A simulation and evaluation of earned value metrics to forecast the project duration

It is well-known that well managed and controlled projects are more likely to be delivered on time and within budget. The construction of a (resource-feasible) baseline schedule and the follow-up during execution are primary contributors to the success or failure of a project. Earned value management systems have been set up to deal with the complex task of controlling and adjusting the baseline project schedule during execution. Although earned value systems have been proven to provide reliable estimates for the follow-up of cost performance, it often fails to predict the total duration of the project. In this paper, we extensively review the existing methods to forecast the total project duration. Moreover, we investigate the potential of a newly developed method, the earned schedule method, which makes the connection between earned value metrics and the project schedule. We present an extensive simulation study where we carefully control the level of uncertainty in the project, the influence of the project network structure on the accuracy of the forecasts, and the time horizon where the newly developed measures provide accurate and reliable results.