Those in the chat will remember my last restaurant's job - and its' aggravations. Those aggravations all were defined by one word: Schedule.
The day I first arrived, the GC and the customer insisted the place would be open in two weeks. I said "no way," that there was at least two month more work to be done. I was informed in no uncertain terms as to how wrong I was.
Well, for the next two months ... all I heard was the 'two weeks' pressure. Rush, rush, rush.
Guess what happened? They opened two days shy of two months .... all MY stuff was ready, and working ... and the GC spent another two weeks completing his stuff.
This job progressed fairly smoothly, with minimal delays caused by waits for other trades, or equipment deliveries. If there were any avoidable delays, they were caused by attempts to 'hurry things along' by doing work out of sequence. (For example, my wiring the kitchen was slowed by the customer insisting on using the kitchen as a store-room ... and the GC hanging the drop ceiling grid before anyone's pipes were run).
I came away convinced that the 'time pressure' is an artificial issue, created in the belief that giving you an impossible target will somehow inspire you to herculean efforts. It's just another game, another version of 'more, more .. faster, faster ... cheaper, cheaper."
A second job had an enormous time pressure applied to it. In that instance, the CUSStomer had a complete set of plans approved in January ... then, when I show up in March I was presented with a set of unapproved plans that bore NO resemblance to the original set. The customer was delayed, simply because they tried to short-cut the plan approval process.
This customer was clever, though .... his rep was a sweet, lovable lady, who managed to inspire everyone to really, really want to make her happy. ANYTHING to please her ... if that meant assuring her that winter concrete could set in 15 minutes ... she got the promise. (Then the concrete guys were blamed when it took longer).
Only later did it become clear that her only purpose was to adhere to the original schedule ... in essence, making all the contractors 'eat' the lost two months. The reason: they simply didn't want to pay more rent. As soon as they moved in, the niceness and charm disappeared.
We really should have noticed that she rode to work on a Nimbus 2000
I've bored you with these tales to make one point: "Schedules" are most often tools for fictional management, and not really schedules at all. Times and dates are pulled out of thin air. Don't let them bother you. As I told that lady: you can turn up the oven all you want; the cake won't bake any faster!