Yankee Chair Company ‘The Yankee Chair Company was anxious to get @ NEW model rocking chair onto the market, Past efforts to introduce ne Todels had resulted in frustrating failure. Bret Ricks, president of Yankee Chair, was determined that it would not happen aBsln with the newest model. He had no confidence in his current management tear, s0 he hired Jan Dymore, a local consultant to organize and manage this project. He assigned a Yankee Chair manager, Tom Gort, to work with Dymore to stat developing some talent for project management within the company, Dymore decided to set up a PERT network and sided Gort through the process of listing activities, assigning precedence, and estimating completion times. She also explained the critical path concept to Gort, who by this time had a reasonable grasp of the project direction. At the first review session with Mr. Ricks, the PERT approach was accepted enthusiastcally, but toward the end of the review Dymore made some critical remarks about the product design and was subsequently released from the project. icks then asked Gort if he could carry on the oach by himself. Gort jumped at the chance, but fie rice he began to question whether or not he really cq wis the PERT network effectively. Dymore had made apg we ertical path would be and how long the project wou Take, but she had also told Gort that several other Sees fat to be made in order to calculate the exact ime estimates cach activity and the variances of those activity times realy did not understand the mathematics involved and ce, tainly did not want to Look bad in Ricks’ eyes, so he decided take Dymore's guess atthe critical path and get the best posiie ‘estimates of those activity times. By concentrating bis attention ‘on the critical path activities and ignoring the variance issues, he figured he could bring the project in on oe Questions: Will Gort’s approach work? How much moreof 1 gamble is Gort taking than any project manager normally takes? What should Gort watch out for? Scanned with CamScannercjcnnat software aati Software, Which Currently specialize, ic manufactring Tesource planning (Mi ms, is planning a major expansion sa Meese resource planning (ERP) ys got the tes sofware area wl be organ ‘a sone poet of stategic importance. The company he Pei 4 project manager and team to follow the projet uth to completion. The project team is very interested in ane an appropriate scheduling technique forthe project the project manager has thus set the following guidelines fey jeseeeton process: simple; able to show durations of event te fow of work, and the relative sequence of events; able ty indcate planning and actual flow, which items may proceed at the same time, and how far they are from completion, The asisant project manager favors the Gantt char, the finance rpreentatve likes PERT, and the information technology department head prefers CPM. in the instale IRP TI) systems nto installing the tems, This major Questions: If you were Would you use, and why? BIBLIOGRAPHY 313 the project manager, which method Scanned with CamScanner