Ops Chapter 4 Project management

Project

A series of related jobs usually directed toward some major output and requiring a significant period of time to perform.

Project management

Planning, directing, and controlling resources (people, equipment, material) to meet the technical, cost, and time constraints of a project.

Project milestones

A specific event in a project.

Work breakdown structure (WBS)

The hierarchy of project tasks, subtasks, and work packages.

Activities

Pieces of work within a project that consume time. The completion of all the activities of a project marks the end of the project.

Psychological safety

Whos on the team doesn’t matter, but how they interact is what matters.

• Equality in conversational turn taking

• Ostentatious listening

Conversational turn taking

• Equality in conversational turn taking: If everyone speeks around the same amount of time the team is likely to suceed

Ostentatious listening

As a team member you have to show other team members that you are listening because it creates psychological safety.

Critical path

The sequence(s) of activities in a project that form the longest chain in terms of their time to complete. This path contains zero slack time. It is possible for there to be multiple critical paths in a project.

Immediate predecessor

Activities that need to be completed immediately before another activity.

Slack timer

The time that an activity can be delayed without delaying the entire project; the difference between the late and early start times of an activity.

Early start and early finish

the earliest times that the activity can start and be finished

Late start and late finish

the latest times the activities can start and finish without delaying the project

Time cost models (crashing)

Extension of the critical path models that considers the trade-off between the time required to complete an activity and the cost. This is often referred to as “crashing” the project.

Completion of one or more work packages results in the completion of a

subtask

Completion of one or more subtasks results in the completion of a

task

Completion of all tasks results in the completion of a

project

Appropriate steps for critical path method

1. Identify each activity to be done in the project and estimate how long it will take to complete each activity

2. Determine the required sequence of activites and construct a network reflecting the precedence relationships

3. Determine the critical (longest) path

4. Determine the early start/finish and late start/finish schedule

Early start schedule

A project schedule that lists all activities by their early start times.

Late start schedule

A project schedule that lists all activities by their late start times. This schedule may create savings by postponing purchases of material and other costs associated with the project.

Activity direct costs

Costs associated with expediting activities and add to the project direct cost

Project indirect costs

Costs associated with sustaining the project

Project management involves meeting each of the three goals

1. Scope (objectives)

2. Cost of resources

3. Time schedule