Network Scheduling

Techniques
 Calculating Activity Start and
Finish Times
 In addition to scheduling the events of a project, detailed scheduling of
activities is performed by calculating the following four times (or dates) for
each activity (i, j):
Example
 Calculating Activity Start and
Finish Times
 Thus, the earliest time when an activity can begin is
equal to the early time of its start event;
 The latest an activity can finish is equal to the late finish
of its finish event.
– For activity D in the example, which is denoted by arc (3, 4) in
the network, we have ES34 34
= t33 = 5 and LF34
34
= T44 = 13.
 The earliest time when an activity can finish is given by
its ES plus its duration;
 The latest time when an activity can start is equal to its
LF minus its duration.
– For activ­ity D, this implies that EF34 = ES34 + L34 =5 + 7 = 12, and
34 34 34
LS34
34
= LF34 34
- L34
34
= 13 - 7 = 6.
 The full set of calculations is presented in the following
Table.
Slack
 As mentioned, there are two types of slack associated with an activity:
total slack and free slack.
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constrained.
 Because of the importance of slack, project management is
sometimes referred to as slack management.
 We will elaborate on slack management in the chapters that deal with
resources and budgets. The total slack TSijij, (or total float TFij) of
activity (i,j) is equal to the difference between its late start (LS) and its
early start (ES) or the difference between its late finish (LF) and its
early finish (EF); that is
 Slack
 This is equivalent to the difference between the maximum time
available to perform the activity (T jj-tii) and its duration (Lijij). The
total slack of activity D (3,4) in the example is TS 34 34
= LS3434
- ES34
34
=
6-5 = 1.
 The free slack (or free float) is defined by assuming that all
activities start as early as possible. In this case, the free slack, FS
for activity (i,j) is the difference between the early time of its finish
event j and the sum of the early time of its start event i plus its
length; that is,

 For the example; the free slack for activity D (3, 4) is FS 34 = t44 - (t33
34
+ L34
34
) = 13 — (5 + 7) = 1.
 Thus, it is possible to delay activity D by 1 week without affecting
the start of any other activity.
 Slack
 Activities with a total slack equal to zero
are critical because any delay in these
activities will lead to a delay in the
completion of the project.
 The total slack is either equal to or larger
than the free slack because the total slack
of an activity is composed of its free slack
plus the slack shared with other activities.
 Slack
 For example, activity B denoted by (1,3) has a free slack
of 2 weeks. Thus, it can be delayed up to 2 weeks
without affecting its successor D.
 If, however, B is delayed by 3 weeks, then the project
can still be finished on time provided that D starts
immediately after B finishes. This follows because
activities B and D share 1 week of total slack.
 Finally, notice that activity D11 has a total slack of 1 and a
free slack of 0, implying that non-critical activities may
have zero free slack.
AON NETWORK APPROACH
FOR CPM ANALYSIS
 The AON model is an alternative approach to
representing project activities and their
interrelationships.
 In the AON model, the arrows are used to
denote the precedence relations among
activities.
 Its basic advantage is that there is no need
for dummy arrows and it is very easy to
construct.
 AON NETWORK APPROACH
FOR CPM ANALYSIS
 Some additional network construction rules include:
– All nodes, with the exception of the terminal node,
must have at least one successor.
– All nodes, except the first, must have at least one
predecessor.
– There should be only one initial and one terminal node.
– No arrows should be left hanging. Must have a head
and a tail.
– An arrow specifies only precedence relations; its
length has no significance.
– Cycles or closed-loop paths are not permitted
AON NETWORK APPROACH FOR
CPM ANALYSIS

ES = 22
LS = 22

End
 Dealing With Uncertainty
 CPM assumes either that the duration of an activity is
known and deterministic or that a point estimate such as the
mean or mode can be used in its place.
 It makes no allowance for activity variance. When
fluctuations in performance time are low, this assumption is
logically justified and has empirically been shown to produce
accurate results.
 When high levels of uncertainty exist, however, CPM may
not provide a very good estimate of the project completion
time.
 In these situations, there is a need to account explicitly for
the effects of uncertainty.
– Monte Carlo simulation and PERT are the two most common
approaches that have been developed for this purpose.
 PERT and Extensions
 Approaches used to assess uncertainty in projects
are based on the central limit theorem, which states
that the distribution of the sum of independent
random variables is approximately normal when the
number of terms in the sum is sufficiently large.
 The first approach yields a rough estimate and
assumes that the duration of each project activity is
an independent random variable.
 Given probabilistic durations of activities along
specific paths, it follows that elapsed times for
achieving events along those paths are also
probabilistic.
 PERT and Extensions
 Now, suppose that there are n activities in the project, k of
which are critical. Denote the durations of the critical activities
by the random variables dii with mean dii, and variance sii22 , i =
1,..., k. Then the total project length is the random variable X =
d11+d22+…..dkk

 It follows that the mean project length, E(x), and the variance
of the project length, V(x), are given by
 PERT and Extensions
 These formulas are based on elementary probability
theory, which tells us that the expected value of the
sum of any set of random variables is the sum of their
expected values, and the variance of the sum of
independent random variables is the sum of the
variances.
 Now, using the central limit theorem, we can use
normal distribution theory to find the probability of
completing the project in less than or equal to some
given time t as follows:
 PERT and Extensions
 where Z is the standard normal deviate with mean 0 and
variance 1. The desired probability in the above equation can
be looked up in normal probability table
 Continuing with the example project, if BASED ON
Simulation, the mean time of the critical path is 22.5 weeks
and the variance is (2.9)22, then the probability of completing
the project within 25 weeks is found by first calculating

 and then looking up 0.86 in the Normal probability table, we

find that P(Z = 0.86) = 0.805, so the probability of finishing the
project in 25 weeks or less is 80.5%. This solution is depicted
in the following Figure.
 PERT and Extensions
 If, however, the mean project length, E[X], and the variance
of the project length, V[X], are calculated using the
assumption that the critical activities are only those that
have a zero slack in the deterministic CPM analysis (A-C-F-
G), we get

 This probability is higher than 0.805, which was computed

using data from the simulation in which both sequences A-C-
F-G and A-D-F-G were critical.
 PERT
 The above procedure is called PERT
– For each activity i, assess its probability distribution or
assume a beta distribution and obtain estimates of aii,
bii, and mii. These values should be supplied by the
project manager or experts who work in the field.
– If a beta distribution is assumed for activity i, then use
the estimates a, b and m to compute the variance sii22
and mean dii for each activity as follows:
 a i  4m i  b i 2 bi  a i 2
di  si  ( )
6 6
 PERT
 The above procedure is called PERT
– Use CPM to determine the critical path given di, i=1,…n
i
– Once the critical activities are identified, sum their means
and variances to find the mean and variance of the
project length using the equations for V[X] and E[x].
– Use the mathematical equation to evaluate the probability
that the project finishes within some desired time.
PERT
 Using PERT, it is possible to estimate completion
time for a desired completion probability. For
example, for a 95% probability, the corresponding z
value is Z0.95
0.95
= 1.64. Solving for the time  for which
the probability to complete the project is 95%, we get
 PERT and Extensions
 A shortcoming of the standard PERT calculations is that they ignore all
activities that are not on the critical path. A more accurate analytical
approach is to identify each sequence of activities that lead from the
start node of the project to the finish event and then to calculate
separately the probability that the activities that compose each
sequence will be completed by a given date.
 This step can be done as above by assuming that the central limit
theorem holds for each sequence and then applying normal distribution
theory to calculate the individual path probabilities.
 It is necessary, though, to make the additional assumption that the
sequences themselves are statistically independent to proceed. This
means that the time to traverse each path in the network is independent
of what happens on the other paths. Although it is easy to see that this is
rarely true because some activities are sure to be on more than one
path, empirical evidence suggests that good results can be obtained if
there is not too much overlap.
PERT And Extensions
 Once these calculations are performed, assuming
that the various sequences are independent of each
other, the probability of completing the project by a
given date is set equal to the product of the
individual probabilities that each sequence is finished
by that date. That is, given n sequences with
completion times X11, X22,…..., Xnn, the probability that
X < t is found from
Example

 Consider the simple project in Fig. 9.40. If no

uncertainty exists in activity durations, then the
critical path is A-B, and exactly 17 weeks are
required to finish the project.
 Now if we assume that the durations of all four
activities are normally distributed (the corresponding
means and standard deviations are listed under the
arrows in Fig. 9.40), then the durations of the two
sequences are also normally distributed [i.e., N(,)].
with the following parameters:
length(A-B) = X11 ~ N(17, 3.61)
length(C-D) = X2 ~ N(16, 3.35)
Example

 The accompanying probability density functions are

plotted in Fig. 9.41. It should be clear that the project
can end in 17 weeks only if both A-B and C-D are
completed within that time. The probability that A-B
finishes within 17 weeks is
PERT and Extensions
 Thus, the probability that the project will finish by week
17 is approximately 31%. A similar analysis for 20
weeks yields P(X < 20) = 0.7 or 70%.
 The approach that is based on calculating the
probability of each sequence to complete by a given
due date is accurate only if the sequences are
independent. This is not the case when one or more
activities are members of two or more sequences.
 Consider, for example, the project in the following
Figure. Here, activity E is a member of the two
sequences that connect the start of the project (event
1) to its termination node (event 5). The expected
lengths and standard deviations of these sequences
are shown in the following table
Example
Example

Similarly, the probability that the sequence C-

D-E will be completed in 17 days is calculated
by determining z = (17 - 19)/5.22 = -0.383 to
find P = 0.35.
 Example
 Thus, the simple PERT estimate (based on the critical
sequence A-B-E) indicates that the probability of completing
the project in 17 days is 29%.
 If both sequences A-B-E and C-D-E are taken into account,
then the probability of completing the project in 17 days is
estimated as

 Assuming that the two sequences are independent.

However, because activity E is common to both sequences,
the true probability of completing the project in 17 days is
somewhere between 10 and 29%.
 Example:
Expected path times of network diagram
 Probabilistic Estimate of Project
Completion Time
 To calculate the probability of project
completion within a given specific time tspsp
through a definite path, Assume Gaussian
distribution we calculate the standardized
Normal distribution parameter z

From tables we can find out the area

under the curve on the right of tsp and
given that total area = 1 the probability
can be computed
Example tsp = 26 weeks
Z = .12 p(completion) = 88%
Project Graphics
 Gantt (Bar) Chart
 The most widely used management tool developed
during World War I by Henry L. Gantt.
 The Gantt chart specifies the activities to be
performed on the vertical axis and their
corresponding duration on the horizontal axis.
 It is possible to schedule activities by either early-
start or late-start logic.
– In the early-start approach, each activity is initiated as
early as possible without violating the precedence
relations.
– In the late-start approach, each activity is delayed as
much as possible as long as the earliest finish time of
the project is not compromised.
 Gantt Chart
 The early-start schedule is performed
first and yields the earliest finish
time of the project. That time is then
used as the required finish time for
the late-start schedule
 For example, activity D can start only
after activities A and B finish, which
happens at the end of week 5. A
direct output of this schedule is the
earliest finish time for the project (22
weeks for the example).
 Gantt Chart
 On the basis of the earliest finish time, the
late-start schedule can be generated. This
is done by shifting each activity to the
right as much as possible while still
starting the project at time 0 and
completing it in 22 weeks.
 The resultant schedule is depicted in the
following figure.
 The difference between the start (or the
finish) times of an activity on the two
schedules is called the slack (or float) of
the activity.
 Gantt Chart
 Activities that do not have any slack are
denoted by a shaded bar and are termed
critical.
 The sequence of critical activities connecting
the start and end points of the project is
known as the critical path, which logically
turns out to be the longest path in the
network. A delay in any activity along the
critical path delays the entire project.
 The sum of durations for critical activities
represents the shortest possible time to
complete the project.
 Gantt Chart
 The following figure, depicts the Gantt chart for
the microcomputer development project.
 In addition to showing the critical path, Gantt
charts can be modified to indicate project and
activity status.
 In the figure,
– A bold border identify a critical activity,
– Shaded area indicates the completion status