The Importance of a Planning Culture Within Your Organization

Do you find that your organization is consistently delivering projects late to your clients? You aren’t alone. In fact, one study by KPMG found that only about 25% of projects finish within 10% of their originally scheduled deadlines. Many companies believe their scheduling issues are a result of numerous factors such as not having the latest AI-powered scheduling software or fancy Power BI dashboard, missing the mark on resource loading, or the contract didn’t have the right CPM specifications.

Unfortunately, all of these answers are wrong! Being able to hit your schedules boils down to one simple word — culture. That’s right, culture. Companies that don’t identify planning and scheduling as a critical component of their businesses’ success are destined to fail. By shifting this mindset within your organization, you can start improving the timeliness of your projects.

Ways Companies Can Evaluate Their Existing Culture

By evaluating your company culture, business leaders can spot the things that are holding them back. Fortunately, there are a few telltale signs that are easy to identify in a company culture that isn’t schedule centric. If one or more of these apply to your organization, you might need to reevaluate how you approach scheduling as a part of your culture.

• Your company lacks a scheduling team or organization.

• You hire a 3rd party to oversee and manage project schedules.

• Project managers, engineers, and superintendents receive little to no schedule training.

• Each project starts from scratch when developing a scheduling process.

• The last scheduling innovation was forced on you by an owner.

• Project managers and superintendents are as indifferent toward scheduling as a toddler eating their vegetables.

• Your company lacks a scheduling strategy that stretches multiple years and contains both performance goals and improvement initiatives.

“Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

~ Peter Drucker

How to Build a Culture of Scheduling?

If you’re not sure how to get started building a culture of scheduling, you should look to other departments that have influenced your organization's culture the most. One of the most influential is your internal safety team or safety program. Why reinvent the wheel when you can borrow from the best? Here are some reasons why safety is a great benchmark for building your scheduling culture.

• Leadership - Companies with a strong safety culture are driven by good management and leadership. Leadership constantly sends the message that “if you want to work here, this is how you need to embrace safety”.

• The “Why” - Most organizations understand the reason behind safety and champion safety best practices. Everyone understands the role they play in safety.

• Dedicated Team - Most companies have a dedicated team that is solely responsible for working to improve safety.

• Training - A good safety culture requires providing regular training to the team.

• Open and Honest Dialog - In a safety culture, lessons learned are openly discussed to prevent future mistakes or accidents.

• Wins - The wins in a safety culture are always celebrated. There are plenty of fun events to keep the team motivated and engaged.

• Continuous Improvement - Most companies with a strong safety culture always strive to improve their safety performance.

By mimicking many of these attributes with regard to scheduling, you can transform your company into a planning and schedule-focused organization.