2 It is week 35 of a busy year at Ashby Architect’s and Jo Ashby is facing a big problem. Both her two junior partners have been diagnosed with a serious illness contracted on a trip to scope out a prospective job in Lichtenstein. So Jo has to step in and complete the outstanding jobs that were being worked on by the two juniors. The outstanding jobs are shown in Table 10.3 .

Jo has heard that a sequencing rule called the critical ratio (CR) will give efficient results. The priority of jobs using the CR rule is defined by an index computed as follows:

CR =

time remaining work days remaining

=

due date-today’s date work days remaining Using this rule, in what priority should Jo give the jobs?

Job Due Date (week) Weeks of work remaining Ashthorpe lavatory block 40 2.0 Bubgwitch bus shelters 48 5.0 Crudstone plc HQ 51 3.0 Dredge sewage works 52 8.0 Table 10.3 Outstanding jobs that Jo will need to complete