Johanna Rothmann has a series on "project games." One of the games is "Project Chicken" where dates are used in place of deliver ables. The primary of Integrated Master Plan / Integrated Master Schedules (IMP/IMS) is to separate the passage of time from progress.
IMP/IMS is the standard method of planning for Defense contracts and now for NASA Programs. The just-published Exploration Systems Mission Directorate Program Management Handbook describes the program and project management methods for the ESMD initiatives which includes the manned return to space in the form the Crew Exploration Vehicle. These are huge programs, but the IMP/IMS principles are applicable to the smallest project - "tell me what done looks like, and how you're going to recognize it when it comes along."
A senior aircraft maintenance officer once told me, while I was asking "when is this pig going to fly, I have a mission to go on," responded with "never confuse effort with results." That phrase (utter in 1970 off the coast of Vietnam) still rings true in the project world.