Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Introduction
Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) and the Critical Path
Method (CPM) can be used to plan, schedule and control a wide variety
of projects:
1. Research and development of new products and processes
2. Construction of plants, buildings and highways
3. Maintenance of large and complex equipment
4. Design and installation of new system
Objective of the project managers must schedule and coordinate the
various jobs or activities so that the entire project is completed on time.
A complicating factor in carrying out this task is the interdependence of
the activities.
Introduction
Projects may have as many as several thousand activities
project managers look for procedures that will help them
answer questions such as the following:
1. What is the total time to complete the project?
2. What are the scheduled start and finished dates for each
specific activity?
3. Which activities are critical and must be completed exactly
as scheduled to keep the project on schedule?
4. How long can noncritical activities be delayed before they
cause an increase in the total project completion time?
PERT and CPM can help answer these questions.
Introduction
Many activities associated with this project had never been
attempted previously, so PERT was developed to handle
uncertain activity times.
CPM was developed primarily for industrial projects for which
activity times were known.
CPM offered the option of reducing activity times by adding
more workers and/or resources, usually at an increased cost.
A distinguishing feature of CPM was that it identified trade
offs between time and cost for various project activities.
A
5
Start
A
5
B
6
Start
A
5
C
4
Start
B
6
A
5
Start
B
6
D
3
C
4
A
5
Start
B
6
E
1
D
3
C
4
A
5
Start
B
6
E
1
D
3
C
4
F
4
10
A
5
Start
B
6
E
1
F
4
10
D
3
G 10 24
14
C
4
A
5
Start
B
6
E
1
F
4
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D
3
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14
C
4
H 9
12
21
A
5
Start
B
6
E
1
F
4
10
D
3
G 10 24
14
C
4
H 9
12
21
I 24 26
2
Finish
Latest finish
time
A
5
Start
B
6
E
1
F
4
10
D
3
G 10 24
14
C
4
H 9
12
21
I 24 26
2 24 26
Finish
A
5
0
0
5
5
Start
B
6
E
1
F
4
10
D
3
G 10 24
14 10 24
C
4
H 9 21
12 12 24
I 24 26
2 24 26
Finish
A
5
Start
B
6
0
6
6
12
E
1
F
4
6 10
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D
3
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G 10 24
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C
4
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I 24 26
2 24 26
Finish
A
5
0
0
5
5
Start
B
6
0
6
6
12
E
1
5
5
6
6
F
4
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D
3
5 8
7 10
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C
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12 12 24
I 24 26
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Finish
Critical
Path
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Description
Develop product design
Plan market research
Prepare routing (manufacturing engineering)
Build prototype model
Prepare marketing brochure
Prepare cost estimate (industrial engineering)
Do preliminary product testing
Complete market survey
Prepare pricing and forecast report
Prepare final report
Immediate
Predecessor
A
A
A
C
D
B, E
H
F, G, I
C
3
A
6
Start
B
2
F
2
11
D
5
11
G 11 14
3
J 15 17
2
E
3
H
4
I 13 15
2
13
Finish
C 6 9
3 10 13
A
6
0
0
6
6
Start
B
2
0
7
F 9 11
2 13 15
D
5
6 11
7 12
G 11 14
3 12 15
J 15 17
2 15 17
E
3
6
6
H
4
I 13 15
2 13 15
2
9
9
9
9 13
9 13
Finish
Earliest
Finish
(EF)
6
2
9
11
9
11
14
13
15
17
Latest
Finish Slack Critical
(LF) (LS-ES) Path
6
0
Yes
9
7
13
4
12
1
9
0
Yes
15
4
15
1
13
0
Yes
15
0
Yes
17
0
Yes
Earliest
Finish
(EF)
7
10
6
9
12
Latest
Finish Slack Critical
(LF) (LS-ES) Path
7
0
Yes
10
0
Yes
7
1
10
1
12
0
Yes