Critical Path Analysis (3.3.4)

Question 1

What do business processes need to be?

Answer 1

Need to be efficient as possible

Question 2

What tends to happen when a product is first to the market?

Answer 2

Usually the one that is first adopted by customers so businesses want to capitalize on this. Allows a firm to start generating revenue to recover any money invested in their operations

Question 3

What is critical path analysis?

Answer 3

Main goal is to understand the longest amount of time a project will take and which activities will cause a delay if not completed on time

Question 4

What are the Advantages of a critical path analysis?

Answer 4

-Minimize project competition time
-Can plan cash flow and orders around tasks
-Can use JIT production
-Removes uncertainty in complex projects
-Identifies critical activities so you can allocate resources to them

Question 5

What are the Disadvantages of a critical path analysis?

Answer 5

-All based on estimates
-May encourage corner cutting
-CPA’s take time and delay projects starting
-Depends on the experience of the manager
-Doesn’t take into consideration unforeseen events (Pandemics)

Question 6

What does the usefulness of CPA’s depend on?

Answer 6

-The skill/flexibility of the workforce
-The accuracy of the estimates to complete each activity

Question 7

How do you work out Earliest Start Time?

Answer 7

Longest route to next node

Question 8

How do you work out Latest Finish time?

Answer 8

When activity must be finished

Question 9

What direction do you go in for EST and LFT?

Answer 9

EST- Left to Right
LFT-Right to Left

Question 10

What does Critical Path Analysis show?

Answer 10

-All the activities to be completed during a project
-The duration of each activity
-Which activities can be done simultaneously
-Which activities can only be done when another finishes
-How soon a project can be completed

Question 11

How do you Label the Node on a CPA?

Answer 11

Node reference EST
number LFT