Research Articles
Field-grounded research on project controls, scheduling, EVM and forensic delay analysis. Edited by Dr. Hassan Eliwa, Founder of PMMilestone.org.
Construction Project Controls — A Definitive Implementation Guide
A practitioner-led framework for implementing project controls on large-scale construction, infrastructure and power projects — covering schedule health, cost, risk and EVM application.
What Makes Mega-Projects Fail — A Field Perspective from 17 Years of Project Controls
After a decade and a half on capital programs, the same five root causes appear again and again. None of them are technical.
Earned Value vs Earned Schedule — When the SV Lies, Reach for ES
Schedule Variance converges to zero as a late project completes. Earned Schedule corrects the well-known weakness of EVM for late projects.
Five Symptoms of an Unhealthy Schedule (And the DCMA Checks That Catch Them)
Most schedule failures are visible in the network long before they hit the field. The DCMA 14-point check surfaces them in under an hour.
Rolling-Wave Planning on EPC: Practical Patterns for Engineering Heavy Programs
How to combine a Level-2 control schedule with Level-4 short-interval plans without losing baseline integrity.
Frequently Asked Questions
What kind of research articles are published here?
Field-grounded research on project controls, scheduling, EVM, forensic delay analysis, owner-side project controls maturity, and quantitative risk modelling — written from the perspective of practising planning and controls engineers on construction, power and infrastructure programmes.Who is the audience for PMMilestone research articles?
Planning engineers, project controls engineers, cost engineers, project managers and owner-side advisors working on capital projects. Articles assume working familiarity with CPM scheduling, EVM and risk management; complete beginners are pointed at the encyclopedia first.How often are new research articles published?
New long-form articles are published on a rolling cadence, typically every 2–4 weeks, with periodic updates to existing articles when industry guidance changes (for example, new AACE recommended practices or DCMA guidance revisions).Can I cite PMMilestone research articles in academic work?
Yes. Each article carries a published date, an author byline (Dr. Hassan Eliwa, PhD, Founder of PMMilestone.org), and a stable canonical URL. Use a standard web citation format including the article title, author, year and URL.Where do I find templates and calculators referenced in the articles?
Templates (the Risk Register Template, Schedule Health Checker, EVM workbook) and the live EVM, SPI and CPI calculators are hosted on the flagship platform, linked from the relevant article sections.What are common misconceptions corrected across the research library?
Three recurring ones: (1) SPI = 1.0 at the end of a late project means nothing — switch to Earned Schedule SPI(t) after ~70% progress; (2) CPI does not 'stabilise' early — trust it only after 15–20% physical progress; (3) a baseline schedule passing the DCMA 14-point check is necessary but not sufficient — quality has to be re-checked at every monthly update, not just at baseline.