Value of Planning engineer
This article was originally published on LinkedIn
By Rangarajan Ramaswamy, PMP, PMI-SP, PMI-RMP
Stranger 1 — “Hi, how are you, my name is Chris and I am a Business executive”
Stranger 2 — “I am fine Chris, my name is Ranga and I am Planning Engineer”
Stranger 1 — “ O_O O_O hmmm…so you are saying you are a Planning engineer!”
This sort of conversation is not new for planning engineers. I am sure many Planning engineers have faced such type of chat. Though it is a very familiar name in the construction industry, but to the outside world this is taboo. Planning engineers help in ensuring that the project is completed within the expected deadline, with desired quality and standard, in line with the safety regulation and also within budget.
A Planning engineer goes by several versions such as Project control engineers, Project control specialists, Planners (often misunderstood with Urban and town planners), Schedulers etc. depending on how the company’s corporate policy has defined their responsibilities. On the whole, the prime responsibility of a Planning Engineer is to synchronize activities in a well thought-out manner for a flourishing outcome. The below mentioned set of situations will illustrate the role and liability of a planning engineer in simpler comical manner.
Just visualize the Situation Alpha, where you are in a battle field with your team and your project manager. You were ambushed and all of you are in the open with assault guns having a ferocious battle with your enemy. The most palpable result is a collateral damage irrespective of whether you win or lose.
In the same way, consider the Situation Beta now, where you, with your team, are crawling through the bushes and facing the enemy on the line, but your project manager is positioned somewhere very high at an advantage point with a M200 sniper rifle and eye on the combat zone like a hungry eagle. As soon he spots the enemy team approaching towards his teammates, he does the following:-
a) Intelligence gathering: — He gathers information about the Enemy, their movements, strengths, weakness, risks and impact involved.
b) Studies the Wind: — A famous quote says -”to kill is a crime, but to kill at the right time is politics”. The project manager studies the velocity of the wind, the temperature and the right time to take-out the Enemy.
c) Communication: — The projects manager radios the ground team with the location, and the movement of the Enemy Team, discusses contingency and fallback plans to execute.
d) Preparation: — Team builds the requisite defenses and decoy for the Enemy. The team is alert and ready to take charge.
d) Execution: — The instant Enemy approaches, they are ambushed and captured.
e) Confirm Enemy Down: — The Enemy is captured and stats are radioed back to the Project Manager.
After going through this, it is the time to decide for yourself which side you want to be in, Situation Alpha or Situation Beta, for sure my presumption is accurate, the latter.
The prime constituent in the victory of Situation Beta, as you might have guessed already, is the position of Project Manager. Wrong! It’s the M200 sniper rifle. Do you think the Project manager could have been able to accomplish anything without the sniper rifle? At this moment, if you compare it with Situation Beta, you can easily conclude that Planning Engineers are like the M200 sniper rifle who gives you the data a) Status information b) Trend and variance analysis c) Reports and Forecasts to the team d) What-if analysis to select the best strategy e)Consolidated Plan for execution f) Update status.
The accessibility of the aforementioned details is enormously valuable and pivotal to the success of any project. This makes the role of Planning engineer of high significance for any company or project. The profession of the planning engineer calls for critical thinking in a logical way, with apt reactions to both predicted and sudden problems.
I anticipate I have been able to make you understand the value of Planning engineers in a comical manner. And for you all hardworking Planning Engineers, be proud of who you are and what your significance is to the projects and the country. Salute!
(Photo: fabricgraphic.com)
Source: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rangarajanramaswamy
My name is George Nwogu, an Engineer, Project Manager/Planner/Control and Trainer from Nigeria. I’m currently a PM Consultant and Project Planner at Bizville Project Management
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