Time is Money: How Schedule Impacts Your Bottom Line

For critical infrastructure projects, schedule delays are more than an inconvenience. Projects that fall behind are costing you money. For every day that your facility is not up and running, you are losing a valuable revenue stream. Whether your product is natural gas, oil, power or water, your facility needs to be operational to add value to your organization.

Schedule is so important that it comes as no surprise that many Engineering, Procurement & Construction (EPC) contracts have financial incentives or penalties tied to schedule. Change orders, parts or equipment
delays or labor shortages can all impact your project timeline. However, effective project management can mitigate or avoid these setbacks.

Since the schedule is so vital to the success of your project, it’s important to work with an EPC contractor who has proven they can complete projects on time. Let’s take a look at some of the less obvious ways schedule impacts your bottom line.

The Importance of Front-End Loading in Critical Infrastructure Projects
During the pre-project planning/ Front End Loading (FEL) phases of your project, it is important that labor/staffing estimates are accurate. If the labor resources required to complete a component of the project are significantly underestimated, the project will fall behind and cost more to complete. If adding additional labor is a possibility, you might stay on schedule, but at an additional expense.

As the scope of a project is defined, it’s important that your estimates are also refined. Experienced contractors will help look out for circumstances that will cause work to take longer and plan accordingly.

Resource Management Matters for EPC Projects
Effective labor resource management is also important to keep your project on schedule. Skilled labor, such as welders, electricians or technicians, may need to be mobilized to the project site at particular times in the project. If the project is running behind, these resources may be onsite but unable to complete their work as they wait for another phase of the project to finish. Their time is valuable and the additional time on site will be an added expense.

Similarly, the timing of specialized construction equipment and labor must be carefully planned. If the project runs behind, those resources may be allocated to other projects when needed. If you must wait for those resources to become available again, your project will stall and valuable time will be lost. Again, it may be possible to compensate for these delays through overtime or other measures but not without added expense. An experienced project manager or EPC contractor will be proactive as they face these challenges. A contractor with a large pool of resources will be able to leverage those assets when needed and avoid costly delays.

Matrix Service Company: A Proven Partner
At Matrix Service Company, our energy and industrial clients know they can trust us with their most challenging critical infrastructure projects. Over the last 35 years, we’ve proven that we can complete projects
on-time, on-budget and with safety at the forefront. Our strategic locations across North America help efficiently bring equipment and labor to your job site. Our skilled team can provide the labor and resources you
need to take your project from concept to commissioning. Successful projects start here.