Using spreadsheets features to schedule non-identical multi-storey building projects

Repeating activities are commonly found in construction industry such as housing projects and high-rise buildings. Repetitive activities extremely need to maximize the efficiency of resource utilization. The line of balance (LOB), as a resource-driven technique, is well suited for scheduling such repetitive projects. It maintains resource continuity for an activity from one unit to the next one and achieves logic constraints at the same time. However, LOB is faced by several practical challenges: variability in construction works, diverse directions in activities workflow, skeleton constraint, and presentation difficulties. The line of balance technique should be adapted in order to maximize the performance of scheduling multi-storey building projects. A new technique has been developed in this paper to overcome these challenges. Details of the model and computerized implementations are developed in a spreadsheet algorithm. Spreadsheets are efficient computational tool used in many fields with wide range of calculations. An application example is presented to illustrate the features of the proposed approach. The model is useful for practitioners that it avoids scheduling errors, and provides a clear presentation of all types of activities. It is also useful for researchers that many future extensions of the proposed approach may then be discussed clearly.