Project 

Management
Project Management

The on-going process of directing

and coordinating all the steps in the
development of an information
system
Goal
 to produce an IS that is
acceptable to its end-user
 developed within the specified
time frame and budget
Project Management...
Role
recognize such factors and to
eliminate/minimize their negative
effects
Players
manages a project to develop an IS
defines a project’s activities and
events
estimates the time and cost
necessary to complete each activity
Project Management...

Players (cont...)
schedules and assigns the activities
to specific members of the project
team
coordinates activities
monitors events
evaluates and reports on the
progress of the activities and events
Project Scheduling

determining the order in which activities

will be performed, setting start and end
times for each activity, and assigning
specific tasks to team members
SCHEDULING TOOLS
◦ GANTT Charts
◦ PERT/ CPM Charts
GANTT Charts

GANTT Charts
◦ developed by Henry L. Gantt
◦ a horizontal bar that graphically illustrates a
schedule
◦ horizontal axis : time
◦ vertical axis : activity
◦ length of the bar indicates duration of the
activity
GANTT Charts...
GANTT Charts (cont...)
◦ positioning of the bar shows the start and end
of the activity
◦ useful for tracking and reporting progress
◦ graphically displays a schedule
◦ often used to report progress because they
present an easily understood picture of project
status
GANTT Charts...

1. The completed portion of each bar is

shaded.
GANTT Charts...
current date

2. A triangle or arrowhead indicator is

used.
GANTT Charts...

3. A second bar shows the completed

work.
GANTT Charts...

Problems
◦ no indication of activity dependencies
◦ how an activity which is behind schedule can
influence the entire project
◦ no. of hours per day required to complete an
activity is not shown
◦ no. of people assigned is also not shown
◦ it can not determine how far ahead/behind
schedule a project is
Create a Gantt Chart
◦ Task 1 – Jan. 14 – Feb 10
◦ Task 2 – Feb 19 – Mar 18
◦ Task 3 – Mar 16 – Apr. 24
◦ Task 4 – May 4 – May 31
◦ Task 5 – Mar 19 – Apr 14
◦ Task 6 – Apr 16 – Jun 6
◦ Task 7 – May 16 – July 14
PERT/ CPM Charts

PERT (Program Evaluation Review

Technique)
◦ developed by the Navy Special Projects Office
in 1950’s to control the development of the
Polaris submarine missile program(Three point
estimate)
CPM (Critical Path Method)
◦ developed by the private industry at the same
time as PERT to meet similar project
management needs (Single point estimate)
PERT/ CPM Charts...

Charting Conventions
◦ Activity
- Describes each task
Shown as vectors
-Line with an Event
Represented as branches (lines)
-Identified by letters
- Start/end of an activity
PERT/ CPM Charts...

Event
◦ displayed graphically as nodes, circle or
rectangle
◦ identified as node in the network
Path
◦ sequence of activities leading from the
beginning node to the final node
PERT/ CPM Charts...

Dummy Activities
◦ indicated by dotted lines
◦ no labeled process description/time
◦ used to ensure continuity
Simultaneous activity
◦ serial arrangement means one after the other
◦ parallel format shows overlapping activities
PERT/ CPM Charts...
Concepts:
◦ Optimistic time estimate – completion time
expected if everything went exactly as planned
◦ Pessimistic time estimate – completion time
expected if everything possible went wrong
◦ Most likely time estimate – only if normal
problems are encountered
◦ Critical Path – defines the most sensitive part of
the chart that may affect the schedule of the
whole project (longest time to complete)
◦ Slack – extra time to do an activity without
affecting project schedules
Getting the Estimated Time and Slack

ET = Optimistic + 4 x Most Likely +

Pessimistic / 6

Slack/Float = Earliest Finish – Latest

Finish
PERT/ CPM Charts...

Rules in PERT/CPM Networks

Each activity must be represented by its
own branch on the chart.
Direction of time flows is indicated by
arrows. An activity line meeting an event
node indicates activity completion. The
length of an activity branch is not
representative of the time the activity will
take.
PERT/ CPM Charts...
 Relationship between activities are determined
by the sequence of the branches.
 If several activities terminate at one node, no
activities starting at that node may begin until
all entering activities are completed.
 For analysis reason, no two activities are
allowed to both start and end at the same
nodes. If the project network would seem to
require this, a dummy activity must be
inserted.
 A dummy activity has no time, it merely
preserves the proper sequencing in the network
design.
PERT/ CPM Charts...

Steps included:
1. determine the activities needed to
complete the project
2. sequential relationship of these activities
(try to establish as many simultaneous
activities as possible
3. estimate the completion time for each
activity
4. draw the PERT/CPM network, showing
the relationship activities as determined in
STEP 2
PERT/ CPM Charts...

Steps included:
5. starting with the beginning node of the
network, use the earliest start – earliest
finish relationships to determine the
project completion time (Forward Pass)
6. moving to the end node of the network,
use the latest start – latest finish
relationships to determine the activities on
the critical path and the float for activities
not on the critical path
PERT/ CPM Charts...

7. use the earliest time - earliest finish

relationships in STEP 5 and the latest start
– latest finish relationships in STEP 6 to
develop an activity time table for the
project
 Network Diagram
The most common information shown is:
The activity name
The normal duration time
The early start time (ES)
The early finish time (EF)
The late start time (LS)
The late finish time (LF)
The slack