At the Hard Rock Cafe, like many organizations, project management is a key planning tool. With Hard Rocks constant growth in hotels and cafes, remodeling of existing cafes, scheduling for Hard Rock Live concert and event venues, and planning the annual Rockfest, managers rely on project management techniques and software to maintain schedule and budget performance.

Tomasso is in charge of the Rockfest event, which is attended by well over 100,000 enthusiastic fans. The challenge is pulling it off within a tight 9-month planning horizon. As the event approaches, Tomasso devotes greater energy to its activities. For the first 3 months, Tomasso updates his Microsoft Project charts monthly. Then at the 6-month mark, he updates his progress weekly. At the 9-month mark, he checks and corrects his schedule twice a week.

The day of the rock concert itself is not the end of the project planning. Its nothing but surprises. A band not being able to get to the venue because of traffic jams is a surprise, but an anticipated surprise. We had a helicopter on stand-by ready to fly the band in, says Tomasso.

On completion of Rockfest in July, Tomasso and his team have a 3-month reprieve before starting the project planning process again.

Questions

1. Draw AON network (4 points). Please use software tool (such as Excel or PowerPoint) to draw the diagram. Note, to get credit, your diagram must clearly tell from which activity to what activity.

2. Perform CPM analysis by identifying ES, EF, LS, LF, Slack time, and whether critical, for each activity. (4 points)

3. What is the critical path? How long does the project take? (2 points)

4. To shorten the project time to by 4 weeks, which activity or activities should be crashed to minimize the increased cost? What is the new project duration after crashing? What is the increased cost? What is the critical path(s) now? (2 points)

data

ACTIVITY	DESCRIPTION	PREDECESSOR(S)	TIME (WEEKS)	COST ($)
NORMAL	CRASH	NORMAL	CRASH
A	Finalize site and building contracts		7	4	3100	3970
B	Hire production manager	A	3	2	2000	2560
C	Select local promoter	A	3	3	1500	1500
D	Target headline entertainers	C	4	2	3800	4540
E	Hire operations manager	A	4	4	2700	2700
F	Design promotional Web site	C	5	3	2500	3070
G	Set TV deal	F	5	4	2200	2500
H	Hire director	G	4	3	900	1690
I	Plan for TV camera placement	H	2	2	3500	3500
J	Set venue capacity	B	2	2	2300	2300
K	Ticketmaster contract	F, J	3	2	1200	1470
L	Target support entertainers	D	4	3	2600	2960
M	Travel accommodations for staff	C	20	17	3900	5100
N	Passes and stage credentials	I, L	5	5	3000	3000
O	Travel accommodations for talent	L	10	7	1000	2140
P	Sound and staging	B	6	4	2500	3420
Q	Secure merchandise deals	C	6	6	2000	2000
R	On-site ticketing	K	8	7	2200	2400
S	Hire sponsor coordinator	C	4	3	3200	3880
T	Finalize sponsors	S	4	2	1300	2360
U	Define/place signage for sponsors	T, X	3	3	2200	2200
V	Hire security director	E	7	4	3200	5630
W	Develop site plan	E	6	3	1200	2430
X	Power, plumbing, AC, toilet services	W	8	7	2200	2800
Y	Set police/fire security plan	V	4	2	1300	2160
Z	Online merchandise sales	Q	6	3	700	1690
End	A dummy end node	P,R,N,O,Z,U,Y,M	0	0	0	0