forecast costs.

Contingencies.

Potential claims.

And things that nobody has priced yet.

This is why construction cost control and forecasting are such important parts of project management.

The project manager needs to have a reasonable idea of where the project stands today and where it is likely to finish.

Waiting until the end to discover a problem isn’t cost control.

It’s just discovering a problem late.

When the Material You Need Isn’t Here

Another lesson that becomes obvious once you work on construction projects is that the schedule depends on things that don’t always appear obvious in the schedule.

A piece of equipment can be critical.

A custom door can be critical.

An electrical component can be critical.

A piece of mechanical equipment can be critical.

If something has a long lead time and it isn’t ordered early enough, the problem may not become visible until months later.

That is why procurement and long-lead item tracking are such an important part of construction management.

The project team needs to know what has been ordered, what has been approved, when it is expected, whether manufacturing is progressing, and whether something is starting to threaten the construction schedule.

Sometimes expediting is just as important as scheduling.

The Schedule Is a Management Tool

I have a separate book dedicated to Primavera P6, but I also wanted scheduling to have an important place in this book.

A project manager doesn’t necessarily need to sit in Primavera P6 all day.

But they absolutely need to understand the schedule.

What’s supposed to happen next?

What is actually happening?

Where are we behind?

What is driving the project?

What work needs attention over the next two weeks?

What needs to be ready before the next major activity can start?

This is where lookahead planning and field planning become very useful.

A good schedule isn’t just something that gets submitted once a month.

It should help the project team decide what needs to happen next.

Progress Claims and Payments

Then there is the financial side of paying for the work.

Contractors and subcontractors need to be paid, but someone also needs to verify what work has actually been completed.

That means dealing with progress claims, payment certification and holdback.

In Canada, understanding the payment process is particularly important because construction payment requirements and contractual procedures have to be taken seriously.

For a project manager, this is another example of how construction management is not just about what happens in the field.

The financial and administrative side matters just as much.

What Happens When the Project Falls Behind?

Eventually, most project managers face some version of this conversation:

“We’re behind.”

The important thing is what happens next.

How far behind?

Behind what?

Which activities caused the problem?

Is the project completion date actually affected?

What can be done to recover the lost time?

Was the delay caused by the contractor, the owner, a consultant, a supplier, or something outside the project’s control?

And perhaps most importantly:

Did we document what happened?

The book looks at construction delays, delay documentation and claims from the project-management perspective.

Again, the emphasis is on what the project team actually needs to do rather than simply defining the terminology.

Eventually, the Building Has to Be Finished

After months or years of construction, the project eventually starts moving toward completion.

This brings a completely different set of problems.

Deficiencies need to be tracked.

Testing and commissioning need to be completed.

Documentation needs to be collected.

Inspections need to be coordinated.

Outstanding work needs to be closed.

And for a high-rise residential project, occupancy becomes one of the biggest milestones of the entire development.

Getting to occupancy isn’t simply a matter of saying that the building is finished.

There is a lot of work behind that final milestone.

The book follows the Lakeshore Heights Tower through project closeout and occupancy, bringing the construction story to its conclusion.

What I Tried to Do With This Book

I didn’t want this to be another book that says a project manager should be organized, communicate well, manage stakeholders and be a good leader.

All of that is true.

But it doesn’t really tell you what the job looks like.

The job is more like opening your computer in the morning and finding:

Three urgent emails.

A subcontractor asking about a change.

A consultant waiting for an RFI response.

A progress claim that needs to be reviewed.

A procurement item that is late.

A meeting in an hour.

A schedule update showing a problem.

And someone asking you for a report by the end of the day.

That’s much closer to the reality of construction project management.

The project manager has to connect all these things together and keep the project moving.

That is what I wanted to capture in this book.

Who I Wrote It For

The book is mainly aimed at people who are either managing construction projects or preparing to move into that role.

That includes construction project managers, project coordinators, construction managers, engineers, superintendents, project controls professionals and construction-management students.

It can also be useful for someone who has experience in one part of construction—such as estimating, scheduling, engineering or coordination—and wants to understand the bigger picture of running a project.

From Mobilization to Occupancy

The Lakeshore Heights Tower started as an idea in the earlier books.

It went through development and preconstruction.

A contractor was eventually selected.

Now it has to be built.

That’s where this book begins.

From mobilization and site startup to RFIs, submittals, procurement, change orders, cost control, schedule management, progress claims, delays, closeout and occupancy, the book follows the project through the part of its life where all the earlier planning is finally put to the test.

Construction management is ultimately about getting a complicated project finished.

On time if possible.

Within budget if possible.

With the right quality.

And with a good record of how you got there.

That’s what this book is about.

Get the Book

Practical Learning of Construction Project Management: Mobilization to Occupancy on a Canadian High-Rise is now now available on Amazon .com and .ca. Also available on the Amazon marketplace in your country; search for the title.

If you’re interested in construction project management, construction management, project coordination, construction cost control, change orders, RFIs, submittals, procurement, construction scheduling, delay management, progress claims, or high-rise construction, you can find the book here:

View the book on Amazon.ca

View the book on Amazon.com

This book is part of my Construction Project Management – The Lakeshore Heights Series.

The previous books looked at what happens before construction and how to build and manage the project schedule. This one is about what happens when the plans finally meet the real world.

This is my third book in the Practical Learning series, and it is probably the book that takes the reader furthest back in the life of a construction project.

When we talk about construction, most people think about what happens on the job site. Excavation, concrete, structure, mechanical and electrical work, finishes, inspections, deficiencies, and eventually turnover.

But by the time the first piece of equipment arrives on site, a huge amount of work has already been done.

The land has been evaluated. The development has been tested financially. Consultants have been hired. Designs have been developed. Budgets have changed several times. Financing has been arranged. Approvals have been worked through. The construction strategy has been considered. Contractors have been invited to bid.

And eventually, someone has to decide which contractor will build the project and under what terms.

That whole period is what I wanted to explore in this book.

A High-Rise Project From the Beginning

For the book, I created a fictional 25-storey condominium project called Lakeshore Heights Tower, located in Mississauga, Ontario.

I use the same project throughout the book instead of jumping from one unrelated example to another.

The project starts as an opportunity and gradually develops into a construction-ready project.

This allows the reader to see how the different pieces fit together.

We start with land and development feasibility and then move into the development pro forma, due diligence, approvals, consultant selection, design development, estimating, financing, scheduling, procurement, tendering, bid analysis, contractor selection, contract negotiation, and finally contract award and Notice to Proceed.

That sequence is really the main story of the book.

Why Start With the Pro Forma?

One of the first things that needs to be answered in a development project is a fairly simple question:

Does the project make financial sense?

Before a developer can worry about the construction schedule or selecting a general contractor, there needs to be a reasonable understanding of the project’s potential costs and revenues.

This is where the development pro forma comes in.

In the book, I use the Lakeshore Heights Tower to show how items such as land cost, construction cost, consultant fees, development charges, financing, sales revenue, contingencies, and other project costs can come together in a development pro forma.

More importantly, I wanted to show that the pro forma isn’t just a spreadsheet that gets prepared once.

As the project develops, assumptions change.

The design changes.

Construction costs change.

The schedule changes.

Financing assumptions change.

And all of those changes can affect the financial picture of the development.

What Happens During Preconstruction?

Once a project looks feasible, there is still a tremendous amount of work to do before construction can start.

This is where preconstruction becomes important.

The project team needs to deal with development approvals, consultants, design, estimating, budgeting, constructability, financing, procurement, tendering, and many other issues.

One of the things I tried to do with this book is show how these activities are connected.

For example, a design decision can affect the construction estimate.

The estimate can affect the development budget.

The development budget can affect financing.

The financing structure can affect the schedule.

And the schedule can affect the overall financial performance of the project.

These aren’t separate problems. They are all part of the same project.

Design, Estimating and Constructability

As the design develops, the project team gets a better idea of what the building is actually going to cost.

Early estimates are based on limited information. Later estimates become more detailed as drawings and specifications develop.

This is where progressive cost planning becomes important.

I also spend time on constructability because I think it is something that should be considered much earlier than it sometimes is.

A design may look good on paper, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it will be easy or economical to build.

Getting construction input early can identify problems before they become expensive changes during construction.

The book also looks at value engineering and cost optimization, particularly when the developing design is pushing the project beyond its budget.

Planning the Project Before Construction

Scheduling doesn’t start on the day the contractor arrives.

There are many important activities that need to happen before that point.

Design milestones, approvals, financing, tender documents, procurement, tendering, bid evaluation, contract negotiation, and award all have to be considered.

I cover preconstruction scheduling and project controls as part of the overall development process.

The idea is to understand how the development and preconstruction schedule eventually leads to the construction phase.

Choosing the Contractor

Eventually, the project needs to go to the construction market.

But choosing a contractor isn’t simply a matter of looking at three numbers and picking the lowest one.

Contractor proposals can contain different assumptions, exclusions, qualifications, allowances, alternates, and approaches.

This is why bid leveling and bid analysis are so important.

The book goes through this process and looks at how contractor bids can be compared and evaluated before making a selection.

From there, the project moves into contract negotiation and contract award.

At that point, many of the decisions made during the previous stages become part of the actual construction agreement.

From Development to Construction

The part of this process that I find particularly interesting is the transition from preconstruction into actual construction.

A project can have a great-looking design and an attractive financial model, but that doesn’t automatically mean it is ready to build.

The team needs to make sure that the design, budget, schedule, financing, procurement strategy, contracts, and other important pieces are sufficiently developed.

The goal is to get to a point where the project can move from planning to execution with as few unanswered questions as possible.

Of course, no project ever starts with everything perfectly resolved. Construction will always bring new challenges.

But good development and preconstruction can eliminate many problems before they reach the job site.

Who Is the Book For?

I wrote this book for people who want to understand what happens before construction starts.

It can be useful for developers, construction project managers, construction managers, project coordinators, estimators, engineers, architects, project controls professionals, and students studying construction management or real estate development.

It may also be useful for people who already work in construction but have mostly been involved in the construction phase and want to understand what happens on the development and preconstruction side.

The Main Idea

If I had to summarize the book, I would say that it is about how a construction opportunity becomes a construction project.

It starts with a piece of land and an idea.

Then come the feasibility analysis, pro forma, due diligence, approvals, design, estimating, financing, scheduling, procurement, tendering, bid analysis, contractor selection, and contract award.

Each decision affects the next one.

By the time the project reaches Notice to Proceed, there is a long history behind it.

That is the part of construction that I wanted to put into a practical book.

Get the Book

Practical Learning of Construction Development and Preconstruction: Pro Forma to Contract Award on a Canadian High-Rise is now available on Amazon .com and .ca. Also available on the Amazon marketplace in your country; search for the title.

If you are interested in construction development, preconstruction, real estate development, development pro formas, construction estimating, procurement, tendering, contractor selection, or high-rise construction, you can find the book here:

View the book on Amazon.ca

View the book on Amazon.com

The book is part of my Construction Project Management – The Lakeshore Heights Series.

This is another book in the series, and I’m continuing to build the series around different stages and practical aspects of construction project management.

After publishing my first book, Practical Learning of Microsoft Project, I wanted my next book to focus on another tool that is widely used in construction planning and project controls: Oracle Primavera P6.

But I didn’t want to write another book that simply explains where to find different buttons and menus in Primavera P6.

There are already many resources that can teach you how to use the software.

What I wanted to do was different.

I wanted to show how Primavera P6 is actually used to develop and manage a construction schedule.

Learning Primavera P6 Through a Real Project

One of the main ideas behind this book is to learn Primavera P6 by working on one realistic project from beginning to end.

For this purpose, I created the Lakeshore Heights Tower project and used it throughout the book.

Instead of having one example for creating activities, another unrelated example for relationships, and another one for updating a schedule, the reader follows the same project as the schedule develops.

We start with the project structure and gradually build the schedule.

The book covers things such as project calendars, WBS, activities, activity relationships, schedule logic, critical path and float. But it doesn’t stop there.

Once the schedule is developed, we move into the things that planners and project controls professionals actually have to deal with during a project.

That includes updating the schedule, measuring progress, maintaining baselines, cost loading, preparing lookaheads, reviewing schedule health, reporting progress, analyzing delays, and developing recovery schedules.

Why I Wrote This Book

In my experience, there is a big difference between knowing Primavera P6 and knowing how to use Primavera P6 as a project scheduler.

You can learn how to create an activity in P6 in a few minutes.

The harder questions are:

Why should this activity be connected to that activity?

• Is the schedule logic reasonable?
• Why did the critical path change?
• Does this delay actually affect the project completion date?
• How much float does the project really have?
• What should we do when the project falls behind?
• How do we document a delay?
• How can we analyze the effect of a delay on the schedule?
• How do we prepare a recovery schedule?

These are the kinds of questions that I wanted the book to address.

From the Baseline Schedule to Schedule Updates

A construction schedule is not something that you create at the beginning of a project and then put away.

Once construction starts, things change.

Actual progress doesn’t always match the original plan. Activities take longer than expected. Materials arrive late. Drawings and decisions may be delayed. Work may have to be resequenced. Sometimes a project simply falls behind.

This is where Primavera P6 becomes much more than scheduling software.

It becomes a project-control tool.

The book follows this process and explains how the schedule can be updated and used to understand what is happening on the project.

I also cover baselines, progress management, schedule reporting, lookahead planning, and schedule health checks.

Critical Path, Float and Schedule Logic

I have always considered schedule logic one of the most important parts of construction scheduling.

A schedule with thousands of activities doesn’t necessarily mean it is a good schedule.

The relationships between those activities are what make the schedule useful.

The book therefore spends time on activity relationships, schedule logic, the critical path, and float.

The objective is not just to show how to create a relationship in Primavera P6, but to help the reader understand the reason behind the relationship and its effect on the overall schedule.

That distinction is important when you’re working on a real project.

When the Project Is Delayed

This is another area I wanted to cover in more detail.

Delays are a normal part of construction projects, but analyzing a delay properly is not always straightforward.

The book introduces practical approaches to documenting delay events, analyzing schedule impacts, and developing recovery schedules.

There is also a section on Time Impact Analysis (TIA) and how it can be used to assess the effect of a delay or change on a project schedule.

I have also included practical worksheets and templates to make these sections more useful for someone who wants to actually apply the concepts rather than just read about them.

Schedule Quality and DCMA 14-Point Assessment

Another topic that I think is often overlooked when people learn Primavera P6 is schedule quality.

Creating a schedule is one thing. Knowing whether the schedule is properly built is another.

The book introduces schedule health checks and the DCMA 14-Point Assessment, along with practical tools that can be used to review a schedule.

This can be particularly useful for planners, schedulers, and project controls professionals who need to review schedules prepared by others.

Practice Files and Templates

I also wanted this book to be something that readers could work with.

The companion practice materials include Primavera P6 XER schedule checkpoints, WBS and activity registers, calendar files, schedule reporting tools, delay-event logs, Time Impact Analysis worksheets, DCMA 14-Point assessment tools, lookahead templates, schedule narratives, and other project-control documents.

The idea is simple: don’t just read the book. Build the schedule, make changes to it, update it, review it, and see what happens.

That is how I believe Primavera P6 is best learned.

Who Is This Book For?

I wrote the book mainly for people working with construction schedules and project controls, including:

• Project planners and schedulers
• Project controls professionals
• Construction project managers
• Construction project coordinators
• Engineers and other construction professionals
• People who are starting to work with Primavera P6
• Experienced Primavera P6 users who want to strengthen their practical scheduling skills
• Students who want to understand how construction scheduling works in practice

You don’t need to be an expert in Primavera P6 to start working through the book.

At the same time, I didn’t want to make the book only for beginners. Some of the later topics, particularly schedule auditing, delay analysis, recovery schedules, Time Impact Analysis, and DCMA schedule assessment, are aimed at readers who are already working with project schedules.

The Main Idea Behind the Book

If I had to summarize the book in one sentence, it would be this:

I want you to learn not only how to use Primavera P6, but how to think like a scheduler.

Primavera P6 is a powerful tool, but the software itself doesn’t make someone a good scheduler.

Good scheduling requires an understanding of construction, sequencing, logic, progress, delays, critical path, project controls, and how all of these things are connected.

That is what I tried to bring together in this book.

Where You Can Find the Book

Practical Learning of Primavera P6: A Hands-On Guide to Planning, Scheduling, Project Controls, and Construction Schedule Management is now available on Amazon .com and .ca. Also available on the Amazon marketplace in your country; search for the title.

If you are working in construction planning, Primavera P6 scheduling, project controls, or construction project management, I hope you find the book useful.

View the book on Amazon.ca

View the book on Amazon.com

This is my second book, and it is also part of my Construction Project Management – The Lakeshore Heights Series.

I’m continuing to work on the series, so there are more books coming.

Practical Learning of Microsoft Project. Paperback and Kindle.
I didn’t write it as a software tutorial. There are enough of those, and most of them are written from behind a desk. The gap I kept seeing on jobs was different: people who knew where the buttons were but couldn’t build a schedule the site would actually follow. What to do when progress comes in out of sequence. How to defend a date in a coordination meeting. What a delay event looks like in the file, not just in the meeting minutes. That’s the book.

The whole thing runs on one fictional project, a 25-storey condo in the Greater Toronto Area, from notice to proceed through substantial performance, about 30 months of project life. Baselines, weekly updates, lookaheads, a delay claim, a recovery plan, closeout. The contract language is Canadian, but a concrete cycle is a concrete cycle. Schedules slip the same way everywhere. If you’re a coordinator, a scheduler, or a junior PM who wants to learn Microsoft Project the way it’s actually used on a project, this was written for you.

There’s also a free practice package, real schedule files, Excel tools, and templates to work through alongside the chapters.

Paperback and Kindle:
Amazon com: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1067931805
Amazon ca: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/1067931805

Also available on the Amazon marketplace in your country; search for the title.

It’s about construction scheduling, but not from a software angle. More about what actually happens on site when the plan starts slipping.

One thing that pushed me to start was this gap that’s always there. People who are actually dealing with this stuff every day are usually too busy (or just done by the end of the day) to sit and write a book. And a lot of the books out there, they explain things well, but you can tell they weren’t written from the middle of a job.

I’m just trying to write down what I’ve seen, where coordination breaks, where sequencing looks fine on paper but doesn’t work in reality, that kind of thing.

It’s been slower than I expected. A lot of rewriting. Cutting things that didn’t feel right. Trying not to make it sound like a textbook.

It’s getting close now. Still some cleanup, but most of it is there.

We’ll see how it turns out.

A clear example is Scrum and Agile certificates. Over the past year their market has suddenly grown. People sometimes change careers after university and work in unrelated fields. But getting professional certificates that have nothing to do with your actual job is strange and mostly useless. Like being a lawyer and going to get an international dentistry certificate.

I know many colleagues with 10 or even 20 years in oil and gas, power plants, construction, roads, steel. They attended classes, paid money, got Scrum Master and similar certificates, and are still doing the same work in construction, what we call traditional project management.

What is clear to me is that Agile and Scrum were never meant for these industries and will not have a role in executing these types of projects. They do not even claim that. In Agile principles, change is not only accepted but welcomed. You do not see that mindset in construction projects where continuous scope change is not acceptable.

Knowing about these topics is useful. But spending money to get certifications in Agile and Scrum, when your past work and future plan are not in that field, is mostly wasted effort. It is following the wave created by certification pressure.

In my view, the main cause is some training institutes and some instructors creating this environment.

The situation has reached a point where some people think without these certificates they have no future. That is not true. For those working in contractor companies, these certificates will not help you, your company, or your project. The only benefit goes to those training providers.

Important point. Critical path float is not always zero. It can be zero, negative, or positive.

When do we get negative float.
If the schedule has a hard finish constraint, once one or more critical activities fall behind, negative float shows up. Negative float means you are behind the schedule. It is delay.

Question. Is negative float only during control, or can it exist at the start of planning.
Yes, it can exist from the beginning.

For example, you start planning one month after contract award. A critical early package like mobilization should have been done but was not. At the same time, the project has a must finish on constraint at the end. Right away the critical path shows negative float.

If critical activities are ahead while a hard finish exists, float becomes positive.

Is negative float important.
Very. Sometimes near mid or late stages, people ask for a recovery schedule on a job with a fixed finish. Some make the mistake of forcing all negative floats to zero. That is wrong. You lose visibility. You cannot see which activities were actually driving the delay. Critical items that needed recovery get mixed with zero float work.

Where do we usually see negative float.
Projects where the finish date cannot move. Jobs tied to specific events or official openings. Stadiums for a tournament. Government milestone dates. In these cases stakeholders will not accept any delay. The planner puts a hard constraint on the finish milestone. Once critical work slips, negative float appears. Recovery effort should focus first on activities with negative float.

Priority for recovery.
Activities with negative float first.
Then zero float.
Then low positive float.
Then the rest.

Again, forcing negative float to zero in recovery is wrong unless the baseline or finish date is changed.

Does negative float mean bad planning.
Not always. Constraints reduce flexibility and are not ideal inside the schedule, but sometimes they are required. In projects where the finish date cannot move, a hard finish is unavoidable. A stadium project for a world event is a clear case.

Negative float is called a problem because it represents delay. Not because it should never exist.

No.

But without a plan.

As much as you can imagine.

Not planning means planning to fail. Moving without a plan means you are heading straight toward failure.