The Scheduling Dilemma

Sarah's project had now become more than she had anticipated. Sarah's company had a philosophy that the project manager would be assigned during proposal preparation, assist in the preparation of the proposal, and take on the role of the project manager after contract award, assuming the company would be awarded the contract. Usually, contract go-ahead would take place within a week or two after contract award. This made project staffing relative easy for most of the project managers. It also allowed the company to include in the proposal a detailed schedule based on resources that would be assigned upon contract award and go-ahead. During proposal preparation, the project manager would anticipate who would be available for assignment to this project over the next few weeks. The functional managers could then estimate with reasonable accuracy the duration and effort required based on the grade level of the resources to be assigned. Since the go-ahead date was usually two weeks after contract-award and the contract award was usually within a week or so after proposal submittal, the schedule that appeared in the proposal was usually the same schedule for the actual project with very few changes. This entire process was based on the actual availability of resources rather than the functional managers assuming unlimited resources and using various estimating techniques. Although this approach worked well on most projects, Sarah's new project had a go-ahead date of three months after contract award. For the functional managers, this created a problem estimating the effort and duration. Estimating now had to be made based on the assumption on unlimited availability rather than on the availability of limited resources. Functional managers were unsure as to who is available three or four months from now, yet some type of proposal had to appear in the proposal. Sarah knew the risks. When the estimates were being prepared for her proposal, the functional managers assumed that the average worker in the department would be available and assigned to the project after go-ahead. The effort and duration estimates were then made based on the average employee. If, after go-ahead, above-average employees would be assigned to Sarah's project, she could possibly see the schedule accelerated but had to make sure that cost overruns did not happen because the fully loaded salary of the workers might be higher than what was estimated in the proposal. If below-average workers are assigned, a schedule slippage might occur, and Sarah would have to look at possible schedule compression techniques, hopefully without incurring added costs. AWARD OF CONTRACT Sarah's company was awarded the contract. Sarah had silently hoped that the company would not get the contract, but it did. As expected, the go-ahead date was three months from now. This created a problem for Sarah because she was unsure as to when to begin the preparation of the detailed schedule. The functional managers told her that they could not commit to an effort and duration based on actual limited resource availability until somewhere around two to three weeks prior to the actual go-ahead date. The resources were already spread thin across several projects, and many of the projects were having trouble. Sarah was afraid that the worst case scenario would come true and that the actual completion date would be longer than what was in the proposal. Sarah was certainly not happy about explaining this to the client should it be necessary to do so. APPROACHING GO-AHEAD DAATE As the go-ahead date neared, Sarah negotiated with the functional managers for resources. Unfortunately, her worst fears came true when, for the most part, she was provided with only average or above average resources. The best resources were in demand elsewhere, and it was obvious that they would not be available for her project. Using the efforts and durations provided by the functional managers, Sarah prepared the new schedule. Much to her chagrin, she would be at least two weeks late on the four-month project. The client would have to be told about this. But before telling the client, Sarah decided to look at ways to compress the schedule. Working overtime was a possibility, but Sarah knew that overtime would lead to burned-out workers and increased chances of making mistakes. Also, Sarah knew that the workers did not want to work overtime. Crashing the project by adding more resources was impossible because no other resources were available. Outsourcing some of the work was not possible as well because the statement of work identified proprietary information provided by the client and that the contract would not allow any outsourcing of the work to a third party. Because of the nature of the work, doing some of the work in parallel rather than in series was not possible. There was always the chance that the assigned resources could get the job done ahead of schedule, but Sarah believed that a schedule delay was inevitable. TIME FOR A DECISION Sarah had to make a decision as to when and how to inform the client of the impending schedule delay. If she told the truth to the client right now, the client might understand but might also believe that her company had lied in the proposal. That would be an embarrassment for her company. If she delayed informing the client, there might be a chance, however slim, that the original schedule in the proposal will be adhered to. If the client was informed at the last minute about the delay, it could be costly for the client and equally embarrassing for her company. Source: Kerzner (2017) Answer ALL the questions in this section.

SECTION B [60 Marks] Answer ANY THREE (3) questions in this section.

QUESTION 1

Is it possible to convince a client that the schedule is just a rough guess during competitive bidding and that finalisation of the schedule can be made only after the go-ahead? Justify your response. 1.1 (10 marks) Critically discuss the two (2) major schedule compression techniques that were considered in the case study and justify with confidence, which would be the more practical technique to adopt. 1.2 (30 marks)

QUESTION 2 [20 Marks]

The technical staff you requested to work on your project were not familiar with a key project management concept, task dependency. Using relevant diagrams, illustrate to these staff the different types of dependencies among tasks and provide examples to demonstrate simply each dependency type.

QUESTION 3 [20 Marks] Provide a critical discussion on the main contents of a project scope statement.

QUESTION 4

The schedule below was developed for a construction project. A contract was entered into to deliver the project within 12 days. A clause in the contract stated that the project contractor will be penalised R5 000 per day for each day that the project was delayed and R1 000 per day should the project be successfully concluded earlier than the 12 stipulated days. Answer the questions that follow and be sure to adhere to all technical requirements for diagrams and calculations required. ACTIVITY DURATION (Days) PREDECESSOR A 1 - B 3 - C 1 - D 2 A E 4 D F 3 D G 2 C H 3 B I 4 H J 2 G K 5 EJ L 4 F M 6 J N 2 L O 1 KM 4.1 Create an activity on node (AON) network diagram for the schedule above. (5 marks) 4.2 Find the critical path using slack for the schedule above. (10 marks) Will the project contractor be paying a penalty or be receiving a reward? Calculate the value of the penalty/reward. 4.3 (5 marks)

QUESTION 5 [20 Marks]

Breaking work into smaller tasks is a common project management technique used to make the work more manageable and approachable. A work breakdown structure (WBS) is a visual, hierarchical, and deliverable-oriented deconstruction of a project. Analyse and discuss how this tool will assist a project manager to ensure the success of a project.