Analysis of metrics for diagnosis of Last Planner System implementations -

Abstract

Planning enables managers to reduce uncertainties of a project and to improve the efficiency of the processes while achieving a better understanding of project objectives. As projects are becoming more complex, planning is failing to achieve its objectives. Consequently, the Last Planner System (LPS) has been implemented on construction projects to increase planning reliability. Previous researchers have proposed multiple metrics to measure the performance of the LPS. However, research correlating the various measures with the effectiveness of the LPS implementations has been both challenging and time consuming. This study proposes new metrics and details their calculation method to measure significant aspects not yet supported by a measurement metric. Finally, a framework that organizes the different metrics is established. The framework assists planners in assessing: strength of teams in anticipating tasks, agility of teams in making tasks ready, consistency of teams in committing to required tasks, awareness of teams to their capacity loading and finally reliability of teams in completing required, not required, and new tasks. Moreover, the framework and the proposed metrics were applied to two on-going projects in the United States. The two projects were analyzed individually at both project level and team level. At project level, the study showed that projects tend to run behind schedule when teams fail to: 1) make tasks ready, 2) commit or complete critical tasks, 3) match load to capacity. At team level, the study showed that some teams reacted negatively when new unstable teams joined the project and overall performance decreased. Finally, the study highlights major issues in production planning and presents recommendations to improve future LPS implementations.