The Overall Project Schedule (OPS) is the primary schedule control tool.  The OPS provides the comprehensive plan for the entire project.  This schedule serves as the framework in which major tasks, resources and interfaces necessary for the planning, design and construction/implementation of a project are identified and monitored.  The OPS furnishes a number of more specific tools with detailed project information which require special attention during the life of the project (Example at Figure 2).

These schedules, complemented by the project progress reports, provide project management with a dynamic instrument of control. The Draper approach to engineering the OPS include:

• Identifying the activities necessary to carry out the planning, design and construction
• Identifying the precedence relationships among those activities
• Assigning appropriate duration and manpower to those activities
• Incorporating the above data into the initial scheduling display
• Analyzing the resulting project plan with respect to both project length and effective manpower utilization
• Refining these schedules until the Overall Project Schedule objectives are met