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33rd International Conference of the
TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
www.tocpractice.com 18 - 19 October 2017, Cape Town, South Africa

Using CCPM in an Engineering

R&D environment

Christo Wentzel,
Centurion Systems part of the FAAC Group,
South Africa
19 October, 2017
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
www.tocpractice.com

Christo Wentzel

Studied Electrical Heavy Current T3 @ Vaal

University of Technology
(1991 – 1993)
Worked at ISCOR Vanderbijlpark as Master
Technician (1993 – 1999)
Worked at MaxID Group as Project Manager
(1999 – 2011)
Own Company MyGSM www.mygsm.co.za
(2011 – 2013).
Bought out by Centurion System in 2013
Contact info
Currently at Centurion Systems
part of FAAC Group as Email :
TOC Project Manager Christo.wentzel@centurionsystems.co.za
(Feb 2013 – Present) Tel : +27 (0)11 699 2400 Ext 322

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Life Before TOC

• Constant disruptions on the floor

• Management highly frustrated with the rate the R&D
projects are completed
• Resources felt unappreciated
• High staff turn-over, sick-leave, etc.
• Resource allocations clashing
• Projects running late, constantly delaying our
commitment to the market
• Project manager was an island on his own, busy
tracking tasks and recording history.

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Our first year

• We struggled to prioritise and freeze our many R&D

projects. Even if management agreed to stop certain
projects, a few weeks later, the exceptions where made
by the same management team. “Can we quickly..”
• Task managers did not always follow the priorities.
(Task manager was the actual person doing the work)
• Remaining duration updates were just mechanically
completed by deducting 1 day every day. Task
remaining for weeks on a number of 1 day remaining.
• Planning detail was too much, was busy re-planning
every day.
• Overall our performance was about the same than what
it was before
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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Our first year

• Grey line is planned projects

• Blue line is actual project completions
• Completed 5 R&D projects of the 7 planned projects
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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Our second year

• We enforced the discipline onto the workforce to follow

the priorities and update progress
• Got the management to follow the rule of pipelining and
limiting the WIP i.t.o the number of projects.
• Only projects in Concerto are projects that can be
worked on, no more “special projects”
• Still had issues with task updating not being done with
some thinking behind it.
• Still had too much detail in our plans, trying to force
certainty onto a R&D environment, pretending we can
predict the future

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

www.tocpractice.com

Our second year

• Grey line is planned projects

• Blue line is actual project completions
• Completed 30 R&D projects of the 36 planned projects,
with the same number of people (It is 6x more projects)
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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Our third year

• Change the organisation structure to have the direct

manager being the task manager, controlling the work
to the resources, not allowing them to work on too many
tasks
• Reduced the number of tasks on the schedule and use
“place-holder” task for future unknown content
• Management really got on-board with all 3 rules of
CCPM implementations

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Our third year

• Grey line is planned projects

• Blue line is actual project completions. (Completing
project ahead of time, clearing the backlog)
• Completed 4 projects of the previous year and 12 new
projects
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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Our year to date

• Really reduced the detail in the planning

• Have a company wide view of everything that is
consuming capacity, from HR projects, IT projects,
Management initiatives, etc.
• Have regular pipelining meetings to release new
projects into the pipeline.
• Task managers across the world are updating their
tasks, suppliers and sub-suppliers
• Flow is our key measurement

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Our year to date

• Grey line is planned projects

• Blue line is actual project completions.
• Completed 18 projects to date, projecting 30 projects
for the year, still with the same team that use to
complete 6 projects per year
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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Planning Before TOC

• Used MS Projects
• Too many tasks
• Detail, Detail, Detail ….
• Resource allocations clashing
• Due dates were never met
• GANNT Charts were never correct

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Old way planning :
Main Phases – Rolled up

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Old way planning :
First Phases - Expanded

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Old way planning :
Execution Phase - Expanded

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Old way planning :
Within Execution Phase

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Are the details good?

SO WHAT CAN WE DO

BESIDES CRY ?
33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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What a Project looks like

Target

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Borrowed from : Philip Viljoen

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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New way planning :
Complete plan

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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New way planning :
First phases

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

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Where we use Concerto Today

• R&D Projects
• Production Projects
• Finance Projects
• IT Projects
• HR Recruitment process
• Products Certification renewals (LOA, ICASA, CE)
• ECP’s (Engineering Change Process)
• Product Life Cycle testing

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

www.tocpractice.com

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA

www.tocpractice.com

33rd International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA