Project Management

[DrewP]

Something that we don't seem to talk about too much, but this is an extremely important part of completing a complex, widely laid out project like building a race car, or restoring a neglected car.

I usually don't go more complex than making myself checklists or Bills-of-Materials to keep track of what I have on hand, what I have to order, where to order it from, necessary part #'s like expected delivery times, and things like that.

I like to use GoogleDocs (now called Drive I believe) because I can get to my checklists from my phone, computer in my shop, at work, at home, etc. I can also add my brother or team-mates as being allowed to edit the document to cross things off as they complete them even if I don't know it's happened yet.

My current spreadsheet for the yellow race car.

This link you should all be able to view, but not edit. Also a handy feature.




What kinds of things do you guys do to keep on track and make sure you have what you need, when you need it?

[SwedeSport]

Apparently I don't do enough, or my projects might take less time.

I have always been old school with hand written lists stuck to the metal cabinets with magnets.

[Geoff]

I have always been old school with hand written lists stuck to the metal cabinets with magnets.

This

I use MS Project at work but when I start doing that stuff at home... it's a great tool but feels too much like work and not enough like fun.

I did make a pretty detailed (~150 line?) project plan for our wedding, but that was mostly to keep track of 'her' requests...

[MattWatson]

Yah I have to say... on my engine job, I did a terrible job of getting all the stuff lined up at one time... and I am a Project Manager for my Job. I am with you on it Geoff, it feels too much like work.

My wedding was managed by my wife... who also is a project manger. And better at it than I am

I am going to have to do it on the rally car though. I want to get it done in a shortish period of time, so I think it will be required.

[DrewP]

I also have notes I write all over the shop too, but from work (engineering, but all the technical job bosses serve the function of a project manager / scheduler) I know how much more efficiently I can get things done if there is a more formal plan in place.

I will never get to the point of putting together a Gantt chart or anything like that (I am terrible at forecasting deadlines and task durations) but something in between a thousand Post-It's and full blown PDM/PLM layout is nice for some structure.

[Geoff]

(I am terrible at forecasting deadlines and task durations)

Yes, especially when it comes to old cars and the job "should" have only taken a half hour but then something broke and you couldn't remove it because it was rusted so you had to remove the far end and of course you don't have that part on-hand and all the stores are closed on Sundays etc....

[Crazyswede]

I just wait till I am half way through the project and then I put it in storage and start another one.

[Luke]

I usually just keep a master excel spreadsheet similar to what you have for major projects like a race car build, or sometimes for prep for an event.

I usually keep the master document fairly high level. As I get to them I pluck out the high level tasks and then expand with more details and sometimes even exact process steps each on on an index card which I use magnets on a cabinet to organize and group.

[MattWatson]

Yes, especially when it comes to old cars and the job "should" have only taken a half hour but then something broke and you couldn't remove it because it was rusted so you had to remove the far end and of course you don't have that part on-hand and all the stores are closed on Sundays etc....

After managing developers and application deployments for 5 or so years now, I flatly refuse to forcast in anything less than days. If you think you can get 2 things done in a day, fine. But don't tell me it is going to take you 2hours and 15 mintues, because it will take longer.

[SwedeSport]

I have project (to do) lists that are 20 years old.

Hell I have lists that have 10 years since I crossed anything off...

[KoogiA17]

My project spreadsheet has 81 separate tabs including a detailed list of practically all the nuts, bolts, washers and screws on a 99. Think I might have gone a bit too far!

[MattWatson]

I have project (to do) lists that are 20 years old.

Hell I have lists that have 10 years since I crossed anything off...

I don't go that far, but I do have some honey-do lists from when we bought the house...

[87 n/a]

I have a dry-erase board in the garage. Have columns for each year car 87,88,94,97 and a list of things to do under each year. Haven't added a '67 column yet.