The Parade Game illustrates what impact work-flow variability has on the performance of
construction trades and their successors. The game consists of simulating a construction
process in which resources produced by one trade are prerequisite to starting work by the
next trade. Production-level detail, describing resources being passed from one trade to
the next, illustrates that throughput will be reduced, project completion delayed, and
waste increased by variations in flow. The game shows that it is possible to reduce waste
and shorten project duration by improving the reliability of work flow between trades.
Basic production management concepts are thus applied to construction management.
They highlight one of the shortcomings of using CPM for field-level planning, which is
that CPM does not explicitly represent reliability. The Parade Game can be played in a
classroom setting either by hand or using a computer. Computer simulation enables
students to experiment with numerous alternatives in order to sharpen their intuition
regarding variability, process throughput, buffers, productivity, and crew sizing. Managers
interested in schedule compression will benefit from understanding work-flow
variability’s impact on succeeding trade performance.