Reconsider Prob. 10.3-4 involving a project at Stanley Morgan Bank to install a new management information system.

Ken Johnston already has obtained the earliest times, latest times, and slack for each activity (see a partial answer in the back of the book). He now is getting ready to use PERT/Cost to schedule and control the costs for this project. The estimated durations and costs of the various activities are given in the table on the right.

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(a) Use the Excel template for PERT/Cost in your OR Courseware to display the budget and schedule of costs based on earliest start times for this project on a single spreadsheet.
T

(b) Repeat part

(a) except based on latest start times.

(c) Use these spreadsheets to draw a figure like Fig. 10.17 to show the schedule of cumulative project costs when all activities begin at their earliest start times or at their latest start times.

(d) After 8 weeks, activities A, B, and C have been completed with actual costs of $190,000, $70,000, and $150,000, respectively.
Activities D, E, F, G, and I are under way, with the percent completed being 40, 50, 60, 25, and 20 percent, respectively.
Their actual costs to date are $70,000, $100,000, $45,000, $50,000, and $35,000, respectively. Construct a PERT/Cost report after week 8. Which activities should Ken Johnston investigate to try to improve their cost performances?