Work Breakdown Structure

A complex project is made manageable by first breaking it down into individual

components in a hierarchical structure, known as the work breakdown structure, or the WBS.
Such a structure defines tasks that can be completed independently of other tasks, facilitating
resource allocation, assignment of responsibilities, and measurement and control of the project.
The Work Breakdown Structure can be illustrated in a block Diagram:

Because the WBS is a hierarchical structure, it may be conveyed in outline form:

Work Breakdown Structure Outline:
Level 1 Level 2 Level 3
Task 1 Task 1
Subtask 1.1
Work Package 1.1.1
Work Package 1.1.2
Work Package 1.1.3
Subtask 1.2
Work Package 1.2.1
Work Package 1.2.2
Work Package 1.2.3
Task 2
Subtask 2.1
Work Package 2.1.1
Sub Task Work Package 2.1.2 Su
1.1Work Package 2.1.3
Terminology for Different Levels
Each organization uses its own terminology for classifying WBS components according
to their level in the hierarchy. For example, some organizations refer to different levels as tasks,
sub-tasks, and work packages, as shown in the above outline. Others use the terms phases,
entries, and activities.

Organization by Deliverables or Phases

The WBS may be organized around deliverables or phases of the project life cycle.
Higher levels in the structure generally are performed by groups. The lowest level in the
hierarchy often comprises activities performed by individuals, though a WBS that emphasizes
deliverables does not necessarily specify activities.

Level of Detail
The breaking down of a project into its component parts facilitates resource allocation
and the assignment of individual responsibilities. Care should be taken to use a proper level of
detail when creating the WBS. On the one extreme, a very high level of detail is likely to result
in micro-management. On the other extreme, the tasks may become too large to manage
effectively. Defining tasks so that their duration is between several days and a few months works
well for most projects.

WBS's Role in Project Planning

The work breakdown structure is the foundation of project planning. It is developed
before dependencies are identified and activity durations are estimated. The WBS can be used to
identify the tasks in the CPM and PERT project planning models.
 Henry Laurence Gantt

Henry Laurence Gantt (1861-1919) was a mechanical engineer and management

consultant who is most famous for developing the Gantt chart in the 1910s. These Gantt charts
were employed on major infrastructure projects including the Hoover Dam and Interstate
highway system.

Henry Laurence Gantt's legacy to management is the Gantt chart. Accepted as a

commonplace project management tool today, it was an innovation of world-wide importance in
the 1920s. But the Chart was not Gantt's only legacy; he was also a forerunner of the Human
Relations School of management and an early spokesman for the social responsibility of
business.

Life and carrier

Henry L Gantt was born into a family of prosperous farmers in Maryland in 1861. His
early years, however, were marked by some deprivation as the Civil War brought about changes
to the family fortunes. He graduated from Johns Hopkins College and was a teacher before
becoming a draughtsman in 1884 and qualifying as a mechanical engineer. From 1887 to 1893
he worked at the Midvale Steel Company in Philadelphia, where he became Assistant to the
Chief Engineer (FW Taylor) and then Superintendent of the Casting Department. Gantt and
Taylor worked well in their early years together.

Gantt chart
During the era of scientific management, Henry Gantt developed a tool for displaying the
progression of a project in the form of a specialized chart. An early application was the tracking
of the progress of ship building projects. Today, Gantt's scheduling tool takes the form of a
horizontal bar graph and is known as a Gantt chart, a basic sample of which is shown below:
Gantt chart Format

Task Duration Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
1 2 mo.
2 2 mo.
3 2 mo.
4 2 mo.
5 2 mo.
6 2 mo.

The horizontal axis of the Gantt chart is a time scale, expressed either in absolute time or
in relative time referenced to the beginning of the project. The time resolution depends on the
project - the time unit typically is in weeks or months. Rows of bars in the chart show the
beginning and ending dates of the individual tasks in the project.

In the above example, each task is shown to begin when the task above it completes.
However, the bars may overlap in cases where a task can begin before the completion of another,
and there may be several tasks performed in parallel. For such cases, the Gantt chart is quite
useful for communicating the timing of the various tasks.

For larger projects, the tasks can be broken into subtasks having their own Gantt charts to
maintain readability.

Gantt chart Enhancements

This basic version of the Gantt chart often is enhanced to communicate more information.
 A vertical marker can used to mark the present point in time.
 The progression of each activity may be shown by shading the bar as progress is made,
allowing the status of each activity to be known with just a glance.
 Dependencies can be depicted using link lines or color codes.
 Resource allocation can be specified for each task.
 Milestones can be shown.

Gantt chart Role in Project Planning

For larger projects, a work breakdown structure would be developed to identify the tasks
before constructing a Gantt chart. For smaller projects, the Gantt chart itself may used to identify
the tasks.

The strength of the Gantt chart is its ability to display the status of each activity at a
glance. While often generated using project management software, it is easy to construct using a
spreadsheet, and often appears in simple ascii formatting in e-mails among managers.

For sequencing and critical path analysis, network models such as CPM or PERT are
more powerful for dealing with dependencies and project completion time. Even when network
models are used, the Gantt chart often is used as a reporting tool.

Editorial note: The name of this tool frequently is misspelled as "Gannt". The correct spelling is
"Gantt."
 CPM - Critical Path Method

In 1957, DuPont developed a project management method designed to address the

challenge of shutting down chemical plants for maintenance and then restarting the plants once
the maintenance had been completed. Given the complexity of the process, they developed the
Critical Path Method (CPM) for managing such projects.

CPM provides the following benefits:

 Provides a graphical view of the project.
 Predicts the time required to complete the project.
 Shows which activities are critical to maintaining the schedule and which are not.

CPM models the activities and events of a project as a network. Activities are depicted as
nodes on the network and events that signify the beginning or ending of activities are depicted as
arcs or lines between the nodes. The following is an example of a CPM network diagram:

CPM Diagram
3 Wk
C 5 Wk
F

5 Wk

A
5 Wk
D
Finish
Start

6 Wk 4 Wk
B E

Steps in CPM Project Planning

1. Specify the Individual Activities

From the work breakdown structure, a listing can be made of all the activities in the
project. This listing can be used as the basis for adding sequence and duration information in
later steps.
2. Determine the Sequence of the Activities
Some activities are dependent on the completion of others. A listing of the immediate
predecessors of each activity is useful for constructing the CPM network diagram.
3. Draw the Network Diagram
 Once the activities and their sequencing have been defined, the CPM diagram can be
drawn. CPM originally was developed as an activity on node (AON) network, but some project
planners prefer to specify the activities on the arcs.
4. Estimate Activity Completion Time
The time required to complete each activity can be estimated using past experience or the
estimates of knowledgeable persons. CPM is a deterministic model that does not take into
account variation in the completion time, so only one number is used for an activity's time
estimate.
5. Identify the Critical Path
The critical path is the longest-duration path through the network. The significance of the
critical path is that the activities that lie on it cannot be delayed without delaying the project.
Because of its impact on the entire project, critical path analysis is an important aspect of project
planning. The critical path can be identified by determining the following four parameters for
each activity:

 ES - earliest start time: the earliest time at which the activity can start given that its
precedent activities must be completed first.
 EF - earliest finish time, equal to the earliest start time for the activity plus the time
required to complete the activity.
 LF - latest finish time: the latest time at which the activity can be completed without
delaying the project.
 LS - latest start time, equal to the latest finish time minus the time required to complete
the activity.

The slack time for an activity is the time between its earliest and latest start time, or
between its earliest and latest finish time. Slack is the amount of time that an activity can be
delayed past its earliest start or earliest finish without delaying the project.

The critical path is the path through the project network in which none of the activities
have slack, that is, the path for which ES=LS and EF=LF for all activities in the path. A delay in
the critical path delays the project. Similarly, to accelerate the project it is necessary to reduce
the total time required for the activities in the critical path.
6. Update CPM Diagram
As the project progresses, the actual task completion times will be known and the
network diagram can be updated to include this information. A new critical path may emerge,
and structural changes may be made in the network if project requirements change.

CPM Limitations
CPM was developed for complex but fairly routine projects with minimal uncertainty in
the project completion times. For less routine projects there is more uncertainty in the
completion times, and this uncertainty limits the usefulness of the deterministic CPM model. An
alternative to CPM is the PERT project planning model, which allows a range of durations to be
specified for each activity.
 PERT – Program Evaluation and Review Technique

Complex projects require a series of activities, some of which must be performed

sequentially and others that can be performed in parallel with other activities. This collection of
series and parallel tasks can be modeled as a network.

In 1957 the Critical Path Method (CPM) was developed as a network model for project
management. CPM is a deterministic method that uses a fixed time estimate for each activity.
While CPM is easy to understand and use, it does not consider the time variations that can have a
great impact on the completion time of a complex project.

The Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) is a network model that allows
for randomness in activity completion times. PERT was developed in the late 1950's for the U.S.
Navy's Polaris project having thousands of contractors. It has the potential to reduce both the
time and cost required to complete a project.

The Network Diagram

In a project, an activity is a task that must be performed and an event is a milestone
marking the completion of one or more activities. Before an activity can begin, all of its
predecessor activities must be completed. Project network models represent activities and
milestones by arcs and nodes. PERT originally was an activity on arc network, in which the
activities are represented on the lines and milestones on the nodes. Over time, some people
began to use PERT as an activity on node network. For this discussion, we will use the original
form of activity on arc.

The PERT chart may have multiple pages with many sub-tasks. The following is a very
simple example of a PERT diagram:

PERT Chart

The milestones generally are

numbered so that the ending node
of an activity has a higher number
than the beginning node.
Incrementing the numbers by 10
allows for new ones to be inserted
without modifying the numbering
of the entire diagram. The
activities in the above diagram are
labeled with letters along with the
expected time required to complete
the activity.
Steps in the PERT Planning Process
PERT planning involves the following steps:
1. Identify the specific activities and milestones.
2. Determine the proper sequence of the activities.
3. Construct a network diagram.
4. Estimate the time required for each activity.
5. Determine the critical path.
6. Update the PERT chart as the project progresses.

1. Identify Activities and Milestones

The activities are the tasks required to complete the project. The milestones are the events
marking the beginning and end of one or more activities. It is helpful to list the tasks in a table
that in later steps can be expanded to include information on sequence and duration.
2. Determine Activity Sequence
This step may be combined with the activity identification step since the activity
sequence is evident for some tasks. Other tasks may require more analysis to determine the exact
order in which they must be performed.
3. Construct the Network Diagram
Using the activity sequence information, a network diagram can be drawn showing the
sequence of the serial and parallel activities. For the original activity-on-arc model, the activities
are depicted by arrowed lines and milestones are depicted by circles or "bubbles".
If done manually, several drafts may be required to correctly portray the relationships
among activities. Software packages simplify this step by automatically converting tabular
activity information into a network diagram.
4. Estimate Activity Times
Weeks are a commonly used unit of time for activity completion, but any consistent unit
of time can be used. A distinguishing feature of PERT is it's ability to deal with uncertainty in
activity completion times. For each activity, the model usually includes three time estimates:

 Optimistic time - generally the shortest time in which the activity can be completed. It is
common practice to specify optimistic times to be three standard deviations from the
mean so that there is approximately a 1% chance that the activity will be completed
within the optimistic time.

 Most likely time - the completion time having the highest probability. Note that this time
is different from the expected time.

 Pessimistic time - the longest time that an activity might require. Three standard
deviations from the mean is commonly used for the pessimistic time.

PERT assumes a beta probability distribution for the time estimates. For a beta
distribution, the expected time for each activity can be approximated using the following
weighted average:
 Expected time = ( Optimistic + 4 x Most likely + Pessimistic ) / 6

This expected time may be displayed on the network diagram. To calculate the variance
for each activity completion time, if three standard deviation times were selected for the
optimistic and pessimistic times, then there are six standard deviations between them, so the
variance is given by:

[ ( Pessimistic - Optimistic ) / 6 ]2

5. Determine the Critical Path

The critical path is determined by adding the times for the activities in each sequence and
determining the longest path in the project. The critical path determines the total calendar time
required for the project. If activities outside the critical path speed up or slow down (within
limits) the total project time does not change. The amount of time that a non-critical path activity
can be delayed without delaying the project is referred to as slack time.

If the critical path is not immediately obvious, it may be helpful to determine the
following four quantities for each activity:
 ES - Earliest Start time
 EF - Earliest Finish time
 LS - Latest Start time
 LF - Latest Finish time
These times are calculated using the expected time for the relevant activities. The earliest start
and finish times of each activity are determined by working forward through the network and
determining the earliest time at which an activity can start and finish considering its predecessor
activities. The latest start and finish times are the latest times that an activity can start and finish
without delaying the project. LS and LF are found by working backward through the network.
The difference in the latest and earliest finish of each activity is that activity's slack. The critical
path then is the path through the network in which none of the activities have slack.

The variance in the project completion time can be calculated by summing the variances
in the completion times of the activities in the critical path. Given this variance, one can calculate
the probability that the project will be completed by a certain date assuming a normal probability
distribution for the critical path. The normal distribution assumption holds if the number of
activities in the path is large enough for the central limit theorem to be applied.

Since the critical path determines the completion date of the project, the project can be
accelerated by adding the resources required to decrease the time for the activities in the critical
path. Such a shortening of the project sometimes is referred to as project crashing.

6. Update as Project Progresses

 Make adjustments in the PERT chart as the project progresses. As the project unfolds, the
estimated times can be replaced with actual times. In cases where there are delays, additional
resources may be needed to stay on schedule and the PERT chart may be modified to reflect the
new situation.

Benefits of PERT
PERT is useful because it provides the following information:
 Expected project completion time.
 Probability of completion before a specified date.
 The critical path activities that directly impact the completion time.
 The activities that have slack time and that can lend resources to critical path activities.
 Activities start and end dates.

Limitations
The following are some of PERT's weaknesses:
 1. The activity time estimates are somewhat subjective and depend on judgment. In
cases where there is little experience in performing an activity, the numbers may be only
a guess. In other cases, if the person or group performing the activity estimates the time
there may be bias in the estimate.

 Even if the activity times are well-estimated, PERT assumes a beta distribution for these
time estimates, but the actual distribution may be different.

 Even if the beta distribution assumption holds, PERT assumes that the probability
distribution of the project completion time is the same as the that of the critical path.
Because other paths can become the critical path if their associated activities are delayed,
PERT consistently underestimates the expected project completion time.

The underestimation of the project completion time due to alternate paths becoming
critical is perhaps the most serious of these issues. To overcome this limitation, Monte Carlo
simulations can be performed on the network to eliminate this optimistic bias in the expected
project completion time.
 Time-Cost Trade-offs

There is a relationship between a project's time to completion and its cost. For some types
of costs, the relationship is in direct proportion; for other types, there is a direct trade-off.
Because of these two types of costs, there is an optimal project pace for minimal cost. By
understanding the time-cost relationship, one is better able to predict the impact of a schedule
change on project cost.

Types of Costs
The costs associated with a project can be classified as direct costs or indirect costs.

 Direct costs are those directly associated with project activities, such as salaries, travel,
and direct project materials and equipment. If the pace of activities is increased in order
to decrease project completion time, the direct costs generally increase since more
resources must be allocated to accelerate the pace.

 Indirect costs are those overhead costs that are not directly associated with specific
project activities such as office space, administrative staff, and taxes. Such costs tend to
be relatively steady per unit of time over the life of the project. As such, the total
indirect costs decrease as the project duration decreases.

The project cost is the sum of the direct and indirect costs.

Compressing the Project Schedule

Compressing or crashing the project schedule refers to the acceleration of the project
activities in order to complete the project sooner. The time required to complete a project is
determined by the critical path, so to compress a project schedule one must focus on critical path
activities.

A procedure for determining the optimal project time is to determine the normal
completion time for each critical path activity and a crash time. The crash time is the shortest
time in which an activity can be completed. The direct costs then are calculated for the normal
and crash times of each activity. The slope of each cost versus time trade-off can be determined
for each activity as follows:

Slope = (Crash cost - Normal cost) / (Normal time - Crash time)

The activities having the lowest cost per unit of time reduction should be shortened first.
In this way, one can step through the critical path activities and create a graph of the total project
cost versus the project time. The indirect, direct, and total project costs then can be calculated for
different project durations. The optimal point is the duration resulting in the minimum project
cost, as show in the following graph:
Project Cost versus Duration

Attention should be given to the critical path to make sure that it remains the critical path

Cost
after the activity time is reduced. If a new critical path emerges, it must considered in subsequent
time reductions. To
ta
To minimize the cost, those activities that are not on the critical path can be extended to
minimize their costs without increasing the project completion time.

Time-Cost Model Assumptions

The time-cost model described above relies on the following assumptions:
 The normal cost for an activity is lower than the crash cost.
 There is a linear relationship between activity time and cost.
 The resources are available to shorten the activity. D
The model would need to be adapted to cases in which the assumptions do not hold. For
example, the schedule might need to take into account the need to level the load on a limited
resource such as a specialized piece of equipment.

Additional Considerations
There are other considerations besides project cost. For example, when the project is part
of the development of a new product, time-to-market may be extremely important and it may be d irec
beneficial to accelerate the project to a point where its cost is much greater than the minimum In
cost.

In contract work, there may be incentive payments associated with early completion or
penalties associated with late completion. A time-cost model can be adapted to take such
incentives and penalties into account by modeling them as indirect costs.
 Because of the importance of the critical path in compressing a project schedule, a project
planning technique such as the Critical Path Method or PERT should be used to identify the
critical path before attempting to compress the schedule.