Ask anyone on a project team what a planner does and you'll often hear something like "keeps the programme up to date". Ask a planner and you'll hear something very different:
• Defining the strategy
• Understanding how the work will actually be built
• Testing whether the dates work
• Spotting the risks
• Managing the data and building the reports
• And, often, telling people what they'd rather not hear
That difference is the competency gap in planning. Some of it is real. Some of it is perception. Both are holding projects back.
The accidental profession
Hardly anyone sets out to become a planner. In fact, I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that's what they wanted to do as a career. Unless you're directly involved in the project environment, most people generally don't even know planners exist.
Most of us were simply in the right place at the right time. We came up from site or a trade, moved across from engineering or quantity surveying, or were the nearest person when the company or project realised the programme needed updating. There's no single route in, and for me, that's part of the problem.
From crime scenes to critical paths
I came in from a different direction altogether. After nine years as a police detective, I joined a structured planning trainee programme with Amec, an engineering contractor in Aberdeen, at 29. The scheme was supposed to last four years, although you could complete it in less than half the time if you landed lucky with experience and knuckled down with the training courses.
The programme involved on-the-job mentoring in a project environment, rotating through different sizes and types of project, from mods to new modules, and offshore rotations during shutdowns or campaigns. Alongside that came the mandatory training: the ECITB Silver Card in Supervisory Management, the City and Guilds in Project Controls, a Level 3 NVQ in Planning, and the obligatory Primavera P6 course with the legendary David Kelly.
Being older than most wasn't a disadvantage. I already had strong interpersonal skills and a background in how to gather information, question what I was told and explain complex terms in a way a layman would understand. What I needed was the technical grounding, and the programme gave me that in a safe and structured way, where I could build confidence and skills step by step rather than being left to pick it up as I went along.
I'm a big believer that anyone can learn anything. But planning does have to be learned, and the skills need to be used daily to make sure you stay competent. Good planners can come from anywhere, but in my opinion, they need a structured start. Too many are left to find their own way by updating (or fixing) someone else's programme using non-standard methods, skills and techniques, without understanding the intricacies the discipline requires.
What makes a good planner
The technical side can be taught. The people side is harder, and it's what separates a good planner from a P6 jockey. Software comes last on this list, and that's deliberate.
• Understanding how things are built. You can't plan work you don't understand. Time on site is good for getting your bearings and seeing real progress, but unless you're a specialist in everything, you'll always rely on others. The best planners know this and learn how the work is built from whoever knows it best: engineers, site teams, vendors and the people who've done it before. A planner hanging around site looking over people's shoulders every day can be counterproductive.
• Logic. Seeing what drives what, and what happens to everything else when one thing moves. In simple terms, I like to picture it as building a wall. What happens if the weather delays you starting your foundations, or your bricks arrive a day late? What's the knock-on effect?
• Listening. The programme is built from what other people know. A planner who talks more than they listen ends up with a programme nobody recognises.
• Building relationships. Engineers, site teams, contractors and commercial all hold pieces of the plan, and they share them with people they trust. And yes, this can be done entirely remotely. I've worked on projects on the other side of the world and managed this perfectly well from Aberdeen.
• Challenge, with diplomacy. Asking "how do you know?" and testing the answer against the evidence, in a way that keeps people on side. Also, "why does it have to be done that way?" Just remember who, what, when, where and why, and you can't go far wrong.
• Being willing to be unpopular. Sometimes the programme says something nobody wants to hear. A good planner says it anyway, clearly and early.
• Communication. Turning a 5,000-activity programme into three sentences a board can act on.
• Judgement. Knowing when a number is wrong before you can prove it. This also links into communication and being unpopular. Before you declare it's wrong, make sure you know why, because I can guarantee you'll be challenged on it.
• Then the tools. Primavera P6, Microsoft Project, Excel, Power BI and the myriad of business-specific tools matter, but they're how you do the job, not the job itself. Whatever tools your company uses, remember they're all largely the same, just with a different name on the box.
Qualifications: useful, but not enough
There are good routes to recognised qualifications, including APM's qualifications, the City and Guilds in Project Controls, ECITB and PMI's scheduling certification. They give a common language and show commitment. I've kept learning throughout my career too, and I'll write separately about what that training did and didn't give me.
But a certificate doesn't build judgement. That comes from development, exposure and experience.
Development, exposure and experience
• Development. A clear path from updating to planning to leading, with the skills expected at each step written down. Mentoring from someone senior who reviews your work and explains why, not just what.
• Exposure. Time with each discipline, rotation across phases (concept and tender, execution, commissioning and handover), and site visits where they add something. A planner who has only ever seen execution doesn't understand why the front end matters.
• Experience. There's no shortcut, but it can be accelerated. Peer review of programmes, sitting in on change and risk meetings, and being trusted to present your own work can compress years into months.
What to avoid on a project
• Assuming anyone can plan. From the outside, planning looks like a list of dates in a Gantt chart on some software. Too many people believe they can do it without realising they can't, and the cost shows up months later.
• Treating the planner as a P6 operator. If the planner isn't in the room when decisions are made, the programme will always be catching up. Planners tend to have a more complete picture than most, so they likely they have more context than you realise.
• Bringing planning in late. The most valuable planning happens before the contract is signed.
• Leaving the programme to one person. A programme nobody else understands is a programme nobody else owns.
• Updating without understanding. Moving dates to match reported progress, without asking why, is how a programme drifts away from reality.
• Judging the programme by how it looks. A busy Gantt chart is not evidence of a good plan.
• Shooting the messenger. If the planner is punished for bad news, you'll stop hearing it until it's too late.
Why planners leave
If I'm honest, I don't think many people want to be planners for their entire career; I have days where I think like that every so often. It can be a stressful and, at times, thankless job, especially on a difficult project, when the programme is the bearer of bad news and the planner is the one in the firing line.
And while project management has a clear ladder, planning often doesn't. So many good planners treat it as a stepping stone to other project management roles, where progression is better defined.
That isn't all bad. Planners often make excellent project managers. But if planning is only ever a stepping stone, projects lose their most experienced planners just as they become most valuable. That's a shame, because at its best planning is one of the most rewarding seats on a project. You see the whole picture, you shape the decisions, and you're the person people come to when they need the truth.
What employers can do
• Attract. Because so few people set out to become planners, the routes in have to be built on purpose. Open them up to people with no experience, and write adverts that ask for thinking, not just "five years of P6" or "engineering degree".
• Develop. Invest in structured trainee programmes, mentoring and peer review, and give planners the exposure that builds judgement.
• Retain. Make planning a destination, not just a stepping stone. That means a defined career path through to principal and head of planning, recognition when the programme gets it right, backing when it has to deliver bad news, and planners in the room when it matters. Planners who feel valued and heard stay.
Closing
The gap between what planners can do and what projects let them do is one of the cheapest problems to fix in project delivery. It doesn't need new software. It needs us to treat planning as a profession, and planners as people worth investing in.
If you're building or strengthening a planning team, or want an independent view of how your planning function is working, get in touch through lightspeedprojects.co.uk. And follow Lightspeed Projects on LinkedIn for more on planning, project controls and the people who make them work.