OM Chapter 3 Quiz

A project manager is interested in crashing a project with variable activity times. Which of the following tools should he/she employ?

PERT

The main difference between PERT and CPM is that:

PERT employs three time estimates for each activity

Ethical issues that may arise in projects large and small include: gifts from contractors. exaggerated expense reports. compromised quality standards to meet bonuses or avoid penalties related to schedules. pressure to mask delays with false status reports. All of these.

all of these

Project management at the Tour de France races can be complex because: a team is like a "large travelling circus." there is a wide variety of support staff. there are races being held simultaneously. each team has over two dozen riders. All of these

all of these

The control of projects involves close monitoring of which of the following? resources costs quality budgets All of these

all of these

The waterfall approach is used most often for: well-defined projects projects whose changes tend to be minor projects with step-by-step progress controlling projects All of these

all of these

Which of the following projects were completed by Bechtel? Hoover Dam Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Rebuilding Kuwait after Iraq's invasion in 1990 Rebuilding Iraq after the U.S. invasion, starting in 2003 All of these were Bechtel projects

all of these

Which of the following statements regarding Bechtel is true? Its competitive advantage is project management. Bechtel was the construction contractor for the Hoover Dam. While helping to rebuild Iraq, Bechtel's crews had to travel under armed escort. Bechtel's procurement program is global in nature. All of these are true.

all of these

In a PERT network, non-critical activities that have little slack need to be monitored closely: because PERT treats all activities as equally important. because near-critical paths could become critical paths with small delays in these activities. because slack is undesirable and needs to be eliminated. because they have a high risk of not being completed. because they are causing the entire project to be delayed.

because near-critical paths could become critical paths with small delays in these activities

Which of the following statements about Bechtel is true? Even though Bechtel is over 100 years old, the Kuwaiti oil fields was its first "project." Bechtel is the world's premier manager of massive construction and engineering projects. Bechtel's competitive advantage is supply chain management. While its projects are worldwide, its network of suppliers is largely in the United States All of these are true.

bechtel is the world's premier manager of massive construction and engineering projects

The ________ distribution is used by PERT analysis to calculate expected activity times and variances.

beta

The difference between AON and AOA networks is that:

both are acceptable in practice; however, microsoft project uses AON Answer was: all of these

Which of the following is NOT one of the phases of project management? planning scheduling controlling budgeting All of these are project management phases.

budgeting

The beta distribution is used in project management to:

calculate expected activity times

Which of these statements regarding time-cost tradeoffs in CPM networks is true? Crashing is not possible unless there are multiple critical paths. Crashing a project often reduces the length of long-duration, but noncritical, activities. Activities not on the critical path can never be on the critical path, even after crashing. Crashing shortens the project duration by assigning more resources to one or more of the critical tasks. The crash time always exceeds the normal time.

crashing shortens the project duration by assigning more resources to one or more of the critical tasks

Which of the following statements regarding time-cost tradeoffs in CPM networks is false? Activities not on the critical path can become critical after crashing takes place. Crashing shortens project duration by assigning more resources to critical tasks. Crashing must consider the impact of crashing an activity on all paths in the network. A negative crash cost per period would imply that either crashing is cheaper than not crashing or that the crash time was slower than the normal time. Crashing sometimes has the reverse result of lengthening the project duration.

crashing sometimes has the reverse result of lengthening the project duration

A code of ethics especially for project managers:

has been established by the Project Management Institute

Which of the following statements regarding CPM networks is true? There can be multiple critical paths on the same project, all with different durations. The early finish of an activity is the latest early start of all preceding activities. The late start of an activity is its late finish plus its duration. If a specific project has multiple critical paths, all of them will have the same duration. None of these are true.

if a specific project has multiple critical paths, all of them will have the same duration

A project organization:

is effective for companies with multiple large projects.

A project organization that becomes permanent is often referred to as a:

matrix organization

A network has been crashed to the point where all activities are critical. Additional crashing:

may require crashing multiple tasks simultaneously

The beta distribution is used in project management to: calculate slack on activities not on the critical path. calculate the probability that a project will be completed within its budget. calculate pessimistic and optimistic activity times. determine which activity should be crashed. None of these

none of these

Which of the following statements regarding critical paths is true? The shortest of all paths through the network is the critical path. Every network has only one critical path. On a specific project, there can be multiple critical paths, all with exactly the same duration. Some activities on the critical path may have slack. The duration of the critical path is the average duration of all paths in the project network.

on a specific project, there can be multiple critical paths, all with exactly the same duration

Which of the following statements regarding PERT analysis is true? Project standard deviation is the sum of all critical activity standard deviations. Project variance is the sum of all activity variances. Each activity has two estimates of its duration. The most likely time is equivalent to the expected activity time. Only critical activities contribute to the project variance.

only critical activities contribute to the project variance

Project activities have to be clearly defined, independent, and stable in their relationships. Only one time estimate can be used for each activity. Precedence relationships must be specified and networked together. Time estimates tend to be subjective and are subject to fudging by managers. There is the inherent danger of placing too much emphasis on the critical path.

only one time estimate can be used for each activity

The phases of project management are:

planning, scheduling, and controlling

Which of the following is NOT performed by Microsoft Project? providing PERT probability calculations drawing the project AON network creating the project Gantt chart identifying the critical path tracking the progress of the project

providing PERT probability calculations

The time an activity will take assuming very unfavorable conditions is:

the pessimistic time

Projects such as road building and plane building are:

well-defined

WBS stands for which of the following project management tools?

work breakdown structure