Note: In exam explain algorithm

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PROJECT Scheduling Methods
- Project Scheduling or project management is used to schedule, manage and control
projects which are comprised of various independent activities or tasks.
- The management of large projects requires analytical tools for scheduling activities and
allocating resources. The tools are collectively known as the Project Evaluation and
Review Technique (PERT) and the Critical Path Method (CPM).
1. PERT
– Program Evaluation and Review Technique
– Developed by U.S. Navy for Polaris missile project
– Developed to handle uncertain activity times
2. CPM
– Critical Path Method
– Developed by Du Pont & Remington Rand
– Developed for industrial projects for which activity times generally
were known
- Today’s project management software packages have combined the best features of
both approaches.
- PERT/CPM is used to plan the scheduling of individual activities that make up a
project.
- Projects may have as many as several thousand activities.
- A complicating factor in carrying out the activities is that some activities depend on the
completion of other activities before they can be started.
- Project managers rely on PERT/CPM to help them answer questions such as:
1. What is the total time to complete the project?
2. What are the scheduled start and finish dates for each specific activity?
3. Which activities are critical and must be completed exactly as scheduled to
keep the project on schedule?
4. How long can noncritical activities be delayed before they cause an
increase in the project completion time?
- PERT/CPM uses a network representation to capture the precedence or parallel
relationships among the tasks in the project.
- The PERT/CPM formalism has these elements and rules:
- A project network can be constructed to model the precedence of the activities.
- The nodes of the network represent the activities.
- The arcs of the network reflect the precedence relationships of the activities.
- A critical path for the network is a path consisting of activities with zero slack.
- Slack is the amount of time that noncritical activities can be delayed without
increasing the project completion time.
- Immediate predecessor(s) is (arc) activities that must be completed immediately
before the current activity can begin.
- The (estimated) project duration or project completion time equals the length of the
longest path through the project network.
- This longest path is called the critical path. (If more than one path tie for the longest,
they all are critical paths.)
Procedure for solving a Project Network
1. Determine the sequence of activities.
2. Construct the network or precedence diagram.
3. Starting from the left, compute the Early Start (ES) and Early Finish (EF)
time for each activity.
4. Starting from the right, compute the Late Finish (LF) and Late Start (LS)
time for each activity.
5. Find the slack for each activity.
6. Identify the Critical Path.
Where,
t Duration of an activity
ES The earliest time an activity can start
EF The earliest time an activity can finish (EF = ES + t)
LS The latest time an activity can start and not delay the project
LF The latest time an activity can finish and not delay the project
Slack The extra time that could be made available to an activity without
delaying the project (Slack = LS – ES)
Critical Path The sequence(s) of activities with no slack
Example:
PERT/CPM with
Step 1: Determine the sequence of activities.
Immediate Completion
Activity Predecessors Time (days)
A --- 3
B A 3
C A 2
D B 3
E C 7
F B,C 3
G D,E 6
H C 2
Step 2: Construct the network or precedence diagram.

Project Network

B D

G
F
A Finish
Start
H
E

Step 3: Make a forward pass through the network as follows: For each activity i
beginning at the Start node, compute:
- Earliest Start Time = the maximum of the earliest finish times of all activities
immediately preceding activity i. (This is 0 for an activity with no predecessors.)
- Earliest Finish Time = (Earliest Start Time) + (Time to complete activity i ).
The project completion time is the maximum of the Earliest Finish Times at the
Finish node.
 Earliest Start and Finish Times

B 3 6 D 6 9
3 3
G 12 18
F 6 9
6
A 0 3 3
Start Finish
3
H 5 7
E 5 12
2
7
C 3 5
2

Step 4: Make a backwards pass through the network as follows:

Latest Finish Time Rule: LF = Smallest LS of the immediate successors.
The immediate successors for a node are all nodes that immediately follow the current
node.
Procedure for obtaining latest times for all activities:
1. For each of the activities that link directly to the finish node, set LF equal to
project completion time.
2. For each activity whose LF value has just been obtained, calculate LS = LF –  (the
time to complete the current activity)
3. For each new activity whose immediate successors now have LS values, obtain its
LF by applying the latest finish time rule. Apply step 2 to calculate its LS.
4. Repeat step 3 until LF and LS have been obtained for all activities.
Latest Start and Finish Times

B 3 6 D 6 9
3 6 9 3 9 12
G 12 18
F 6 9
6 12 18
A 0 3 3 15 18
Start Finish
3 0 3
H 5 7
E 5 12
2 16 18
7 5 12
C 3 5
2 3 5
Step 5: Calculate the slack time for each activity by:
Slack = (Latest Start) - (Earliest Start), or
= (Latest Finish) - (Earliest Finish).
- Activity Slack Time
Activity ES EF LS LF Slack
A 0 3 0 3 0 (critical)
B 3 6 6 9 3
C 3 5 3 5 0 (critical)
D 6 9 9 12 3
E 5 12 5 12 0 (critical)
F 6 9 15 18 9
G 12 18 12 18 0 (critical)
H 5 7 16 18 11
Step 6: Determining the Critical Path
- A critical path is a path of activities, from the Start node to the Finish node, with 0 slack
times.
Critical Path: A–C–E–G
- The project completion time equals the sum of the duration times of all activities along
the critical path.
Project Completion Time: 18 days
- The following schedule should be followed in order for the project to be completed in
18 days.
Activity A: Must begin on day 0 and be finished by day 3.
Activity B: May begin between day 3-6, and must be completed by day 9.
Activity C: Must begin on day 3 and be finished by day 6.
Activity D: May begin between day 6-9, and must be completed by day 12.
Activity E: Must begin on day 5 and be finished by day 12.
Activity F : May begin between day 6-15, and must be completed by day 18.
Activity G: Must begin on day 12 and be finished by day 18.
Activity H: May begin between day 5-16, and must be completed by day 18.
PERT WITH UNCERTAIN ACTIVITY TIMES
- Experience and historical data can be used for projects that have be completed in the
past (such as home and apartment construction) to provide accurate activity time
estimates.
- In many cases, however, projects are new or unique and activity times are uncertain. In
these cases estimating activity times could be difficult.
- When there is uncertainty associated with activity times, they are often best described
by a range of possible values instead of one specific time estimate.
- Uncertain activity times are treated as random variables with associated probability
distributions. These distributions allow us to form probability statements about the
likelihood of meeting a specific completion date.
- Three time estimates are collected for each activity to incorporate the uncertainty.
- Uncertain Activity Times
- In the three-time estimate approach, the time to complete an activity is assumed to
follow a Beta distribution.
- An activity’s mean completion time is:
t = (a + 4m + b) / 6
a = the optimistic completion time estimate
b = the pessimistic completion time estimate
m = the most likely completion time estimate
- An activity’s completion time variance is:
2
 (b  a ) 
 
 6 
a = the optimistic completion time estimate
b = the pessimistic completion time estimate
m = the most likely completion time estimate
- In the three-time estimate approach, the critical path is determined as if the mean
times for the activities were fixed times.
- The overall project completion time is assumed to have a normal distribution with
mean equal to the sum of the means along the critical path and variance equal to the
sum of the variances along the critical path.