Project Schedule Management by Eng Ssempebwa Kibuuka Ronald-Libre

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Project Schedule Management
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PROJECT SCHEDULE MANAGEMENT
BY: Eng Ssempebwa Kibuuka Ronald
ATLANTA INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY
Scheduling is the process of arranging, controlling and optimizing work and workloads in
a production process or manufacturing process. Scheduling is used to allocate plant and
machinery resources, plan human resources, plan production processes and purchase materials.
Forward scheduling is planning the tasks from the date resources become available to determine
the shipping date or the due date. Backward scheduling is planning the tasks from the due date or
required-by date to determine the start date and/or any changes in capacity required.
A schedule or a timetable, as a basic time-management tool, consists of a list of times at

which possible tasks, events, or actions are intended to take place, or of a sequence of events in
the chronological order in which such things are intended to take place. The process of creating a
schedule - deciding how to order these tasks and how to commit resources between the varieties
of possible tasks - is called scheduling, and a person responsible for making a particular schedule
may be called a scheduler. Making and following schedules is an ancient human activity. [Dunne,
1995]
Schedules can usefully span both short periods, such as a daily or weekly schedule, and
long-term planning with respect to periods of several months or years. They are often made using
a calendar, where the person making the schedule can note the dates and times at which various
events are planned to occur. Schedules that do not set forth specific times for events to occur may
instead list algorithmically an expected order in which events either can or must take place. [
Roos and AS Aiden 2009]
In some situations, schedules can be uncertain, such as where the conduct of daily life
relies on environmental factors outside of human control. People who are vacationing or
otherwise seeking to reduce stress and achieve relaxation may intentionally avoid having a
schedule for a certain period of time. [Shouman 1991]
A key character of scheduling is the productivity, the relation between quantity of inputs
and quantity of output. Inputs are plant, labor, materials, tooling, energy and a clean environment.
Outputs are the products produced in factories either for other factories or for the end buyer. The
extent to which any one product is produced within any one factory is governed by transaction
cost.
Output within the factory; the output of any one work area within the factory is an input to the
next work area in that factory according to the manufacturing process. [Koulouris 2007]
Production scheduling tools greatly outperform older manual scheduling methods. These
provide the production scheduler with powerful graphical interfaces which can be used to
visually optimize real-time workloads in various stages of production, and pattern recognition
allows the software to automatically create scheduling opportunities which might not be apparent
without this view into the data. For example, an airline might wish to minimize the number of
airport gates required for its aircraft, in order to reduce costs, and scheduling software can allow
the planners to see how this can be done, by analyzing time tables, aircraft usage, or the flow of
passengers.
The benefits of production scheduling include; Process change-over reduction, Inventory

reduction, leveling, Reduced scheduling effort, increased production efficiency, Labor load
leveling, accurate delivery date quotes, and real time information.
Batch production scheduling is the practice of planning and scheduling of batch

manufacturing processes. Although scheduling may apply to traditionally continuous processes
such as refining, it is especially important for batch processes such as those for pharmaceutical
active ingredients, biotechnology processes and many specialty chemical processes. [Kolisch and
Padman 2001]
A schedule may also involve the completion of a project with which the public has no interaction
public prior to its completion. In project management, a formal schedule will often be created as
an initial step in carrying out a specific project, such as the construction of a building,
development of a product, or launch of a program.
In project management, a schedule is a listing of a project's milestones, activities, and
deliverables, usually with intended start and finish dates. Those items are often estimated in terms
of resource allocation, budget and duration, linked by dependencies and scheduled events. A
schedule is commonly used in project planning and project portfolio management parts of project
management. Elements on a schedule may be closely related to the “work breakdown structure”
(WBS) terminal elements, the Statement of work, or a Contract Data Requirements List.
In many industries, such as engineering and construction, the development and maintenance of
the project schedule is the responsibility of a full-time scheduler or team of schedulers,
depending on the size of the project.
Establishing a project management schedule involves listing milestones, activities, and

deliverables with intended start and finish dates, of which the scheduling of employees may be an
element. A production process schedule is used for the planning of the production or the
operation, while a resource schedule aids in the logistical planning for sharing resources among
several entities. [Kianfar and Ranjbar 2011]
When scheduling situations become more complicated, for example when two or more
processes share resources, it may be difficult to find the best schedule. A number of common
scheduling problems become very difficult to solve as their size (number of procedures and
operations) grows. In such cases, a schedule "is obtained by estimating the duration of each task
and noting any dependencies amongst those tasks”. Dependencies, in turn, are tasks that must be
completed in order to make other tasks possible, such as renting a truck before loading materials
on the truck (since nothing can be loaded until the truck is available for things to be loaded on).
[Karaca and Onargan 2007]
Scheduling of projects, therefore, requires the identification of all of the tasks necessary
to complete the project, and the earliest time at which each task can be completed. In creating a
schedule, a certain amount of time is usually set aside as a contingency against unforeseen days.
This time is called scheduling variance, or float, and is a core concept for the critical path
method.
A schedule generated using critical path techniques often is not realized precisely, as
estimations are used to calculate times: if one mistake is made, the results of the analysis may
change. This could cause an upset in the implementation of a project if the estimates are blindly
believed, and if changes are not addressed promptly. However, the structure of critical path
analysis is such that the variance from the original schedule caused by any change can be
measured, and its impact either ameliorated or adjusted for. Indeed, an important element of
project postmortem analysis is the As Built Critical Path (ABCP), which analyzes the specific
causes and impacts of changes.
The critical path method (CPM) is a project modeling technique developed in the late
1950s by Morgan R. Walker of DuPont and James E. Kelley, Jr. of Remington Rand. Kelley and
Walker related their memories of the development of CPM in 1989. Kelley attributed the term
"critical path" to the developers of the Program Evaluation and Review Technique which was
developed at about the same time by Booz Allen Hamilton and the U.S. Navy. The precursors of
what came to be known as Critical Path were developed and put into practice by DuPont between
1940 and 1943 and contributed to the success of the Manhattan Project.
CPM is commonly used with all forms of projects, including construction, aerospace and
defense, software development, research projects, product development, engineering, and plant
maintenance, among others. Any project with interdependent activities can apply this method of
mathematical analysis. Although the original CPM program and approach is no longer used, the
term is generally applied to any approach used to analyze a project network logic diagram.
The essential technique for using CPM is to construct a model of the project that includes
the following: A list of all activities required to complete the project (typically categorized within
a work breakdown structure), the time (duration) that each activity will take to complete, the
dependencies between the activities and, Logical end points such as milestones or deliverable
items.
Using these values, CPM calculates the longest path of planned activities to logical end
points or to the end of the project, and the earliest and latest that each activity can start and finish
without making the project longer. This process determines which activities are "critical" (i.e. on
the longest path) and which have "total float" (i.e. can be delayed without making the project
longer).
In project management, a critical path is the sequence of project network activities which
add up to the longest overall duration. This determines the shortest time possible to complete the
project. Any delay of an activity on the critical path directly impacts the planned project
completion date (i.e. there is no float on the critical path). A project can have several, parallel,
near critical paths. An additional parallel path through the network with the total durations
shorter than the critical path is called a sub-critical or non-critical path. [Karaca and Onargan
2007]
CPM analysis tools allow a user to select a logical end point in a project and quickly
identify its longest series of dependent activities (its longest path). These tools can display the
critical path (and near critical path activities if desired) as a cascading waterfall that flows from
the project's start (or current status date) to the selected logical end point.
Although the activity-on-arrow diagram ("PERT Chart") is still used in a few places, it
has generally been superseded by the activity-on-node diagram, where each activity is shown as a
box or node and the arrows represent the logical relationships going from predecessor to
successor as shown here in the "Activity-on-node diagram”. These results, including the drag
computations, allow managers to prioritize activities for the effective management of project
completion, and to shorten the planned critical path of a project by pruning critical path activities,
by "fast tracking" (i.e. performing more activities in parallel), and or by "crashing the critical
path" (i.e., shortening the durations of critical path activities by adding resources).
Crash duration;"Crash duration" is a term referring to the shortest possible time for which
an activity can be scheduled. It is achieved by shifting more resources towards the completion of
that activity, resulting in decreased time spent and often a reduced quality of work, as the
premium is set on speed. Crash duration is typically modeled as a linear relationship between cost
and activity duration, however in many cases a convex function or a step function is more
applicable.
The Critical Path Method (CPM) provides a way for project managers to determine which
tasks are critical (zero slack time) and which tasks can be delayed (and for how long). Normally,
you would need specialized software such as MS Project, but not anymore, now you can just
download the CPM spreadsheet that implements the CPM / PERT algorithm in Excel. If you can
copy and paste, enter data into cells, and follow a few simple guidelines, you can do a critical
path analysis with almost no learning curve. [Kelleher 2004]
CPM scheduling is a technique that has been used since the 1950s, and the construction
industry benefits from its use in some areas such as the planning and controlling of projects,
communicating plans, and training new managers. Project managers use commercial project
management software based on critical path analysis, such as Primavera Project Planner P3
or Microsoft Project, which are based on heuristic methods to plan and control schedules.
[Liberatore et al. 2001]
In one research investigation, labor productivity improved by 6% when resources were

considered in CPM schedules and an additional 4–6% improvement was obtained when using
computerized systems Perdomo-Rivera 2004. Other efforts have attempted to integrate
Computer-Aided Drafting, Primavera Project Management software, and Geographical
Information Systems to generate three-dimensional 3D drawings and show synchronized
schedules that permit a faster and better conceptualization of projects and these may be useful
in scheduling, planning, controlling, and decision making processes. [Riley- 2000, Poku and
Arditi- 2006].
Originally, the critical path method considered only logical dependencies between
terminal elements. Since then, it has been expanded to allow for the inclusion of resources related
to each activity, through processes called activity-based resource assignments and resource
leveling. A resource-leveled schedule may include delays due to resource bottlenecks (i.e.,
unavailability of a resource at the required time), and may cause a previously shorter path to
become the longest or most "resource critical" path. A related concept is called the critical chain,
which attempts to protect activity and project durations from unforeseen delays due to resource
constraints.
Since project schedules change on a regular basis, CPM allows continuous monitoring of
the schedule, which allows the project manager to track the critical activities, and alerts the
project manager to the possibility that non-critical activities may be delayed beyond their total
float, thus creating a new critical path and delaying project completion. In addition, the method
can easily incorporate the concepts of stochastic predictions.
Currently, there are several software solutions available in the “industry” that use the
CPM method of scheduling. The method currently used by most project management software is
based on a manual calculation approach developed by Fondahl of Stanford University.
There are mathematical programming methods that involve formulating the scheduling
problem as an optimization problem where some objective, e.g. total duration, must be
minimized (or maximized) subject to a series of constraints which are generally stated as a set of
inequalities and equalities. The objective and constraints may involve zero-or-one (integer)
variables as well as nonlinear relationships. An appropriate solver is applied for the resulting
mixed-integer linear or nonlinear programming problem. The approach is theoretically
guaranteed to find an optimal solution if one exists. The disadvantage is that the solver algorithm
may take an unreasonable amount of time. Practitioners may use problem-specific simplifications
in the formulation to get faster solutions without eliminating critical components of the
scheduling model. [East and S. Kim 1993]
In manufacturing, the purpose of scheduling is to minimize the production time and costs,
by telling a production facility when to make, with which staff, and on which equipment.
Production scheduling aims to maximize the efficiency of the operation and reduce costs.
Scheduling is important as an internal process in computer science, wherein a schedule is

a list of actions from a set of transactions in databases, and scheduling is the way various
processes are assigned in computer multitasking and multiprocessing operating system design.
This kind of scheduling is incorporated into the computer program, and the user may be
completely unaware of what tasks are being carried out and when. Scheduling operations and
issues in computing may include; the operation of a network scheduler or packet scheduler, an
arbiter program that manages the movement of certain pieces of information in the computer.
Open shop scheduling, Job Shop Scheduling, Flow Shop Scheduling Problem, optimization
problems in computer science are some of the tasks of a scheduler.
Each job may be processed only at one workstation at a time, and each workstation can
process only one job at a time. However, unlike the job-shop problem, the order in which the
processing steps happen can vary freely. The goal is to assign a time for each job to be processed
by each workstation, so that no two jobs are assigned to the same workstation at the same time,
no job is assigned to two workstations at the same time, and every job is assigned to each
workstation for the desired amount of time. The usual measure of quality of a solution is its make
span, the amount of time from the start of the schedule (the first assignment of a job to a
workstation) to its end (the finishing time of the last job at the last workstation).
Project management scheduling; A Gantt chart is a type of bar chart, first developed by
“Karol Adamiecki” in 1896, and independently by Henry Gantt in the 1910s, that illustrates a
project schedule. Gantt charts illustrate the start and finish dates of the terminal elements and
summary elements of a project. Terminal elements and summary elements comprise the work
breakdown structure of the project. Modern Gantt charts also show the dependency (i.e.,
precedence network) relationships between activities. Gantt charts can be used to show current
schedule status using “percentage completed” shadings. Gantt charts can be used for scheduling
generic resources, so as well as their use in project management; they can also be used in
scheduling production processes and employee rostering. [Henry Gantt 1922]
There are many computer applications supporting the use of Gantt charts for employee
scheduling. Gantt charts can be used to track shifts or tasks and also vacations or other types of
out-of-office time. Although now regarded as a common charting technique, Gantt charts were
considered revolutionary when first introduced. This chart is also used in information technology
to represent data that have been collected. A Gantt chart is a vital tool for any project manager. It
helps you create a schedule for your project and track the status of each task. There are hundreds
of tools for creating Gantt charts, some far more complex than others. [Thomas Telford, 1994]
The project schedule is the tool that communicates what work needs to be performed,
which resources of the organization will perform the work and the timeframes in which that work
needs to be performed. The project schedule should reflect all of the work associated with
delivering the project on time. Without a full and complete schedule, the project manager will be
unable to communicate the complete effort, in terms of cost and resources, necessary to deliver
the project.
Project tracking; It is helpful to see an example of project tracking that does not include
earned value performance management. Consider a project that has been planned in detail,
including a time-phased spend plan for all elements of work. Figure 1 shows the cumulative
budget (cost) for this project as a function of time (the blue line, labeled PV). It also shows the
cumulative actual cost of the project (red line) through week 8. To those unfamiliar with EVM
(Earned Value Performance Management), it might appear that this project was over budget
through week 4 and then under budget from week 6 through week 8. However, what is missing
from this chart is any understanding of how much work has been accomplished during the
project. If the project was actually completed at week 8, then the project would actually be well
under budget and well ahead of schedule. If, on the other hand, the project is only 10% complete
at week 8, the project is significantly over budget and behind schedule. A method is needed to
measure technical performance objectively and quantitatively, and that is what EVM
accomplishes. [Thomas Telford, 1994]
Consider the same project, except this time the project plan includes pre-defined methods
of quantifying the accomplishment of work. At the end of each week, the project manager
identifies every detailed element of work that has been completed, and sums the EV for each of
these completed elements. Earned value may be accumulated monthly, weekly, or as progress is
made.
Earned value (EV)
Figure 4 shows all three curves together – which is a typical EVM line chart. The best
way to read these three-line charts is to identify the EV curve first, then compare it to PV (for
schedule performance) and AC (for cost performance). It can be seen from this illustration that a
true understanding of cost performance and schedule performance relies first on measuring
technical performance objectively. This is the foundational principle of EVM (Earned Value
Performance Management).
Before a project schedule can be created, the schedule maker should have a “work
breakdown structure” (WBS), an effort estimate for each task, and a resource list with availability
for each resource. If these components for the schedule are not available, they can be created with
a consensus-driven estimation method like Wideband Delphi (forecasting tool). The reason for
this is that a schedule itself is an estimate: each date in the schedule is estimated, and if those
dates do not have the buy-in of the people who are going to do the work, the schedule will be
inaccurate.
The building blocks of a schedule start with a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS). The
WBS is a hierarchical reflection of all the work in the project in terms of deliverables. In order to
produce these deliverables, work must be performed. A work breakdown structure (WBS), in
project management and systems engineering, is a deliverable-oriented decomposition of a
project into smaller components.
A typical approach in developing a WBS is to start at the highest level, with the product
of the project. For example, you are assigned as the project manager of a New Product
Development project. The new product you are developing is a new toy for children age's five
trough nine. The objective of this product development project is to increase the revenue of the
organization by ten percent. [Jaskowski and Sobotka 2006]
Above is an example of a WBS for this new toy. Each level of the WBS is a level of
detail created by decomposition. Decomposition is the process of breaking down the work into
smaller, more manageable components. The elements at the lowest level of the WBS are called
tasks. In the example above, brochures, advertising and commercials are all work packages or
tasks. [Jaskowski and Sobotka 2006]
Marketing collateral is on a summary level called a control account in project
management parlance. In Project Insight, project management software, control accounts are
called 'summary tasks.' Summary tasks are roll ups of the tasks underneath them.
The decomposition of a schedule will continue at varying rates. 'Brochures' is a task

identified at the fourth level of decomposition, while the 'marketing plan' is also a task, but
defined at the third level of decomposition.
As a project manager, the level of decomposition will be dependent on the extent to which
you will need to manage. Project Insight supports as many levels of hierarchy as are needed. The
expectation is that each task will have a single owner and the owner is expected to manage and
report on the work necessary to deliver the task. In Project Insight, this is called the 'task owner.'
If you cannot assign a single owner, or you need to have additional visibility into the progress of
that task, additional decomposition is recommended. [Jaskowski and Sobotka 2006]
Once all the deliverables of the project have been identified, tasks will be performed in
order to create the deliverables. In some cases, these activities are the physical deliverables, but
in other cases they are the actions that need to be performed. A physical deliverable, for example,
might be an image (an actual file) that is needed for the brochure.
During project scheduling, the first step is to define the work. This is typically done in a
hierarchical arrangement called a work breakdown structure (WBS) although the simplest
projects may use a simple list of tasks. In either case, it is important that the WBS or list be
comprehensive. It is also important that the elements be mutually exclusive, so that work is easily
categorized in one and only one element of work. The most detailed elements of a WBS
hierarchy (or the items in a list) are called activities (or tasks).
The second step during project scheduling is to assign a value, called planned value (PV),
to each activity. For large projects, PV is almost always an allocation of the total project budget,
and may be in units of currency (e.g., Uganda Shilling, dollars or Euros) or in labor hours, or
both. However, in very simple projects, each activity may be assigned a weighted “point value"
which might not be a budget number. Assigning weighted values and achieving consensus on all
PV quantities yields an important benefit of EVM (Earned Value Performance Management)
, because it exposes misunderstandings and miscommunications about the scope of the project,
and resolving these differences should always occur as early as possible. Some terminal elements
cannot be known (planned) in great detail in advance, and that is expected, because they can be
further refined at a later time.
The third step I project scheduling is to define “earning rules” for each activity. The
simplest method is to apply just one earning rule, such as the 0/100 rule, to all activities. Using
the 0/100 rule, no credit is earned for an element of work until it is finished. A related rule is
called the 50/50 rule, which means 50% credit is earned when an element of work is started, and
the remaining 50% is earned upon completion. Other fixed earning rules such as a 25/75 rule or
20/80 rule are gaining favor, because they assign more weight to finishing work than for starting
it, but they also motivate the project team to identify when an element of work is started, which
can improve awareness of work-in-progress. These simple earning rules work well for small or
simple projects because generally each activity tends to be fairly short in duration.
The final step is to execute the project according to the plan and measure progress. When
activities are started or finished, EV is accumulated according to the earning rule. This is
typically done at regular intervals (e.g., weekly or monthly), but there is no reason why EV
cannot be accumulated in near real-time, when work elements are started/completed. In fact,
waiting to update EV only once per month (simply because that is when cost data are available)
only detracts from a primary benefit of using EVM (Earned Value Performance Management),
which is to create a technical performance scoreboard for the project team.
Construction management decisions are made based on schedules that are developed
during the early planning stage of projects, yet many possible scenarios should be considered
during construction. Decisions could be made that rely solely on the expertise of schedulers that
use commercial software such as Primavera Project Planner P 3 , Primavera Project Management
P 5 , or Microsoft Project but sometimes the assumptions that are made during the planning stage
of a project change during construction. These decisions, however, need to be supported by a
risk management plan.
In many cases, even though allowances are considered during the planning stage to
minimize the risks, they may not be sufficient to cover all possibilities and the planner will still
have to react when changes occur. For instance, suppose that at a pavement facility, the raw
materials that are coming from a particular quarry are unexpectedly insufficient, or that
abnormal weather makes it too difficult to perform tasks outdoors. These, and many other
unpredictable events, constantly affect project schedules. In many cases, DMs are required to
make decisions quickly during construction.
Even though there are important resources whose restricted availability could affect
project schedules such as equipment, labor, or subcontractors, this article mainly discusses
how fuzzy mathematical models may be used to generate construction project schedules and
how to incorporate restrictions that are defined by schedulers on items such as materials, time,
and cost. Time cost tradeoffs may also be incorporated into schedules using fuzzy
mathematical models, which facilitate time-cost trade-off analysis. In this study, linear relations
are assumed in fuzzy mathematical models.
The proposed approach can help planners and schedulers allocate available resources to
competing tasks in such a fashion that two conflicting objectives can be satisfied using fuzzy
math modeling. Networks were analyzed using three methods: manual critical path method
C P M sch ed ul i n g calculations, Primavera Project Management software P 5 , and
mathematical models using the Optimization Programming Language OPL software. The
practitioners usually have little time to react to changes and the proposed approach can provide
fast solutions for small to moderate size problems up to a couple of thousand activities,
depending on the computer used.
Schedules may not simulate reality if they do not incorporate material constraints. Besides
material shortages and hence delays in project completion times, some other variables also
affect construction projects such as activity durations, early start time, late start time, early
completion time, late completion time, normal costs, and crash costs. The weather, traffic, and
the limited availability of other resources such as skilled workers, machines, equipment, etc.,
also cause some of these problems. Therefore, float calculated using CPM techniques will lose
its significance and new critical sequences will develop. [Wiest 1964] and [Kim and de la
Garza 2005]
Schedules that neglect material constraints might mislead planners and affect the control of
projects. Commercial project management software packages based on CPM schedules
integrated with compatible software provide DMs with valuable alternatives to prevent, or
minimize, the effects of probable delays, such as the software used for the Delay Analysis
System. [Yates 1993].
A different approach has been followed by other writers, who stress that considering project
constraints is not adequate because constraints need to be analyzed and prioritized depending on
their repercussions on the entire project. [ Chua and Shen 2005]
Optimization models have been used in construction projects, but they have not been
successful when used on large networks. CPM techniques with discrete information instead of
continuous membership functions have proven to be more efficient and they provide not
optimal, but usable solutions. However, some optimization techniques present the opportunity
for analyzing more than one objective at a time and this permits a more realistic approach.
Uncertainties have been analyzed by using fuzzy goal programming and optimal solutions have
been achieved while simultaneously considering two objectives and using membership
functions. [Moder et al.1983].
When the plans for a construction project are going to be used to build a different project
in another location the planning, controlling, and execution are performed in a different
manner due to the uniqueness of each project. Therefore, having similar characteristics such as
the plans and project duration, and using the same equipment, standard conditions, and
resources for two projects does not imply the application of the same procedures nor guarantee
similar results. Conditions could change and there could be delays and unexpected situations
that arise during construction. The volatility in the construction materials market makes
scheduled material deliveries uncertain. For example, as the demand for steel or cement
increases, deliveries could be delayed and projects may have to be cancelled. DMs may use
their experience to help achieve goals or objectives as effectively as possible by re-planning and
rescheduling projects when it becomes necessary to do so. [Moder et al.1983]
However, even though project managers may have experience in planning and executing
construction projects, imprecision and uncertainty in their decision-making practices still exists
in the scheduling of processes. The efficiency of a construction project depends on many
variables e.g., early start time, early completion time, late start time, late completion time,
normal cost, crash cost , conditions e.g., priorities, milestones, budget, expected duration, and
material requirement and uncertainties e.g., delays, schedule growth, cost growth, and
material constraints that have to be accounted for by providing forecasts to realistic
construction networks that generate a favorable schedule, minimize the project completion time
and costs and that also consider material constraints.[ Chua and Shen 2005]
Even when construction companies use commercial resource allocation software they
might have material shortages, and it is in these situations when having a mathematical model
with material constraints is useful. Personnel in the construction industry frequently have to
address material management issues, such as materials not being available where and when
they are needed, and a lack of information about where materials are located at job sites. These
problems may increase expenses and the required time to complete a project. Using fuzzy
mathematical models allows project managers to try to achieve the two main project objectives
of minimizing costs and time under material restrictions, and it helps them consider
ambiguities in decisions by using membership functions. Membership functions are used
gradual transition from “ zero” the non-satisfaction level to “one” the maximum
satisfaction level, which allows new constraints to be added to fuzzy mathematical models.
[Kim and de la Garza 2005]
CONCLUSION: Schedule control is a critical task in managing construction projects.

However in practice most contractors do not control and update schedule frequently due to lack
of proper controlling method in the real construction world. Most decision making rules are not
based on mathematical methods but on the contractor’s assumptions, limitations and
management style.
The main objective of providing strategies for scheduling is to provide engineers with
corresponding strategies rather than the fast track crashing project. Schedule control strategies
mainly are to prevent the condition that parts of critical activities are behind schedule severely
and extra resource for crashing the project will be paid.
Though the techniques of scheduling are well developed, they are inconsistently applied
throughout industry. Standardization and promotion of scheduling best practices are being
pursued by the Association for the Advancement of Cost Engineering (AACE), the Project
Management Institute (PMI).
There is not a much better conclusion to be made than that of project managers being the
project success determinants through their tracking of project schedules, resources, budgets and
project related assets in real time. The project schedule can be viewed and updated by team
members associated with the project, keeping everyone well informed on the overall project
status.
To compress the project time, project managers have to accelerate some activities at an
additional expense during project scheduling. Different decisions will be taken regarding
time and cost of each activity for overall network, the set of decisions that result will
contribute to desirable time, cost and realization of time cost trade off problem. This tradeoff
between time and cost gives project planners both challenges and opportunities to work out
the best plan that optimizes time and cost to complete a project and is therefore of
considerable economic importance.
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Project Schedule Management

Conference Paper · August 2013

Ronald Kibuuka Ssempebwa

Presidential Initiative On banana Industrial Development- Uganda View project

MAIZE VALUE CHAIN View project

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

A schedule or a timetable, as a basic time-management tool, consists of a list of times at

The benefits of production scheduling include; Process change-over reduction, Inventory

Batch production scheduling is the practice of planning and scheduling of batch

Establishing a project management schedule involves listing milestones, activities, and

In one research investigation, labor productivity improved by 6% when resources were

Scheduling is important as an internal process in computer science, wherein a schedule is

The decomposition of a schedule will continue at varying rates. 'Brochures' is a task

CONCLUSION: Schedule control is a critical task in managing construction projects.

1. N.Shahsavari Pour, M.Modarres, R.Tavakkoli-R.Moghaddam and E.Najafi, “Optimizing a

3. R.Kolisch and R.Padman. “An integrated survey of deterministic project scheduling,”

4. A.Zeinalzadeh. “An application of mathematical model to time cost tradeoff problem,”

7. 33 O.Bokor, T.Kocsis and G.Szenik. “New tools in project scheduling of the

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