Week 4- Project Crashing and Gantt Charts Flashcards
how can a project be completed sooner?
By “crashing” the time it takes to complete certain stages by throwing more money at it
What impact does project crashing have on indirect and direct costs?
Increases direct costs but may decrease indirect costs because you may avoid the pitfalls of finishing the project late
What is the formula to work out the cost to crash per period?
Cost cost- Normal cost/ Normal time- crash time
What is the crash cost?
The activity cost associated with the crash time
what is the crash time?
The shortest possible tie to complete an activity
what is the first tihing you should do when crashing a project?
Work out the cost to crash per period for each activity in the project
What are the only activities that you can crash to reduce the length of the project?
Ones on the critical path
which activity are you going to crash first?
The one on the critical path with the lowest cost of crashing per period
When should you stop the crashing proceedure?
- When the target project completion is met
- The completion date cant be shortened any further
- An increase in direct costs exceeds the savings from indirect costs
what are gantt charts used for?
Communicating project plans to stakeholders
which activities should you plot on a gantt chart first?
The critical ones
what re the two extemes at which you can plot non-critical activities?
They can be plotted for completion as early as possible or as late as possibel
what is the reason for plotting a non critical activity as early as possible on a gantt chart?
If there is a high risk of not completing them on time in order to minimise the risk of the project running over schedule
what is the reason for plotting a non critical activity as late as possible on a gantt chart?
If you have a loan and dont want to start paying interest on the machinery until the last possible point (pushing costs into the future to maintain cash flow)
what are the advantages of a gantt chart?
- Easily understood
- easily linked to a precedence table so can be quickly plotted
what are the disadvantages of a gantt chart?
- Can only fit a small project onto a single sheet of paper or screen
- Many projects too complex to communicate with Gantt chart
- Activity is only defined in duration, not resources, costs or work
- Showing dependencies clutter diagrams
- Workload within each period of activity assumed constant
- Gantt chart taken as reality rather than what I would like
what is RACI analysis?
The process of assigning people to activities of the gantt chart. Stands for Responsible, accountable, consulted, informed
what does Responsible mean in RACI analysis?
WHo is responsible for doing the task on the gantt chart
what does accountable mean in RACI analysis?
who is accountable for resources needed for an activity on the gantt chart
what does consulted mean in RACI analysis?
Who needs to be consulted before the activity on the Gantt chart can take place
what does informed mean in RACI analysis?
Who needs to be informed of the outcome of the activity on the gantt chart
what is slack time?
The time between the earliest possble time an activity can start and the latest possible time it can start
what is student syndrome?
When given a deadline, many ask for more time. when given more time many then delay starting their project
