Project Time Management
One Minute Thirty Second Overview
My Favorite Triple Constraint View
Think of it as Schedule Management
• If Scope grows/changes, schedule must adapt
• There will be unknowns do deal with – making
it important to
--define sequence of activities
--estimate time needed for each one
--build in some contingency time
-- AND MONITOR, all the way through
It is surprising how slow-going the route from
80% complete to 100% complete can be.
Tools to help manage time with complex
projects include GANTT Charts and Critical Path
Analysis.
What’s Critical Path Analysis?
• The critical path is simply all the tasks that determine the
end date in your project schedule.
Float is….
• In project management, float or slack is the amount of time
that a task in a project network can be delayed without
causing a delay to:
• subsequent tasks ("free float")
• project completion date ("total float")
• http://cms.chicostatepm.webnode.com/capm/
Time Management
• Includes all the processes used to assure
timely completion of the project.
Most important output: the project schedule.
• How it all relates….
Time
• The scope planning process list of activities
-
Activity List is the input to  activity
sequencing, activity resource estimating, activity
duration estimating processes.
Time
• The activity sequence process identifies the
dependencies among the schedule activities
that must be performed.
Time
• The main output of the activity seq. process
are the diagrams used to used to show the
timelines, schedule of work, and
dependencies. Here’s a simple one -
Time
• The diagrams + activity resource requirements
(simply, what you need) that you got from the
resource estimating process ….
• PLUS the activity duration estimates you got
from the activity duration estimating process…
Become the input item to the what?
SCHEDULE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
Time
• The schedule development process  the
project schedule; once approved, it becomes
the schedule baseline, which becomes an
input to…..
SCHEDULE CONTROL PROCESS
Understand How This is Fitting
Together
• Major task of the activity definition process is
to generate the activity list by decomposing
the WBS work packages into activities.
• Major task of the activity sequencing process
is to determine the dependencies among the
activities in the activity list. This makes the list
a “what-put” to the sequencing process?
INPUT
Time
• The output of the activity sequencing process
is a diagram or schema that displays the
dependencies.
• Once you figure out what the activity resource
requirements are, you can estimate the
duration of each activity. (Imagine your own
schedule)
Example – Activity Sequencing
Example: Activity Sequencing
IT Sequencing Example
Any Activity Sequencing
“Models real-world workflows of business
processes…displays which actions need to
take place, and what the dependencies are.”
Time
The approved project schedule acts as a
baseline against which the project process is
tracked.
Things to be careful about…
• Changing the quantity of a resource will affect
the duration estimate (e.g. do more with less.)
• Each activity on a critical path has zero (or
negative) float time and thus poses a schedule
risk. Monitor all critical path activities
carefully.
Also Remember
• That the schedule activities are not the
components of the WBS –they are
components of the project schedule.
• What are components of the WBS?
WBS
Remember for CAPM
• The activity list, generated as an output of the
activity definition process, becomes a
component of the PM plan. Of course!
• Fast-tracking compresses the schedule by
performing activities in parallel which will
otherwise be performed in a sequence
whereas…
Remember
• Crashing compresses the schedule by
assigning more resources.
Can you think of an example of crashing, or tell
us what it might look like?
Have Knowledge of This for CAPM
• You need to know what CRITICAL PATH refers
to.
• Know what “float” is and basically how to
calculate it.
• You can refer to the glossary on our site if
needed.