MANAGING PROJECTS

Managing Projects



Managing Projects

Task 1: The Network Diagram

Introduction

Project management and planning has become one of the most important areas of building and construction industry. There are various approaches used for project management. This assignment describes the application of project management methodologies to the case of consultancy firm Hansdon Ltd.

Activity Network Diagram

The network diagram of the activities of Hansdon Ltd, using the given activity on the node is shown in figure 1.

Figure 1: Network Diagram using Essential Methodology

Timing of Activities and Total Float

In order to determine the timing and activities, we considered the given activity on the node. We calculated the timings by using the information of activities and relation between activities (Field and Keller, 2007. pp. 197)

Table 1 shows the ES: Earliest Start, EF: Earliest Finish, LS: Latest Start, LF: Latest Finish and TF: Total Float

We were easily able to calculate the timing of activities as the relationships between the predecessor and successor are already given. We considered the Earliest Start time, same as the earliest finish time of predecessor activity. Earliest start time is added with the duration of the activity in order to find out the earliest finish time. Latest Start time of the successor activity becomes the latest finish time of the predecessor, while duration of activity is subtracted from the latest finish time for computing Latest start time.

Total Float is the difference between earliest start time and the latest start time.

Table 1: Activity Timings

Activity

Duration

Predecessors

ES

EF

TS

TF

TFloat

A

4

-

0

4

0

4

0

B

5

A

4

9

10

15

6

C

9

B

9

18

9

18

0

D

4

B

9

13

9

13

0

E

7

B

9

16

11

18

2

F

5

B

9

14

13

18

4

G

11

C, D, E, F

14

25

18

29

4

H

5

G

25

30

29

34

4

I

4

G

25

29

25

29

0

J

5

H, I

29

34

29

34

0

K

5

J

34

39

34

39

0

L

7

K

39

46

37

49

3

M

5

K

39

44

39

44

0

N

5

L, M

44

49

44

49

0

O

7

N

49

56

49

56

0

P

4

O

56

60

56

60

0

Q

4

P

60

64

60

64

0

R

5

Q

64

69

64

69

0

Project Duration and Critical Path

The life circle of the project finishes, once all the activities of the project complete. The project duration can be simply defined as the time which the project takes to complete all of its activities. The method often used for calculating the critical path of the project is known as Critical Path Method (CPM). The critical path has a critical role for the entire project, as it has the effect to the project duration. The critical path takes describes that which activities in the project need to be done sequentially, and which can be done in parallel (Bureau of Energy Efficiency, 2010, pp.161).

The duration of the project is 69 days, as the last activity R finishes by this day. The critical path of the given activities, as depicted in figure 1 is A-B-C-G-H-J-K-L-N-O-P-Q-R. If any change occurs in these processes, the entire duration of the project will be affected.

Earliest Completion

For calculating the earliest duration of project, we used the following equation.

TRUNC(69/5)*7+MOD(69/5)

The values used are 69, which is the total number of days required for the project. 5 is used, as we are considering 5-day working weeks, and 7 for the total days in a week. The result obtained is 95. Therefore, if the project starts on Monday 6 August 2012, it will be completed on Wednesday 12 December 2012.

Change in Duration of Activities

Activity D is delayed 1 day.

No effect, as activity D is not in a critical path

Activity M is delayed 1 ...