Measuring Time: Improving Project Performance Using Earned Value Management (International Series in Operations Research & Management Science) Review

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(More customer reviews)Vanhoucke has spent some significant time with studying the science of project tracking and applying some fairly sophisticated research methods. While this book will not be suited to a large audience, we should see some of the author's findings making their way into more sophisticated project management tools.
One example is the difference between earned-value and Lipke's "earned-schedule". Vanhoucke finds that duration estimates made using earned schedule are consistently better (and more understandable) than those made using traditional earned-value.
Other findings are much more sophisticated. The material about schedule adherence and the differences between schedules that are primarily serial vs. those that have many activities running in parallel yield some interesting and useful results. For example, the more highly parallel the project structure is the less effective critical path methods are.
The book will require significant energy to read as the the examples will require some detailed reading and analysis. Still, I don't think there is anything else like it.

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Meant to complement rather than compete with the existing books on the subject, this book deals with the project performance and control phases of the project life cycle to present a detailed investigation of the project's time performance measurement methods and risk analysis techniques in order to evaluate existing and newly developed methods in terms of their abilities to improve the corrective actions decision-making process during project tracking. As readers apply what is learned from the book, EVM practices will become even more effective in project management and cost engineering. Individual chapters look at simulation studies in forecast accuracy; schedule adherence; time sensitivity; activity sensitivity; and using top-down or bottom-up project tracking. Vanhoucke also offers an actual real-life case study, a tutorial on the use of ProTrack software (newly developed based on his research) in EVM, and conclusions on the relative effectiveness for each technique presented.

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