By Glenn Gallop, President, forProject Technology, Inc.
TL;DR: We’ve published two free job aids for DCMA schedule checks. One covers the 14-Point Assessment while the other covers 17 DECM automated schedule metrics that can be calculated from the schedule. Both show how each check is calculated and the threshold it’s held to.
Get the job aids: DCMA DECM Schedule Metrics · DCMA 14-Point Assessment Checklist
Schedule Analyzer forProject supports both the DCMA 14-Point Assessment and the automated DECM schedule metrics, as well as over 150 additional health checks.
What’s in them
The 14-Point Assessment checklist fits on one page. It lists the 14 checks, the formula for each, and the green, yellow and red thresholds from DCMA’s 2009 guidance.
The DECM job aid is two pages. It’s based on DCMA’s DECM v8.1 metric specifications, published in February 2026. Each row gives the check’s purpose, its exact formula and its threshold.
The notes cover the details that trip people up: what counts as an open start, how the constraint method finds the critical path, and when a forecast date is “riding” the status date.
Why it matters to you
While DCMA has shifted focus to DECM for its EVMS reviews, the 14-Point Assessment is still widely used as a quick check of schedule quality.
These guides help you understand how each metric is calculated, so you can better address these issues in your schedule.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are the job aids free? Yes. Each page has a direct PDF download, with no sign-up.
Which one should I use? Both the 14-Point Assessment and the DECM schedule checks are useful, complementary checks of schedule quality.
Further reading
- DCMA Earned Value Management Systems: DECM Metric Specifications, v8.1 (February 2026)
- DCMA IMS Assessment Guide (Rev 7, 2009), the source of the 14 checks. DCMA no longer posts it; our DCMA 14-Point Assessment checklist summarizes it.
- forProject Encyclopedia, including DCMA 14-Point Assessment, DCMA EVMS Compliance Metrics (DECM) and Integrated Master Schedule
- Job Aids