How to Implement Pull Planning on Your Job Site
In this blog, I want to walk you through how to implement pull planning in the field with true operational excellence. I’m speaking directly to field leaders, whether you’re a field engineer, project engineer, assistant superintendent, assistant PM, superintendent, or project manager. If you’re responsible for making the work happen, this applies to you.
Before we even touch pull planning, I’m going to assume two things are already in place.
Your Strategic Baseline
You have a visual master schedule that clearly identifies each phase, controls your milestones, and lays out a solid strategic baseline. And when I say baseline, I do not mean a CPM baseline. I mean a strategic plan that creates flow, direction, and clarity.
Your Meeting System
You’ve established a steady meeting rhythm.
Monday through Friday, you cover strategic planning and procurement.
You run your six-week make-ready look-ahead and your weekly work plan meetings.
And then, every single afternoon, you hold a foreman huddle to plan tomorrow.
The following morning, you communicate that plan in a worker huddle.
Make the plan, communicate the plan. Make the plan, communicate the plan. These two huddles are non-negotiable.
When your strategic baseline is clear, your meeting system is stable, you’re removing roadblocks daily, and your team is aligned socially as one unit, you’re finally ready for operational excellence.
Now let’s talk about pull planning.
What Pull Planning Really Is
Pull planning means we don’t guess the sequence. We don’t hope. We don’t plan in a vacuum.
We build the sequence with our trade partners, forward and back, until every activity has:
- A clear name.
- At least two needs or prerequisites.
As we build backward from the milestone, we check whether each need already exists in the plan to the left. If not, we ask the responsible trade to add it. When every need is accounted for, we know the sequence is complete.
This is a partnership. The job has needs and the trades have needs. Pull planning aligns both.
But here’s the part most teams get wrong…
Pull Planning Must Happen by Zones
You cannot pull plan an entire floor at once. You must pull plan by one representative zone, then map how each trade flows diagonally across remaining zones in takt time.
If your takt plan has four zones, pull plan one zone with your milestone, then confirm that the diagonal flow across all zones still aligns with your strategic baseline.
Done well, you create buffers. Done poorly, you lose all flow.
The Power of Buffers
Your contractual milestone is fixed. But your production target created through the pull plan should land earlier. That difference becomes your buffer.
Buffers allow you to absorb delays without hurting flow. Delays will happen. Critical Chain Project Management makes that clear. Buffers are how we protect the system, the trades, and the flow of work.
When you pull plan correctly by zones, you reduce batch sizes and gain buffer time. Without that, you will always be behind.
Where Most Problems Actually Come From
At Elevate, Anna Louisa and I analyzed the most common constraints and roadblocks on projects. We found 24 recurring issues and over 85% of them traced back to one root cause:
An incorrectly done pull plan:
- Improper takt time.
- Bottlenecks.
- Badly shaped zones.
- Prerequisite work missing.
- Trades not ready.
- Work stacking.
Most of it isn’t “trade issues.” It’s planning issues. Pull planning issues.
Pull planning is the lever. When it’s wrong, everything is wrong.
The Habit You Must Build
If you want a perfect handoff percentage, a PPC above 80%, and a well-run project, here’s the routine you must adopt:
Three months before each phase, do a complete pull plan.
Vent every problem early, optimize your sequence, and build buffers.
This discipline will save your project.
Ask Yourself These Questions
As you read this blog, ask yourself the following:
- Are you current with your pull plans?
- Have you used the takt calculator to determine the right zone sizes?
- Did you pull plan forward and backward, zone by zone, with complete sequences?
- Have you examined how each trade will flow diagonally across the project?
- Did you optimize enough to create buffers that absorb delays?
- Have you reduced system constraints and roadblocks through proper planning?
If not, now is the time to make this a core habit.
Final Thoughts
Pull planning is not a meeting. It’s not sticky notes. It’s not a one-time activity.
It’s a discipline that shapes flow, protects trade partners, and keeps the project off the rocks.
If you need help with pull planning or want resources, reach out anytime. We can support your team through the process.
If you want to learn more we have:
-Takt Virtual Training: (Click here)
-Check out our Youtube channel for more info: (Click here)
-Listen to the Elevate Construction podcast: (Click here)
-Check out our training programs and certifications: (Click here)
-The Takt Book: (Click here)
Discover Jason’s Expertise:
Meet Jason Schroeder, the driving force behind Elevate Construction IST. As the company’s owner and principal consultant, he’s dedicated to taking construction to new heights. With a wealth of industry experience, he’s crafted the Field Engineer Boot Camp and Superintendent Boot Camp – intensive training programs engineered to cultivate top-tier leaders capable of steering their teams towards success. Jason’s vision? To expand his training initiatives across the nation, empowering construction firms to soar to unprecedented levels of excellence.
On we go