Category: Developing the Project Schedule

Now that we have our key inputs (WBS, task relationships, effort estimates, and resource assignments), we are ready to build our initial schedule. There are a few keys to remember here: Value of Scheduling Software If you are not an advocate of scheduling software, or you need to help convince someone else in your organization,…

In this step, we think about what needs to be done first and what can be done at the same time. We want to capture the logical relationships that exist between the tasks in our WBS. The traditional technique used to capture these relationships is the network diagram. An example of a network diagram is…

Because we are on this wavelength, let’s go ahead and review the key steps involved in building a project schedule. The steps are also summarized in Figure 8.4. We will follow up this section with a more in-depth look at a few of these: Let’s take a closer look at a few of the key steps.…

The first step in building a schedule is to review the key inputs. Let’s make sure we are clear on these and where we are in the overall schedule development and planning process. To build a project schedule, you need five key inputs: Due to the amount of important information and the critical nature of…

I’ve used terms such as “realistic” and “well-developed” to describe the type of project schedule we want to develop. Before we continue, let’s clarify what the goal of the schedule development process should be. The schedule development process should generate a project schedule that meets the following criteria: After reviewing this list, you probably see…

The project schedule is the tool that merges all the work tasks to be performed, their relationships, their estimated durations, and their assigned resources to a calendar. Examples of partial schedules are illustrated in Figures 8.1 and 8.2. For most, specialized scheduling software (such as Microsoft [MS] Project) is used to produce a project schedule. For those managers…

It’s funny, really. The one activity that the common person associates with project management is planning, and the main output from this planning effort is a schedule. Yet, it is a challenge to find a project manager who can develop one accurately. Although scheduling is one of the two primary technical aspects of project management,…