20 Aug Please respond to both student response POST1: and student response POST2: in at least 200 words. I have also included the original post only as reference.

Please respond to both student response POST1: and student response POST2: in at least 200 words. I have also included the original post only as reference.

Original post.

Define and analyze Critical Path management. How would you use it on a project? What values would you evaluate each week? Offer corrective actions you can take to get a project back on track.

POST1:

Hello Class,

Critical path management is the process or method to identify, schedule, and deal with project tasks that directly affect the end date (Lohrey, 2020). The critical path is the path with no slack. So, if the critical path of a project is late by one day, then the project will not be finished on time. The principles behind critical path management are cost control and efficiency (Lohrey, 2020). These project efficiencies are created by the project manger to determine which project tasks have the greatest change and effect on the timeline. When these project efficiencies are identified, then the schedule can be designed more accurately and the project deadlines will be completed with more accurate results.

The critical path is used by identifying each activity, establishing the dependencies, creating a network diagram, estimating the completion time for each activity, identifying the critical path, and updating the critical path diagram to show the progress of the project. I would use the critical path on a project to determine the shortest time possible to finish the project.

Values that can be monitored each week are the timeline and the correlation between tasks. This may allow the PM to find ways to shorten project tasks along the way can reduce time, and may be used to get a project back on track. The ultimate use of critical path management is to prepare and design a project schedule and to plan for project resources (Cristobal & Ramon, 2013). This will allow the PM to monitor and control project activity and meet each goal.

Ted

References:

Cristobal, S. Ramon, J. (2013). Critical path definition using multicriteria decsion making. Retrieved from

http://web.a.ebscohost.com.csuglobal.idm.oclc.org/…

Lohrey, J. (2020). What is the principle behind the critical path method & how does this affect project management? Retrieved from https://smallbusiness.chron.com/principle-behind-c…

POST2:

The critical path is the progression of interrelated activities that represent the longest path through a project, which determines the shortest possible project duration. Specifically, the critical path represents the longest sequence of activities in the project network. The project schedule, displayed as a network diagram, defines the network logic for all activities in the work package that either precede or succeed other related tasks. The earliest and the latest possible times can be added to the network diagram and where the two times are the same there is zero float. The chain of activities with zero float are in the critical path.

Network diagrams typically display timescale data poorly, but they are good at revealing mutual dependencies between tasks. They also allow activities to be prioritized based on task duration estimates. Besides activity precedence, the other piece of data required for calculating the critical path is the projected number of days for each task. Tasks with the least amount of flexibility represent the ones that will be included in the critical path (PMI, 2017). The project manager should prioritize activities on the critical path.

Critical path management (CPM) can be used to monitor the schedule for slippage. One corrective action the PM could take to reset the project if the schedule slips is crashing. Crashing assumes that the more resources the PM allocates to tasks the faster the project will be delivered. However, crashing requires a tradeoff between cost and time and should be considered shrewdly. Another corrective option is fast tracking. Fast tracking exploits Start to Start lags and alters the network logic by overlapping sequential stages (Pinto, 2015). An example that Pinto (2015) offers is executing design and construction phases parallelly rather than consecutively. The PM could also add more human and capital resources, improve current resources, and reduce the scope.

References:

Pinto, J. K. (2015). Project management: Achieving the competitive advantage (4th ed.). UpperSaddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Project Management Institute (PMI). (2017). A guide to the project management body of knowledge® (PMBOK® Guide) (6th ed.). Newtown Square, PA: PMI Publications.