Critical Path Method

Critical path analysis identifies the most efficient and cost effective way of completing a complex project. The various activities which together will make up the project are identified, and the order of these activities are identified. Then, the duration of each activity is estimated and these factors are then arranged as a network or graph, showing the whole project from start to finish, and showing which tasks can happen at the same time. The sequence of tasks which have to be done one after another with no gaps in between is called the Critical Path.

Analyzing the critical path, there is a high level risk as it runs parallel to itself, more than one task at a particular time could delay project. Some other tasks run parallel to the critical path and have same duration; a delay in one of these tasks will change the critical path and delay the whole project.

The critical path would be prepare the site, set building footers, building assembly, interior work, set an appointment for final building inspection, landscaping and driveway paving, painting and arrange the sale.

Larson, E., & Gray, C. (2010). Project management, the managerial process. (5th ed., p. 158).

Critical path is the one that determines the shortest time to complete a project, which assumes low uncertainty and does not consider resource dependencies.

Gray, C. F. & Larson, E. W. (2008). _Project Management: The Managerial Process_. Boston, MA: McGraw-Hills Companies, Inc.

In almost every business, project management is critically important. The critical path method (CPM) will provide a timeline for the project manager for when tasks should be completed. In addition, providing a deadline and the negative effects it will have on the following successors if not completed on time. These many task are interdepended. Therefore, the CPM provides the start and finishes times of the tasks, and identifies the few tasks on the critical path that the project manager should observe to determine which task needs the most attention. Already discovering and incorporating the details the task or assignments may require, CPM calculates all task times, which can be measured in hours, days, weeks, and months. For any unintended manually input errors, a warning message will be provided. Including an automatic successor generator, task numbering comment, and data validation, makes it easier on the project manager.

Critical Path: The sequence of activities that represents the longest path through a project, which determines the shortest possible duration.

0 14 408 0.193 1,284 0.61 168 255 418 261 142 1.7d 0.8d 60.2f 10.0f 0.22f 64.9f 1,671f 573 52.5 18,400i 79,700 482 14 24 7 19 15 742 552 11,772 14

Reference Case from "Project Management, A Systems approach to planning, scheduling and controlling" by Harold Kerzner, PH.D.

In field of project management, there are a plethora of mechanisms under perpetual reevaluation. One specific segmentation of project management under such scrutiny pertains to cost duration, which is the time and monetary costs of completing individual tasks within the project’s critical path (IBM Knowledge Center, 2016). The process of monitoring and evaluating the time and financial impacts of each task is referred to as cost duration analysis (IBM Knowledge Center, 2016). A chief concern of cost duration analysis is identifying tasks within the project’s critical path which can reduce project duration (PMI, 2013). A common approach to reducing a project’s duration is task “crashing” (PMI, p.181). According to The Project Management Institute (2013) crashing refers to the process of methodical determining the financial value of increasing a critical path task’s resources in order to decrease project duration (p.181).

While projects can be similar in some instances, no two projects are ever the same. For this reason, management of projects requires the application of tools and techniques to meet the goals of the temporary endeavor. Project managers apply these tools and techniques to determine what is required for project delivery such as the list of activities to completed, the time required to complete the activities, resources needed and the various risks associated with the deliverable and efforts. A multitude of tools and techniques are employed by the project manager based on the need of the effort to organize, identify and communicate the various aspects of the project. While in contrast, the repetitive nature of operations activities

From Figure 1, we know that the critical path is Activity 1-2-5-7-10-13-15. It is because if there is any change of time in the Activities on the critical path, the whole progress time of the project will change. Therefore, we choose to crash the activities on the critical path with the lowest crash cost in order to lower the time used with minimum additional cost. Activity 7 has the lowest crash cost within the Activities on the critical path. So, we choose to crash Activity 7 first.

Project scheduling can be performed in many ways. Some of the more common and popular methods of project scheduling are network analysis and the critical path method of scheduling (CPM). Although companies do not always use these methods in there exact form, most do tend to use a modified version of one or both of these methods. I discovered that Craft does not use network analysis or CPM, but they do have a scheduling method that works for them and is quite similar to CPM.

Formulating a network diagram, likewise alluded to as a logic diagram, in order to comprehend and envision how each task will continue is an extraordinary path to begin. It is a basic idea within project management planning that is effectively utilising as a part of application, commonly used as a part of assembling commercial enterprises, and also to outline and comprehend work processes are what service industries requires. It distinctively shows the rational rules for influencing tasks. (Holland, 2014) The development of the network diagram by incorporating the project team acquires an agreement of comprehension of how the undertaking ought to be accomplished. Nonetheless, giving a discussion to testing acknowledged