Overview

A large utility company needed to facilitate clearing of areas around existing pipelines. It involved the removal and/or relocation of obstacles in the way of gaining access to these underground pipelines. There were over 20,000 projects included in this effort. The client’s objective was to clear a specified amount of these obstacles per month (recorded in miles) and most importantly per year. What they needed was a way to manage this large program and to maintain consistent progress in this effort with the ability to report on this progress weekly.

Challenges

The key issues addressed were the volume of ongoing projects, quantity of needed updates and the accuracy of the data.

1. Volume of ongoing projects – What the current system lacked was the ability to forecast miles of vegetation or structures that need to be cleared. Since this program had so many projects, potentially over 20,000, it would be a challenge to maintain them in P6. In addition, the client wanted to utilize the dates entered in their internal database but then use P6 for the forecasting and reporting capabilities.
2. Quantity of updates – Currently, the client was using an in-house system for the users to enter dates for certain tasks. There were in excess of 200 users entering this data. Data was entered daily and reported on weekly.
3. Accuracy of data – It was requested that this information be more accurate and to be able to see when the work would be complete. In addition, the data captured in the in-house

system needed to be verified for its accuracy. We created specific error reports to aid in securing the correct information. During this effort it brought to light several issues that could then be resolved.

Solution

DRMcNatty implemented a solution that included the following elements:

1. P6 was implemented – This was done in an innovative way that could manage 20,000 plus projects. Each project in P6 was created as a city and the WBS elements were developed for their individual work orders. Templates were created for each type of work and created automatically in the integration.
2. Programmed data import – Due to the magnitude of data and the use of their in-house data entry system, an automatic integration was developed. The automation was set up weekly so updates could be done and reports generated.
3. Custom reports – Reports were created to capture all of the information to show in a clear and concise manner as well as to graphically convey status. Work could be quickly reviewed in these reports by city, division or work order.

Results

An automated system that now offers accurate information with forecasting, in progress and completed work miles on a program level.