What are the most common time-wasters when managing construction deadlines?

In my experience as a construction management professional, a well-defined scope is indeed crucial to avoid unnecessary time wasting and cost overruns. It's not just about outlining the tasks, but also about setting clear expectations and boundaries. This includes defining the quality standards, identifying potential risks, and establishing a robust change management process. A comprehensive scope of work is a roadmap that guides the project team, reduces ambiguity, and helps in effective decision-making. It's important to list the unknowns, things that will be decided on later. Don't leave them out and hope they will get figured out later on in the process.

1-Poor Planning: Inadequate or inaccurate project planning can lead to delays in resource allocation and task sequencing. 2-Scope Creep: Changes to the project scope without proper evaluation of their impact on the schedule can cause delays. 3- Communication Issues: Ineffective communication among team members, subcontractors, and stakeholders can lead to misunderstandings and delays in decision-making. 4- Material and Equipment Delays: Late deliveries of materials and equipment can disrupt the construction schedule.

1-Weather Conditions: Weather-related interruptions, especially in outdoor construction, can cause delays beyond the project team's control. 2-Resource Constraints: Insufficient manpower, equipment, or budget can slow down project progress. 3-Regulatory and Permit Delays: Delays in obtaining necessary permits or approvals can halt work on certain phases of the project. 4-Unforeseen Conditions: Unexpected site conditions or technical challenges may require additional time to address properly.

The communication between the scheduling team and the superintendent(s) is especially important. While we treat the schedule as the "macro" road map through the project, the superintendents actually drive the project. They make the field decisions day to day that reflect increased/decreased production rates for the job. Talking to them and getting inside how they set up their crews and work analysis is important to keep a schedule robust and healthy. Regular input from the field team is a "best practice" to keep the scheduler in the know at the craft level, and will go a long way in weekly reports to stakeholders providing clarity related to production, budget, and time on the project. Think of it like having a micro-schedule for every crew

Project logic of most construction schedules tends to deprecate as early as update #1, and will continue unless the scheduler makes changes. Typically, at a certain point during fit-out, trades begin to become fragmented as a consequence of access and congestion around the time partition framing is well underway. This dispersal of resources requires continual mobilization-and remobilization efforts that cause a primary impact to downtime, and defy representation in the schedule. Poor scheduling by the scheduler or the field managers may be to blame for the impact of the downtime. Once a contractor is aware of the crisis he should then prepare a completion schedule in lieu of the deprecated schedule.

Every meeting should always have a specific goal. There's nothing more pointless and time consuming than a meeting without a goal. Whether it's finding a solution for some specific or just adjusting the timetable for upcoming changes, it has to be defined. If you don't have the goal in mind, you'll end up chatting for hours on end about fishing pikes. There is time for that too, but not whilst doing business.

From my point of view, one of the most time-waster, in order to avoid wasting time we should do the following: 1. Meetings should have clear and specific goals with right agenda for the estimated time. 2. We should stick with estimated time of the meeting (+/- 10 min). 3. Always put agenda for the next step and schedule another meeting if you exceed the estimated time of meeting. 4. Any new meeting should be based on the outcome of previous meetings, (not start over in each meeting). Finally, meetings should be for specific purposes and planned outcomes.

Contract conditions vis Money. Disputes over who is contractually responsible for the delay and which party is going to cover the costs. I know that this should not be a consideration but the reality is that it does have an effect.The best solution is to endeavour to sort this out as quickly as possible and then focus on what is important to the project.

Incompetence ; not fit-for-role ; doesn't listen ; fixed approach , inability to understand the actual situation rather than what is presented.....