LAGUNA COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS

City of Calamba

SCHOOL OF GRADUATE STUDIES

WRITTEN REPORT IN MGT 105

NAME: Maria Danielle T. Salazar PROFESSOR: Dr. Larino

YR/SEC.: MMPA
DATE: June 6, 2022

Network Scheduling Techniques

Network Diagrams
 Scheduling Process:
“the identification of the project objectives and the ordered activity necessary to
complete the project including the identification of resource types and quantities
required.”
 Project scheduling defines the network logic for all activities that must either
precede or succeed other tasks from the beginning of the project until its
completion.
 Benefits and Advantages of Scheduling:
 The Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) perhaps is the best
known of all the relatively new techniques. PERT has several distinguishing
characteristics:
 • It forms the basis for all planning and predicting and provides management with
the ability
 to plan.
 • It enables management for best possible use of resources to achieve a given
goal within
 time and cost limitations.
 • It provides visibility and enables management to control ''one-of-a-kind"
programs as
 opposed to repetitive situations.
 • It helps management to handle uncertainties involved by answering the
following questions
 that provides management with a means for evaluating alternatives:
 a) How time delays in certain elements influence program completion?
 b) Where slack exists between elements?
 c) What elements are crucial to meet the completion date?
  It provides a basis for obtaining the necessary facts for decision making.
 It utilizes a time network analysis as the basic method to determine manpower,
material, and capital requirements as well as providing a means for checking
progress.
 It provides the basic structure for reporting information.
 It reveals interdependencies of activities.
 It facilitates "what if" exercises.
 It identifies the longest path or critical paths.
 It allows us to perform scheduling risk analysis.
 The above-mentioned benefits apply to all network scheduling techniques, not
just PERT.
 Provide a basis for planning and how to use the resources
 Identify the critical path and project completion time
 Identify where slacks (float) are
 Reveal interdependencies of activities
 Aid in risk analysis (what-if analysis)

Network Scheduling Techniques

 Network scheduling techniques provide a logical process to consider the order in
which the project activities should occur.
 The primary methods for developing project activity networks are:
 Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT)
 Critical Path Method (CPM) – Also called Arrow Diagram Method (ADM)
 Precedence Diagram Method (PDM)
  There are two ways to show the network:
 Activity-On-Node (AON) – nodes represent the activities
 Activity-On-Arch (AOA) – archs represent the activities
 AON is easier, and it used in commercial software.

PERT
(Program Evaluation Review Technique)
CPM
(Critical Path Method)
 PERT was developed in the late 1950s in collaboration between the US Navy,
Booz-Allen Hamilton and Lockeed Corporation for the creation of the Polaris
missile program.
 CPM was developed at the same time by DuPont.
 Over the years the differences between PERT and CPM have blurred, so it is
common the refer these techniques as just PERT/CPM.
Precedence Diagramming Method (PDM)
 PERT/CPM networks do not allow for leads and lags between two activities; i.e. a
preceding activity must be completely finished before the start of the successor
activity.
 Precedence Diagramming Method (PDM) allows these leads and lags.
  Most project management software systems use PDM and show
interrelationships on bar charts.

Network Development Rules

 All activities must be linked to each other
 Network diagrams flow from left to right
 An activity cannot begin until all preceding connected activities have been
completed
 Each activity should have a unique identifier (number, letter, code, etc.)
 Looping is not permitted
 It is common to start from a single beginning and finish on a single ending node
Steps in Creating the Network
 Define the project and all of its significant activities
 Develop the relationship among activities
 Decide which activities must precede others
 Draw the network connecting all of the activities
 Compute the longest path which is the critical path
 Calculate activity slacks (float)
 Use the network to help plan, schedule, and control the project
Node Labels
 Nodes representing activities should be labeled with the following information:
 Identifier
 Description
 Duration
 Early Start Time
 Early Finish Time
 Late Start Time
 Late Finish Time
 Float

 Early Start (ES) – Earliest possible date an activity can start based on the
network logic and any schedule constraints.
 Early Finish (EF) = ES + Dur
 Late Start (LS) – Latest possible date an activity may begin without delaying a
specified milestone (usually project finish date).
 Late Finish (LF) = LS + Dur
Project Scheduling Techniques
 Serial activities flow from one to the next
 Concurrent activities are accomplished at the same time
 Merge activities have two or more immediate predecessor
 Burst activities have two or more successor activities
EXAMPLE:
 Path One: A-B-E-H = 18 weeks
 Path Two: A-B-D-F-H = 29 weeks
 Path Three: A-C-D-F-H = 30 weeks
 Path Four: A-C-G-H = 22 weeks
Path three is the critical path
Forward Pass
 Forward pass determines the earliest times (ES) each activity can begin and the
earliest it can be completed (EF).
 There are three steps for applying the forward pass:
  Add all activity times along each path as we move through the network
(ES + Dur = EF)
 Carry the EF time to the activity nodes immediately succeeding the
recently completed node. That EF becomes the ES of the next node,
unless the succeeding node is a merge point
 At a merge point, the largest preceding EF becomes the ES for that node
(because the earliest the successor can begin is when all preceding
activities have been completed)

Backward Pass
 The goal of the backward pass is to determine each activity's Late Start (LS) and
Late Finish (LF) times.
 There are three steps for applying the backward pass:
 Subtract activity times along each path through the network (LF – Dur =
LS).
 Carry back the LS time to the activity nodes immediately preceding the
successor node. That LS becomes the LF of the next node, unless the
preceding node is a burst point.
 In the case of a burst point, the smallest succeeding LS becomes the LF
for that node (because the latest the predecessor can finish is when any
one of the successor activities should start)
Slack Time (Float)
 Since there exists only one path through the network that is the longest, the other
paths must either be equal or shorter.
 Therefore, there are activities that can be completed before the time when they
are actually needed.
 The time between the scheduled completion date and the required date to meet
critical path is referred as the slack time.
 The activities on the critical path have zero slack time.
 The use of slack time provides better resource scheduling.
 It is also used as warning sign i.e. if available slack begins to decrease then
activity is taking longer than anticipated.
 Slack time is equal to:
LS – ES or LF – EF
 Activities on the critical path have 0 slack; i.e. any delay in these activities will
delay the project completion.
Reducing the Critical Path
 Eliminate tasks on the Critical Path
 Convert serial paths to parallel when possible
 Overlap sequential tasks
 Shorten the duration on critical path tasks
 Shorten
 early tasks
 longest tasks
 easiest tasks
 tasks that cost the least to speed up
Lag
 Lag is the time between Early Start or Early Finish of one activity and Early Start
and Early Finish on another activity.
 For example, in a Finish-to-Start dependency with a 10-day lag, the successor
activity cannot start until 10 days after the predecessor activity has finished.
 Lags are not the same as slacks. Lags are between activities whereas slacks are
within activities.
Lead
 Lead allows an acceleration of the successor activity. We can expedite the
schedule by not waiting a preceding activity to be completely finished before
starting its successor.
 For example, in a Finish-to-Start dependency with a 10-day lead, the successor
activity can start 10 days before the predecessor activity has finished.