Scheduling and rescheduling work

When you'll need to schedule or reschedule

Scheduling is one of the things you'll come back to over and over on a job. Reach for these tools when:

• You're laying out a programme for a new Work Package and want to set the dates
• A sub-package has slipped and you need to push it (and everything that follows) along
• The client has changed the brief and you need to reshuffle a whole section of work
• Site has stopped because of weather and you need to roll the schedule back

How dates work

A Work Package itself has two outer date fields:

• Earliest Start Date — the earliest date the work can begin
• Latest Finish Date — the latest date the work should finish by

These are the boundaries. The actual day-to-day schedule lives on the sub-packages underneath. Each sub-package has its own Planned Start Date and Planned End Date, and those are the dates that show up as draggable bars on the Gantt and the inline timeline.

Editing dates by hand

If you know the exact dates you want, the quickest way is to type them in.

1. 1

   Open the Work Package and click the dates in the sidebar to edit them in place.

2. 2

   For sub-packages, open the sub-package and edit its planned start and end dates on its form.

This is the right approach for small precise tweaks where you already know what you want.

Dragging bars on the Gantt

For larger reshuffles, dragging bars around on the Gantt chart is usually faster than editing dates one at a time.

1. 1

   Switch to Gantt view.

2. 2

   Zoom in until the bar you want to move is large enough to grab comfortably.

3. 3

   Drag the middle of a bar to move the whole thing along the timeline (the duration stays the same), or drag either edge to resize it.

4. 4

   Release. The new dates save automatically and the Gantt refreshes.

You can drag Work Packages and sub-packages the same way — sub-packages appear as their own rows underneath their parent on the Gantt.

The mini-timeline on the Work Package detail page

You don't have to go all the way to Gantt view to reshuffle a single Work Package's sub-packages. The detail page has its own mini-timeline card below the description that shows every sub-package as a coloured swimlane.

It supports the same drag gestures as Gantt view. Use the grip handles on each row to grab a bar cleanly. This is the fastest way to rearrange sub-packages within a single Work Package without leaving the page.

What happens when you push past the project end date

If you drag a sub-package's end date past the project's planned completion date, a dialog pops up before the change saves. It asks whether you want to push the project's completion date out to match.

You'll see a checkbox labelled something like:

Update project completion date to {new date}

You've got three choices:

• Tick the checkbox and confirm — the sub-package reschedules and the project's completion date gets pushed out to match
• Leave the checkbox unticked and confirm — the sub-package reschedules but the project end stays where it is, so this sub-package now sits outside the project's planned window
• Cancel — the drag is rolled back and the sub-package returns to its original dates

This gate is here so you never silently push the project end without realising — it makes the change explicit.

Working hours and weekends

Sub-package scheduling respects the working hours and working days you've set up for the company. Weekends can also be hidden from Gantt and timeline views by default — the Hide Weekends switch is in Work Package settings.

Real-world examples

• A sub-package finishes early — drag its end date back, and drag the dependent sub-packages forward to take advantage of the extra time
• A frame goes up late — drag the frame's end date forward, then drag the first-fix sub-packages along so they start at the new finish date
• Bad weather closes the site for a week — open the timeline, drag the affected sub-packages forward by 7 days, and let the dialog flag any that now slip past the project end

Next steps

• Dependencies — to set up the links that show how work flows together.
• Gantt view — for the full Gantt walkthrough.
• Configuring Work Package defaults — for working hours, working days, and weekends.