In the 1993 comedy classic “Groundhog Day,” actor Bill Murray plays a snarky TV weatherman named Phil Connors who is doomed to relive the same Feb. 2 day—over and over again no matter what he does to break the cycle. 

Many construction schedulers can relate to Phil’s plight—as version after version of a prominent forensic scheduling manual, commonly referred to when there are disputes over the costs and causes of project delay, has recommended practices ill-suited for forensic Critical Path Method schedule analysis.

The Association for the Advancement of Cost Engineering International (AACE) is posting for comment draft sections of a planned update to “Recommended Practice No. 29R-03 Forensic Schedule Analysis.” 

Call me Punxsutawney Phil, but when reviewing materials released so far, I saw the shadow that these flawed practices have cast on the field of forensic scheduling. Construction schedulers should prepare for more winters of discontent unless people who care about forensic schedule analysis integrity speak up.

First published by AACE in 2007, Recommended Practice 29R-03 has a stated purpose “to provide a unifying reference … for forensic schedule analysis.” A caveat in the 2011 version states that the recommended practice “is not intended to establish a standard of practice.” But it has become the go-to reference for taking potshots at opposing scheduling experts who may not have deemed it necessary to perform each and every step of the painstakingly detailed instructions.

Among its planned changes, the update will group the various approaches into four lettered classifications. Groups C and D (i.e., half) will be dedicated to controversial modeled techniques, where delays are inserted into or extracted from a schedule to measure delay. If I were grading, groups C and D would get an F.

“Here’s why. Group C’s Modeled Additive schedule analysis, known as the “Retrospective Impacted As-Planned” or “Retrospective Time Impact Analysis” involves inserting delays into a planned schedule to create a hypothetical impacted version used for measuring delay against the unimpacted version. While the technique can demonstrate a limited forensic point, as I wrote in 2015, “TIAs are most useful for demonstrating future impacts [to] decide the best course of action.” The method falters when the hypothetical, impacted schedule created after the fact differs from what actually occurred.

Alternatively, “observational” methods are based in reality, dependent on planned schedules that were created by project participants and objective as-built data. Given the limitations, dedicating one-fourth of the document to modeled additive methods, on equal footing with more widely trusted “observational” forensic analysis, is misguided.

More problematic is Group D’s Modeled Subtractive schedule analysis, known as the “Collapsed As-Built.” Once described to me as the “smoke and mirrors” approach, existing activity logic is altered, and delays are removed to create a hypothetical schedule demonstrating when the project would have finished “but for” the delays. Before publication of the 2011 revision, an ENR Viewpoint author provided unheeded warnings on including this “discredited” approach, since it relies on subjective, ex post facto revisions to schedule logic and activities by the practitioner. The method is avoided by many reality-based scheduling experts, as it is difficult to support and can unravel under scrutiny.

While the AACE document admits “discuss[ing] certain methods of schedule delay analysis, irrespective of whether these methods have been deemed acceptable or unacceptable by courts,” how would a modern medical text of “recommended practices” be received if it provided detailed instructions on bloodletting because leeches were used in the 19th century to balance bodily “humours”? Publishing the Collapsed As-Built as a “recommended practice” provides an imprimatur this approach otherwise lacks.

Phil Connors’ time loop only ends when he perfects a Groundhog Day iteration. There’s still a chance the AACE editors can create a more perfect recommended practice revision, but only if group members make their voices heard as drafts are released on the Claims and Dispute Resolution Community Forum. Hopefully, the final version will discard or relegate these inappropriate methodologies to a section of “Available But Not Recommended Practices.” Until then, the construction litigation community may be stuck in a much less entertaining version of Groundhog Day.

Kurt Rossetti, a registered civil engineer, AACE Certified Cost Professional and project delay expert, runs PKR Consulting, a construction management and litigation consulting firm. He can be reached by email at krossetti@pkrconsulting.com