Learn how P6-Calculator helped a client with automations and streamlining of processes
P6-Calculator made for easier forecasting
Client Overview
The client is a large contractor in the Philippines who deals with projects in many countries and many industries. The amount of data that is needed as a large contractor can be daunting without the ability to automate and streamline processes. That's where we came in.
Challenges
Gathering field data for progress to date and forecasting remaining to complete amounts
Working in multiple currencies with clients in many different countries
Simplifying schedule development and calculations from budgets
Results
Deployed P6-Calculator to assist with resource rates varying by project since P6 does not allow more than 5 different rates
P6-Calculator allowed for different taxes, overhead and profits per resource for more flexibility in cost calculation
Calculated values in multiple currencies to allow for better transparency
Complex calculations of budgets versus actuals and percent completes allowed for easier forecasting in the field
Learn how Emerald Associates helped a client upgrade from P6 v16 to v21
P6 upgraded without any interruptions in service
Client Overview
Founded in the late 1900s, the client is one of the largest midstream oil and gas operators in Canada. The company services oil and gas producers in Western Canada and transports natural gas liquids to markets throughout North America. They have grown through a combination of organic growth and strategic acquisitions, enhancing their infrastructure and expanding their services to meet the demands of the natural gas industry.
Challenges
Upgrade Primavera P6 from version 16 to version 21 without any interruptions in service
Get all machines upgraded and deploy Primavera P6 so it can be worked on remotely as-needed without a loss of performance
Results
Deploy a test server for version 21
Migrate project data into the new version 21 server
Use Emerald's P6-Loader to help clean up old versions
Learn how P6-Loader helped client cleanup their P6 environment
Philippine contractor uses P6-Loader to load from estimating into Primavera P6
Client Overview
Client is a large contractor in the Philippines. They wanted to be able to manage costs once a project was won, so a consistent coding structure across estimating, scheduling, cost controls and accounting was critical. However, the level of detail that each works with can vary greatly. Having a clear way of working all these systems together in an integrated manner can save a lot of time and money to the contractor and enhance their bottom line.
Challenges
Building a consistent structure for all costing to be done from estimating to accounting
Consistent resources, expenses, and cost accounts to ensure matching across the different project data and for ongoing performance measurement
Ongoing loading from estimating into Primavera P6 via Excel to speed up the process for project controls
Results
Reworked master P6 resource dictionary to cleanup labour, equipment and material resources for standardization
Ongoing loading from estimating for task level resources and expenses to bring a consistent and repeatable approach to estimating
Cleanup of activity coding to ensure phase, area, and discipline type reporting could be done with ease
Multi-currency development and data tracking using P6-Loader
Learn how a client's P6 experience was improved with training, implementation, and EAI tools.
Emerald tools added enhanced functionality and efficiency
Client Overview
Client provides marine-related services to the Pacific Northwest. Within the group are three shipyards, an intermodal ferry and car float business, and also a tug and barge transportation company that serves both domestic and international markets.
Challenges
With the implementation of an integrated PMO System, they requested assistance as to best practices in the usage of P6.
Needed a better scheduling and project management reporting process.
Needed to upgrade their Primavera P6 to a new version and clean up their database.
Results
Emerald created additional databases in the hosted environment to add an archive and sandbox environment.
Emerald assisted with creation of a security structure to ease user access management.
Emerald worked with their team to address taking advantage of P6 coding, UDFs, and WBS structures for best reporting and EV results.
Emerald upgraded P6 and presented P6 training.
P6-Loader, P6-Auditor & P6-Reporter (previously EP-datawarehouse) were added to the tools available to P6 users for enhanced functionality and efficiency.
Learn how Emerald helped an oil refinery prepare for a turnaround using Primavera P6
Refinery used P6-Loader to create a P6 schedule prior to a turnaround starting
Client Overview
The client is one of the largest refineries in Canada. They were using CASP as their project management solution for their turnaround (TA). They moved to P6 EPPM six months before their TA and needed to get the historical data from CASP into P6 without delay while getting the team up-to-speed on P6.
Challenges
Previous turnarounds did not finish on time and on budget and were hard to manage.
They had more than 1000 work packages planned, but they were in Excel or on paper.
They had no schedulers familiar with P6.
Time was short - Emerald was put on the project only 6 months before the turnaround was starting.
Results
Emerald sent two implementation specialists four months before the TA started. They set up P6 and created a resource-loaded CPM schedule.
Used P6-Loader to automate grabbing simple Work Order, Task, and Resource sheets from Excel to create the P6 schedule. More packages were being developed and loaded right throughout the turnaround.
A full critical path schedule was built, resource leveling was developed, and reporting and metrics were standardized.
Emerald helped run their three subsequent TAs.
Utilized TAPS for updating progress of the activities.
Learn how TAPS helped with a successful turnaround
Refinery used TAPS to run a successful turnaround
Client Overview
Beginning operations in the early 1900s, the client in this case study is now one of Canada's largest oil refineries and a major supplier of Canada's fuel, distributing millions of litres of fuel a day, and playing a key role in the Canadian energy sector. The complex has undergone various upgrades and expansions over the years to enhance its processing capabilities and efficiency, including a $2.9 billion upgrade project in 2012 that increased operations up to 145,000 barrels per day.
Challenges
Running large turnarounds without needing to increase staff.
Results
Successfully ran a $60M turnaround.
Gave them more time to focus on analyzing the schedule.
Less licenses of Primavera were required for updating progress.
They didn’t require a scheduler for updating progress and were able to use a summer student instead.
From Our Customer
“We never worry about the accuracy of the updating progress in P6.”
Learn how the PCM-Archiver was used to archive projects
Southern U.S. City Used PCM-Archiver to Archive Projects Before Decommissioning Their PCM Server
Written by Dan MacMillan
Client Overview
The client is a capital city of a southern U.S. state with over 400,000 residents.
Challenges
The project team needed to archive dozens of projects with large numbers of documents and attachments.
The team was not using PCM actively anymore, but they needed to get the documents and attachments into a place they could retrieve them to follow their legal obligations
The IT team had the PCM server on the high risk for cyberattack vulnerabilities due to the old Java version PCM needed to run on.
Results
Emerald provided the client with the PCM-Archiver and assisted in getting it set up.
We had some challenges with large projects crashing and hanging up, but Emerald improved the program to overcome these issues
All of the projects have been successfully archived, and we have decommissioned the old PCM server.
PCM-Archiver extracted all records out of PCM into an archive location that doesn't need PCM or any special software to access
Client used PCM-Archiver to move away from PCM and rename attachment files
Written by Dan MacMillan
Client Overview
The client is one of seventeen US Department of Energy National Accelerator Laboratories.
Challenges
Want to sunset Primavera Contract Management, which has been unsupported for years and has security issues, but it has information that must be kept.
The names of some file attachments in Primavera Contract Management included characters that are not legal in Windows file names.
Primavera Contract Management environment database was overloaded, causing random errors when PCM-Archiver downloaded attachments or generated PDFs.
Results
PCM-Archiver extracted all record data, attachments, and PDFs of the default form into an archive location on the file system that doesn't need Primavera Contract Management, or any other special software, to access.
We made changes to PCM-Archiver to automatically rename attachment files with illegal characters when it downloads them.
PCM-Archiver already had logic to re-try operations when certain errors occurred, which we expanded to cover these new errors. This allowed the PCM-Archiver process to complete successfully.
PCM-Archiver helped client archive data before they moved to Unifier.
Written by Nicole Jardin
Client Overview
Capital Health (now AHS - Alberta Health Services) provides health services throughout the province of Alberta, and operates hundreds of facilities. They used Primavera Contract Management (PCM) for 15+ years for all of their capital projects documentation and contract management. When moving to Oracle Unifier, archiving thousands of legacy PCM projects was needed before decommissioning the PCM server.
Challenges
Thousands of PCM projects with thousands of documents in them needed to be archived in a secure manner.
A very large set of attachments needed to be archived.
Project managers' validation and sign-off was required per project. Some coaching was done to handle this.
Results
Over 3 months, Emerald helped AHS extract the projects and work through some enhancements in the tool.
The client wanted an Excel sheet added to capture all fields from each document record to enhance the standard document printout so this was added to the tool.
Learn how the PCM-Archiver helped client extract data out of PCM
Bank in Kuwait used PCM-Archiver to extract all record data, attachments, and PDFs from PCM
Written by Dan MacMillan
Client Overview
Client is the largest financial institution in Kuwait. Their Primavera Contract Management server needed to be taken offline, so PCM-Archiver was used to archive the data.
Challenges
Primavera Contract Management server must be taken offline, as it's been unsupported for years and presents an unacceptable security risk, but it has information that must be kept.
The client has specific requirements for the naming conventions of the extracted documents.
Information was still being added to Primavera Contract Management while some projects were being closed out.
Results
PCM-Archiver extracted all record data, attachments, and PDFs of the default form into an archive location on the filesystem that doesn't need Primavera Contract Management, or any other special software, to access.
PCM-Archiver has a very flexible naming engine that was configured to use the names wanted by the client.
An incremental mode was added to PCM-Archiver that would allow archiving new documents only to accommodate the ongoing projects.
Learn how the PCM-Archiver helped client extract data out of PCM
Energy company used PCM-Archiver to extract data, attachments, and PDFs from PCM
Written by Dan MacMillan
Client Overview
Client is a subsidiary of Michigan’s largest electric and natural gas utility, serving 6.8 million of the state’s 10 million residents.
Challenges
Want to sunset Primavera Contract Management, which has been unsupported for years and has security issues, but it has information that's crucial to keep for legal reasons.
Need to keep custom field data.
Need to know who attached files, and when, in case it's needed for future dispute resolution.
Results
PCM-Archiver extracted all record data, attachments, and PDFs of the default form into an archive location on the filesystem that doesn't need Primavera Contract Management, or any other special software, to access.
PCM-Archiver extracted an Excel spreadsheet for each document that includes custom fields, as well as all other fields, on both the header and line item levels.
PCM-Archiver included a tab in the extracted spreadsheet for each document with attachments that includes information about who attached each file and when.
Learn how P6-Scrubber can edit P6 XERs, XMLs and MSP XMLs
P6-Scrubber used to edit and remove unwanted data prior to import
Client Overview
This State Department of Transportation is a governmental agency that constructs, maintains, and regulates the use of transportation infrastructure. It is responsible for more than 20,000 lane-miles of roadway, nearly 3,000 vehicular bridges and 524 other structures. This infrastructure includes rail lines, state highways, state ferries (considered part of the highway system) and state airports.
Challenges
Users were in need of a faster, easier way to remove or remap data from contractor XERs and XMLs prior to importing to P6.
Users required a fast way to prefix or remove roles in their XERs and XMLs.
Microsoft Project XMLs are provided by contractors. They wanted to also have the ability to edit these files prior to importing them into their P6 database.
Results
Deployed P6-Scrubber to facilitate the editing of XER and XML files.
Quick role prefixing or removing roles was needed, so Emerald added that option to the Simple Scrub module in P6-Scrubber.
MSP XML file scrubbing was added to the P6-Scrubber tool to facilitate the editing of these files.
Client is an employee-owned, multi-disciplined engineering, planning, architectural, and environmental services firm in the United States. With nearly 700 employees spread between more than 30 offices in 12 states, they offer a wide range of services with a focus on aviation, construction, facilities design, federal, power, transportation, survey, and water. They sit in the top 150 of the Engineering News-Record's prestigious Top 500 Design Firms list, while Zweig Group has recognized the client as a best firm to work for in the multi-discipline category for six consecutive years.
Challenges
Needed a solution to coach their client users on scheduling best practices
Users required a way to monitor the quality of their schedules while creating schedules, as well as when they were in-flight
A specific set of quality checks were needed based on contract requirements and general quality guidelines
Results
Emerald Associates built additional checks and a custom report focusing on what was of importance to their team
P6-QA deployed on all databases to monitor project quality using out-of-the-box functions and customized checks
The DOT users are able to self-monitor their schedules without constant assistance from the firm saving countless hours of consulting time
Projects, WBS, Tasks, and Resources Integrated with Ease
Written by Nicole Jardin
Client Overview
Consulting firm that supports large client integration projects, software development, and ongoing hosting and support needed a way to integrate ZOHO CRM, ZOHO Projects, ZOHO Desk and Primavera P6.
Challenges
Tracking software tools development in ZOHO Projects and client tickets from ZOHO Desk to ensure all deliverables are managed and prioritized with larger client projects
Integrate with P6 and Team Member for timesheets that are integrated with role rates and QuickBooks for invoicing
Statusing tickets in ZOHO Desk and issues in ZOHO Projects and having them update P6 tasks quickly for weekly client reporting
Results
Easily create projects in P6 from ZOHO Projects that land in the right EPS and have project codes critical for integrating to QuickBooks for accounting
Easily add in tasks and resource load the tasks to tie to roles and role rates in QuickBooks
Update tasks in ZOHO projects and integrate to P6 so that timesheets in Team Member can be updated and integrated into QuickBooks
Use TaskList Templates in ZOHO Projects to control the roles assigned in P6 for easier invoicing to clients
Updates for statuses and percent completes from ZOHO Projects integrated into P6
