Look-Ahead Schedule
A short-term schedule, usually covering the next two to three weeks, pulled from the full project schedule and reviewed regularly with the crews and subcontractors actually doing the near-term work.
Why it matters
A full project schedule can run hundreds of lines long and cover a year or more, useful for planning, but not something a foreman can act on day to day. The look-ahead schedule translates that into "here's exactly what needs to happen in the next three weeks," which is the timeframe people can actually plan around.
On a real project
Every Friday, a superintendent reviews the coming three weeks of work with every subcontractor on-site, confirming the electrician will be ready to start rough-in the same week the framing crew finishes, rather than everyone discovering a conflict when it's too late to adjust.
Who this matters most to
A Scheduler pulls the look-ahead schedule from the master schedule and keeps it current as work actually progresses. A Superintendent runs the weekly meeting where it actually gets used; it's one of their main tools for keeping every trade coordinated in real time.
Where this goes wrong
A superintendent stops updating the look-ahead schedule for a few weeks because the job feels like it's running smoothly. When an inspection unexpectedly delays one trade, nobody had visibility into how it would ripple into the next three weeks of other trades' work, and crews show up with no task ready for them to actually do.