Builders and Contractors Exchange
Weekly Bulletin: 15 JUNE 2007
FRAG What? And Why Should I Do That?
By: Neil S. Lowenstein
Fragmentary network analysis, or FRAGNET, sounds like one of those mathematical theories we memorized in school and then never again used, but it's not. Instead, it's a great, if not necessary, tool to keep in your tool bag for analyzing time impacts. FRAGNETs utilize critical path technique to analyze individual project changes to demonstrate, graphically and mathematically, the influence and measure of any change related delay, and to then incorporate the delay and impacts into the project schedule. The objective is to pinpoint, isolate, and quantify any time impacts to specific issues.
Okay, fancy words, but why bother? Foremost, more and more contract documents are specifically requiring this type of analysis to substantiate delay claims, particularly public projects. Just as importantly, courts and boards are increasingly mandating this type of mathematical analysis to prove delay impacts at trial; with the days of simply having someone claim they were impacted long gone. And, with technological advancement, the ease and inexpense of performing this type of analysis makes it an easy way to demonstrate both graphically (for those who need to see the evidence) and mathematically (for those who need to understand the logic) how and to what extent you were delayed, and therefore leading to reasoned settlements of associated claims.
However, FRAGNETs are only as good as the data upon which they are based. Primarily, the schedule used must be reliable or, in the everyday language of a recent board hearing, the result is "junk in junk out." Reliable schedules are complete and updated. Approval is not necessarily the measure of reliability; the key is the underlying information itself. Valid logic is one key. Because an analysis' output varies with its input, it is important to insure that input has not been manipulated; for example, one can emphasize or reduce effects by increasing or decreasing durations, or altering links within the software program. Effective schedule analysis must address these to the reviewer's satisfaction.
So these are the brief what and why of FRAGNETs. It's not an arcane math holdover from grammar school, and is instead an important, and increasingly necessary, tool needed to examine and establish specific impacts associated with project delays
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Questions?
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This article is meant to bring awareness to this topic and is not intended to be used as legal advice.