Progress measurement plays a key role in tracking how much work has been completed and how it aligns with contract deliverables. Payment terms are often tied to the value of work performed, making it essential to measure progress accurately. A clear and consistent approach to progress tracking helps teams manage performance, support billing, and maintain visibility throughout the life of the project.
To measure progress effectively, it’s important to understand a few key terms and how they relate to budget and performance tracking.
In InEight Control, you can maintain an original budget, a current budget, and a current estimate. These values can be referenced in preset data blocks, or in a custom data block like the one shown below.
The original budget (OB) is a snapshot of the project plan in its original state prior to execution. It is a baseline used for comparison as the project progresses. You cannot edit your original budget values; they are read-only in the CBS register, available for reference only. After the original budget is set, it will not change unless you unlock it.
In the Control CBS register, you can see the OB values for man-hours, quantities, and costs.
The current budget (CB) is the project’s operational budget, including only project changes approved through a controlled process. The current budget is therefore the sum of your original budget, plus or minus any approved changes.
See Change Management for more details on managing and approving budget changes.
In the CBS register, you can access the Current budget data block and view CB values for planned, earned and forecasted costs, hours, and productivity.
The current estimate (CE) represents the most up-to-date estimate of your work. You can update your current estimate quantities, hours, and costs at any time in the CBS register, with no required approval process or workflow.
You can use the current estimate as a sand box to build out change orders and do what-if analysis to plan for potential changes, without worrying about affecting the current or original budgets.
In the CBS register, you can access the Current estimate data block to view a variety of columns for measuring and analyzing the progress of your project.
Planned Value (PV) is the costs and hours you have estimated and scheduled for the project. Think of PV as your approved budget of scheduled items. In Control, your PV includes the following columns:
CE total Cost
CE total MHrs
CB total cost
CB total MHrs
Earned Value (EV) measures the amount of money you merit in return for the work performed up to that point. You can use EV to measure how much of your planned costs and hours you should have spent so far, according to the percent of work completed. Earned Value uses formula Planned Value × % of work completed = Earned Value.
In InEight Control, your EV includes the following columns:
CE cost earned
CE MHrs earned
CB cost earned
CB MHrs earned
Schedule performance index (SPI) measures how close the work is being completed according to the designated schedule. It is uses the formula CB cost earned ÷ CB planned value (to date).
The SPI calculation uses the time-phased budget values as planned values. To accommodate the time-phased budget values, the planned value includes the cumulative time-phased budget planned value to date.
Actual cost (AC) refers to the costs you incur when you perform the work. You can view AC in the Actual cost (to date) column.
Variance is the difference between EV and AC and uses formula Earned Value - Actual Cost = Variance.
Variance indicates if you are performing better or worse than planned up to that point. Control uses the term Gain/Loss (G/L) rather than variance, shown in the following columns:
CE actual cost G/L (to date)
CE MHrs G/L (to date)
CB actual cost G/L (to date)
CB MHrs G/L (to date)
Remaining is a general finance term for money that is not yet used. Control uses the formula Planned Value - Actual Cost = Remaining Value to calculate remaining cost.
In other words, remaining cost is the difference between what you originally planned and what you have spent so far, to help you understand how much cost or how many man-hours you have left.
The table below summarizes each EVM term with its equivalent term in Control and what it measures.
|
Term |
InEight Control Term |
What it measures |
|---|---|---|
|
Planned Value (PV) |
CE total cost CE total MHrs CB total cost CB total MHrs |
Budget of scheduled values |
|
Earned Value (EV) |
CE cost earned CE MHrs earned CB cost earned CB MHrs earned |
Planned value × percent complete |
|
Actual Cost (AC) |
Actual cost (to date) Actual MHrs (to date) |
Actual ÷ expended values |
|
Variance |
CE actual cost G/L (to date) CE MHrs G/L (to date) CB actual cost G/L (to date) CB MHrs G/L (to date) |
Difference between earned value and actual cost |
|
Remaining |
Remaining qty CE remaining cost CB remaining cost CB remaining qty |
Difference between planned value and earned value |
The following displays planned vs. earned vs. actual values within a custom data block of the CBS register of InEight Control:
If you are the contractor building a project, you will need to monitor the performance of your crews, including how productive they are and how much they are being paid.
Productivity is a measure of effectiveness: the rate of output per unit of input. This can be measured with the following equation: Productivity = Earned MH ÷ Actual MH.
You can view productivity values in the following columns:
CB productivity factor
CE productivity factor
Compensation is the amount of money paid to an employee for their hours worked. Compensation factor is a numerical value comparing the budgeted compensation to the actual compensation. For example, if you had budgeted for work to be completed by master electricians, but you actually used 2nd year apprentices (making a lower wage), then that change would be reflected in the compensation factor. In InEight Control, compensation factor is shown as Compensation factor (to date). You can calculate compensation factor using formula Compensation Factor = Budgeted MH Cost ÷ Actual MH Cost.
Labor efficiency index (LEI) is a numerical value assigned to indicate the effectiveness of resource utilization. In Control, it is shown as LEI (to date). You can calculate LEI using formula LEI = Productivity ÷ Compensation Factor.
If LEI is greater than 1, it means that you are using your resources effectively. If LEI is lower than 1, it means your resources are being used poorly.
The Forecast (T/O) qty represents the total amount of work or materials expected to be completed for a cost item by the end of the project. This value can be updated as the project progresses and represents the current estimate of total quantity, comparable to the original or current budget quantity.
There are a number of ways to update the Forecast (T/O) qty:
Direct entry in the CBS
Rolldown from assigned pay item (need to have this setting enabled)
Rolldown from parent cost item (Qty driver is Superior CI)
Rollup from subordinate cost items (Contribute qty is checked)
Cost item import
Cost item API
When you update the Forecast (T/O) qty, you are prompted to update either the CE unit cost or CE total cost. You can also choose to update either the CE labor cost/Mhr or CE total MHrs, and either CE construction equipment cost/hr or CE total equipment hrs (if applicable).
Updating the Forecast (T/O) qty adjusts the remaining quantity for a cost item, which in turn updates the forecast values. Since forecast is calculated as Remaining Quantity × Selected Unit Cost, any change to the Forecast (T/O) qty directly affects the forecasted cost. This also impacts the % Complete, which is calculated as Quantity Claimed ÷ Forecast (T/O) Qty. As a result, earned value metrics and forecasted revenue values are updated to reflect the new progress and cost expectations.
The Forecast (T/O) - CB qty delta column shows you the difference between the Forecast (T/O) quantity and the current budget total quantity columns.
The calculation for this formula is Forecast (T/O) qty - CB total quantity.
You can filter for cost items with a delta greater than 0 when you want to align the Forecast T/O Quantity and CB total quantity.
The Plan component total qty column represents the planned quantities defined in InEight Plan – essentially, what the team expects to install or complete based on the scope and schedule. Based on details from the field, these planned quantities may differ from the Forecast (T/O) quantity defined in Control.
You can compare planned quantities with the current forecast in the following columns:
Plan component total qty
This allows you to identify discrepancies and make adjustments as needed.
In InEight Plan, cost items from Control are associated to more detailed components. Each component has a planned quantity and can also capture actuals as installed quantities. Multiple components may roll up to a single cost item.
For example, the Install Conduit cost item is assigned to WBS phase code 1139 in the CBS. In Plan, this cost item is represented by two components:
Conduit Material: 150 units
Install Conduit: 120 units
Together, these total 270 units, which appears in Control as the Plan component total quantity for the cost item.
To align the forecast with the planned scope, use the Update Forecast (T/O) qty with Plan component total qty option under the Actions drop-down menu. This copies the Plan quantity directly into the Forecast (T/O) qty field.
You can also access this option from the cost item menu.
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