Purpose
Diagnose the structural and quantitative health of a CPM project schedule — surfacing logic gaps, dangerous float consumption, critical path fragility, milestone sequencing risk, and resource overloads — and deliver a weighted health scorecard with a ranked corrective action list. Turns a raw schedule into a defensible risk picture that survives a gate review.
When to Use
Invoke this skill when the user asks to:
- Health-check or QA a project schedule before baselining or a stage-gate review
- Diagnose why a capital project keeps slipping despite reported progress
- Assess critical path exposure and float consumption on an active schedule
- Review milestone sequencing and interface risk across contractors or work packages
- Validate a contractor's or EPC's schedule submission before acceptance
- Prepare a schedule risk summary for a Project Director or steering committee
Inputs Required
Before starting, collect:
- Project phase: FEED / detailed design / procurement / construction / commissioning
- Schedule data: Activity list with durations, relationships (FS/SS/FF/SF + lags), and total float — either exported (CSV/text) or pasted key activities and milestones
- Baseline vs. current status: Whether this is a baseline review or an update, and the data date
- Key milestones/contractual dates: Named milestones with target/contractual dates and any LDs attached
- Resource loading: Whether the schedule is resource-loaded and, if so, key resource/crew constraints
- Known constraints: Hard constraints (mandatory dates), permit/regulatory gates, long-lead items, weather windows
- Contract type: Lump sum / reimbursable / EPC / multi-prime (affects interface and float ownership risk)
If the schedule is not resource-loaded or float data is missing, note the limitation and assess the remaining dimensions, flagging what cannot be verified.
Instructions
Step 1: Logic Integrity Check
Test the network for structural soundness. Flag each finding with the affected activity count.
- Open ends: Activities missing a predecessor (except project start) or successor (except project finish) — every open end is an uncontrolled float pool
- Dangling logic: Activities with only SS or only FF ties, leaving start or finish undriven
- Excessive lags/leads: Lags over 5% of activity duration or any negative lag (lead) — both hide real logic
- Redundant/hard constraints: Count constraints; flag any "Must Finish On" / "Mandatory" that override network logic and mask negative float
- Relationship mix: Flag if FS relationships are under ~90% of total — heavy SS/FF use inflates parallelism and understates duration risk
- DCMA 14-point overlay where data allows: report logic %, lag %, hard constraint count, high-float %, negative-float count, and merge hotspots
Step 2: Float Consumption Analysis
Assess how much schedule buffer remains and where it is eroding.
- Total float distribution: Bucket activities into negative float, 0–5 days, 6–20 days, 21+ days
- Float erosion trend (if baseline available): Compare current total float to baseline — flag activities that have lost >50% of original float
- False float: Identify high-float activities caused by open ends or missing logic rather than genuine slack
- Near-critical paths: Flag paths with float under 10 days — these become critical with one bad update
Step 3: Critical Path Exposure
Evaluate the fragility of the driving path.
- Path clarity: Confirm a continuous, logic-driven critical path exists from data date to project completion — flag if the path breaks or jumps unexpectedly
- Merge hotspots: Identify milestones/activities where 3+ paths converge — merge bias means these slip more than any single path predicts
- Constraint-driven vs. logic-driven critical path: Flag if the critical path is being set by a date constraint rather than real work sequence (a red flag for a hidden problem)
- Single points of failure: Long-lead procurement, permits, or single-crew activities sitting on or near the critical path
Step 4: Milestone Sequencing Risk
Check that milestones are achievable and correctly ordered.
- Contractual date exposure: Compare each contractual milestone's calculated finish to its target — quantify days ahead/behind and flag LD-bearing milestones at risk
- Sequencing logic: Verify milestones fall in a physically buildable order (e.g., mechanical completion before commissioning, permits before construction start)
- Interface milestones: For multi-prime/EPC, check handoff milestones between parties have defined logic on both sides — orphaned interfaces are a top slippage cause
- Milestone density: Flag periods where too many milestones cluster within a short window without adequate driving logic
Step 5: Resource Loading & Reasonableness
Where resource data exists, test executability.
- Over-allocation: Flag crews/resources exceeding available capacity in any period (histogram peaks)
- Duration reasonableness: Flag activities whose durations imply unrealistic productivity or crew sizes for the scope
- Long-duration activities: Flag any activity over ~44 working days (DCMA threshold) — these hide risk and should be decomposed
- Front-loading / back-loading: Note if the plan defers most work late, creating a back-end resource cliff
Step 6: Calendar, Constraint & Progress Hygiene
Validate the data date and status quality.
- Calendar sanity: Confirm work calendars reflect real conditions (weather windows, shutdowns, holidays, shift patterns)
- Out-of-sequence progress: Flag activities showing progress before predecessors complete — indicates broken logic or update errors
- Stale/actualized status: Flag activities that should have started/finished per the data date but show no status ("should-have-started" / "should-have-finished")
- Progress reliability: Compare % complete claims against remaining duration for internal consistency
Step 7: Build the Health Scorecard
Score each of the six diagnostic dimensions 0–100 and apply weights, then compute an overall grade.
- Logic Integrity (weight 20%)
- Float & Buffer (weight 15%)
- Critical Path Robustness (weight 20%)
- Milestone Sequencing (weight 20%)
- Resource Loading (weight 15%)
- Data & Progress Hygiene (weight 10%)
Grade bands: Green (85–100) baseline-ready; Amber (65–84) usable with corrections; Red (<65) not fit for baseline/gate approval. State the overall grade plainly.
Step 8: Ranked Corrective Actions
List 8–12 corrective actions ordered by risk-reduction impact. For each: the finding, the specific fix, the owner role (planner / discipline lead / contractor / PM), and the priority (Immediate / Before next update / This cycle).
Output Format
- Structure: Seven diagnostic sections → health scorecard table → ranked corrective action list
- Length: 1,000–1,400 words
- Format: Structured document — findings as labeled bullets with counts; scorecard as a table (dimension, score, weight, grade); corrective actions as a numbered ranked list
- Sections: Logic Integrity → Float Consumption → Critical Path Exposure → Milestone Sequencing → Resource Loading → Calendar & Progress Hygiene → Health Scorecard → Ranked Corrective Actions
- Tone: Project controls specialist — quantitative, direct, evidence-first; every flag tied to a count, threshold, or named activity, not a general warning
Quality Checklist
Before delivering output, verify:
- [ ] All six diagnostic dimensions are scored 0–100 and the weighted overall grade is calculated and stated (Green/Amber/Red)
- [ ] Every flagged issue includes a specific count, threshold, or named activity/milestone — no vague "check the logic"
- [ ] Open ends, hard constraints, high-float activities, and negative-float activities are each reported as counts
- [ ] Critical path exposure identifies whether the path is logic-driven or constraint-driven
- [ ] Corrective actions are ranked by risk-reduction impact and each names an owner role and priority (8–12 actions)
- [ ] Any dimension that couldn't be assessed due to missing data is explicitly flagged as unverified, not silently scored
Notes
- A constraint-driven critical path is the single most common way real slippage gets hidden — always confirm the path is set by work logic, not by a "Must Finish On" date
- Merge bias means milestones with many converging paths almost always slip more than a single-path analysis predicts; weight merge hotspots heavily in the risk picture
- On multi-prime and EPC jobs, orphaned interface milestones (logic on only one side) are a leading cause of downstream delay — check both sides of every handoff
- If reviewing a contractor submission before acceptance, a Red grade is grounds to reject and return the schedule rather than baseline it
How to use this skill
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Installing in Claude Code:
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- Drag this file into a new chat, or copy and paste its contents
- Send your task or request as your next message — the AI will apply the skill where it fits
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