IST 302 CH 6

The various dependency types.

1. Mandatory dependencies 2. Discretionary dependencies 3. External dependencies 4. Internal dependencies

Project schedule management

involves the processes required to ensure timely completion of a project.

Six main processes are involved in project schedule management:

1. Planning schedule management 2. Defining activities 3. Sequencing activities 4. Estimating activity durations 5. Developing the schedule 6. Controlling the schedule

Describe a task dependency

A dependency or relationship pertains to the sequencing of project activities or tasks.

Why is it important to understand the slack associated with each project activity?

A technique that can help project managers make schedule trade-offs is determining the free slack and total slack for each project activity. Knowing the amount of float or slack allows project managers to know whether the schedule is flexible and how flexible it might be. Understanding how to create and use slack information provides a basis for negotiating project schedules.

What is the difference between a schedule activity/task and a milestone?

An activity or task is an element of work normally found on the work breakdown structure (WBS) that has expected duration, cost, and resource requirements. A milestone on a project is a significant event that normally has no duration. It often takes several activities and a lot of work to complete a milestone, but the milestone itself is a marker to help in identifying necessary activities.

Compare/contrast the techniques of crashing to complete projects earlier.

Crashing is a technique for making cost and schedule trade-offs to obtain the greatest amount of schedule compression for the least incremental cost. The main advantage of crashing is shortening the time needed to finish a project. The main disadvantage of crashing is that it often increases total project costs.

Why do project managers spend so much time managing tasks on the critical path?

Even though the critical path is the longest path, it represents the shortest time required to complete a project. If one or more activities on the critical path take longer than planned, the whole project schedule will slip unless the project manager takes corrective action. FIND MORE

Compare/contrast the techniques of fast tracking to complete projects earlier.

Fast tracking involves doing activities in parallel that you would normally do in sequence. The main advantage of fast tracking, like crashing, is that it can shorten the time needed to finish a project. The main disadvantage is that it can increase cost and actually lengthen the project schedule because starting some tasks too soon often increases project risk and results in rework.

Planning schedule management

Involves determining the policies, procedures, and documentation that will be used for planning, executing, and controlling the project schedule.

What is the duration of a milestone in Microsoft Project?

Normally, you create milestones by entering tasks with zero duration.

How can culture impact project schedule and deadlines?

Some people prefer detailed schedules and emphasize task completion. Others prefer to keep things open and flexible. For example, in some countries businesses close for several hours every afternoon to have siestas. Countries may have different holidays, which means not much work will be done at certain times of the year. Cultures may also have different perceptions of work ethic—some may value hard work and strict schedules while others may value the ability to remain relaxed and flexible.

What are some common network diagramming techniques?

Some people refer to network diagrams as project schedule network diagrams or PERT charts. The letters A through J represent activities with dependencies that are required to complete the project. uses the activity-on-arrow (AOA) approach or the arrow diagramming method (ADM)—a network diagramming technique in which activities are represented by arrows and connected at points called nodes to illustrate the sequence of activities. A node is simply the starting and ending point of an activity.

Discretionary dependencies

are defined by the project team. For example, a project team might follow good practice and not start the detailed design of a new information system until the users sign off on all of the analysis work. Discretionary dependencies are sometimes referred to as soft logic and should be used with care because they may limit later scheduling options.

Mandatory dependencies

are inherent in the nature of the work being performed on a project. They are sometimes referred to as hard logic. For example, you cannot test code until after the code is written.

Most likely estimate

as you might expect, is based on a most likely or expected scenario.

Understand the difference between duration and effort.

duration includes the actual amount of time worked on an activity plus elapsed time. For example, even though it might take one workweek or five workdays to do the actual work, the duration estimate might be two weeks to allow extra time needed to obtain outside information. The people or resources assigned to a task will also affect the task duration estimate. effort, which is the number of workdays or work hours required to complete a task.

What are the three points of a "three-point estimate"?

includes an optimistic, a most likely, and a pessimistic estimate, such as three weeks for the optimistic scenario, four weeks for the most likely scenario, and five weeks for the pessimistic scenario. is required for performing PERT estimates

Internal dependencies

involve relationships between project activities that are generally inside the project team's control. For example, if software is developed by the team, they can create dependencies such as performing unit testing before system testing.

External dependencies

involve relationships between project and non- project activities. For example, the installation of a new operating system and other software may depend on delivery of new hardware from an external supplier. Even though delivery of the hardware may not be included in the scope of the project, you should add an external dependency to it because late delivery will affect the project schedule.

Developing the schedule

involves analyzing activity sequences, resource requirements, and activity duration estimates to create the project schedule.

Controlling the schedule

involves controlling and managing changes to the project schedule.

Estimating activity durations

involves estimating the number of work periods that are needed to complete individual activities.

Sequencing activities

involves identifying and documenting the relationships between project activities. Requirements, a resource breakdown structure, and project documents updates.

Defining activities

involves identifying the specific activities that the project team members and stakeholders must perform to produce the project deliverables. An activity or task is an element of work normally found on the work breakdown structure (WBS) that has expected duration, cost, and resource requirements.

Describe the purpose of critical path analysis.

is a network diagramming technique used to predict total project duration. This important tool helps you combat project schedule overruns.

What is the main goal/purpose of network diagramming?

is a schematic display of the logical relationships among project activities and their sequencing. represents activities that must be done to complete the project. It is not a race to get from the first node to the last node. not every item on the WBS needs to be shown on the network diagram; only activities with dependencies need to be shown.

A Gantt chart shows multiple elements of a project schedule together in one view. What are some of the elements shown on a Gantt chart?

listing project activities and their corresponding start and finish dates in calendar form. referred to as bar charts because the activities' start and end dates are shown as horizontal bars. are driven by the deliverables on the WBS, and should coincide in turn with the activity list and milestone list. contains milestones, summary tasks, individual task durations, and arrows showing task dependencies.

The optimistic estimate and pessimistic estimate

optimistic is based on a best-case scenario, while the pessimistic estimate is based on a worst-case scenario.

What is the PERT weighted average equation for estimating work? Why would you use it?

optimistic time + 4 * most likely time + pessimistic time / 6 the total project duration estimate takes into account the risk or uncertainty in the individual activity estimates. Note that the above formula assumes a normal distribution or bell curve. You can also use other distributions. Consult other sources for more details. The main advantage of PERT is that it attempts to address the risk associated with duration estimates. Because many projects exceed schedule estimates, PERT may help in developing schedules that are more realistic. PERT's main disadvantages are that it involves more work than CPM because it requires several duration estimates, and there are better probabilistic methods for assessing schedule risk.

Slack or float

the amount of time an activity may be delayed without delaying a succeeding activity or the project finish date.

critical path

the series of activities that determine the earliest time by which the project can be completed. It is the longest path through the network diagram and has the least amount of slack or float.