Examining the project

(seminar)

What is this chapter about?

• Gathering and analysing information for decision making in projects:– What has happened– What is happening– What should have happened– What should be happening

• Process of gathering information: monitoring & controlling

Time related processes

• Concerned with the activities in the project plan:– Determination of logical interactions– Estimation of durations– Schedules and key event schedules

(with identification of critical activities)

• Focus of control is on the future. If not, it will degenerates into a recording system

• Consistent unit of time throughout the plan (with the exemption of different levels of detail).

Cost related processes• Goal: to complete the project within the financial budget,

including forecasting and managing costs.• Estimation of activity costs for the budget-plan are based on:

– Man-hours– Labor-rates (wage etc.)– Material costs– Service costs– Set-up charges– Rental charges– Overheads

• Cost control is based on the budget• Cost control is the principal means of control (esp. for the

customer)

Resource related processes

• Aim: to plan the use and control of resources.

• Resources: anything (any input) that is required. Availability of resources means constraints for the project.

• Resource planning:– Summation (aggregation) for each period– Scheduling activities with resource needs– Coming only after the scheduling of activities by

logical interactions• Resource control: monitor the usage of

resources and report any deviations to the plan

Planning project durationNetwork techniques: a formal and explicit statement of policy, and also a communication tool

1.Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)1. Logical sequencing the project

2. More grouping logic can be used (depending on the project-context):1. Physical

2. Functional

3. Cost-centre etc.

2.Assign the durations to the tasks and task groupsUse iterative refining of the duration estimations

3.Examination of the plan: ‘there is always a better way’Project network techniques identifies the critical activities to focus the examinations on. Duration reduction always costs resources.

Reducing total project time (TPT)

Systematic approach:1.Critical activities subjected to the questioning

technique (if there is a quicker way)2.Can we modify the network logic to overlap or

parallel activities?3.Is it acceptably possible to increase the risk

taken?4.Can any resources moved or can the costs of

increased resources be tolerated?

The questioning method

• Backround is work-study• Systematic questioning:

the same questions on the same (rigid) way• Two kinds of activities:

– ‘do’ activities: tasks advancing the project in themselves

– ‘ancillary’ activities: supporting ‘do’ activities

Questions to be asked when reducing the project time

?• Purpose• Place• Sequence• Person• Means• Overlapping• Risk• Trade-off• Cost

Reduction by overlapping activitiesActivities following each other, depending on the interrelationships can be overlapped or paralleled.

1st day

actvity ‘A’actvity ‘B’

Original sequence

Overlapping activitiesactvity ‘A’actvity ‘B’

actvity ‘A’

actvity ‘A’

actvity ‘B’

actvity name 2nd day 3rd day 4th day 5th day

actvity ‘B’

Parallel activities

actvity ‘A’ actvity ‘B’

actvity ‘A’ actvity ‘B’

Reduction by increased risk

• Reducing activities like:– Testing– Checking– Proving

• Risk of failure will increase

Reduction by the transference of resources

• Trading-off resources: moving resources from non-critical activities to critical ones.

Reduction by increased cost („cost slope concept” or „crashing”)

• Increasing activity cost to reduce its duration.• Cost-slope: cost of reducing duration time by

unit time.• We need network diagrams to do crashing.

Dangers of the cost-slope concept

• It is difficult to find reliable figures for the changes in cost resulting from changes in duration times.

• Cost/time relations are frequently not constant nor simple

• Not all resources are freely convertible to cost (problem of availability)

Reducing cost by increasing time

• Non-critical activities can be increased in time without extending the duration of the whole project (they have float time). In this case cost savings are the only effect.

Relationship between time and labour employed

There is a minimum time below it is impossible to reduce duration.

The final network

• The network after reduction will be different than the one before:– Logic and connections changed between activities– Duration times altered– New critical path

• A test is needed to uncover illogicalities and to match the new activity schedule to the resource availabilities

Reading

• Textbook chapter 8

Thank you for listening