Critical Path Analysis (3.3.4) Flashcards
(15 cards)
What do business processes need to be?
Need to be efficient as possible
What tends to happen when a product is first to the market?
Usually the one that is first adopted by customers so businesses want to capitalize on this. Allows a firm to start generating revenue to recover any money invested in their operations
What is critical path analysis?
Main goal is to understand the longest amount of time a project will take and which activities will cause a delay if not completed on time.
What are the key elements of the Critical Path Analysis?
-List of all activities required to complete this project
-The time (duration) that each activity will take to complete
-How each project activity depends on others
What does Critical Path Analysis?
-Order in which activities must be completed
-Longest path of project activities to the completion of the project
-The earliest and latest that each project activity can start and finish without delaying the completion of the project as a whole
-The shortest time possible to complete the project
What are the Advantages of a critical path analysis?
-Minimize project competition time
-Can plan cash flow and orders around tasks
-Can use JIT production
-Removes uncertainty in complex projects
-Identifies critical activities so you can allocate resources to them
What are the Disadvantages of a critical path analysis?
-All based on estimates
-May encourage corner cutting
-CPA’s take time and delay projects starting
-Depends on the experience of the manager
-Doesn’t take into consideration unforeseen events (Pandemics)
What does the usefulness of CPA’s depend on?
-The skill/flexibility of the workforce
-The accuracy of the estimates to complete each activity
How do you work out Earliest Start Time?
Longest route to next node
How do you work out Latest Finish time?
When activity must be finished
What direction do you go in for EST and LFT?
EST- Left to Right
LFT-Right to Left
What does Critical Path Analysis show?
-All the activities to be completed during a project
-The duration of each activity
-Which activities can be done simultaneously
-Which activities can only be done when another finishes
-How soon a project can be completed
What does the Node look like? What does it represent?
Is a circle that represents a point in time where an activity is started or finished. The node is split into three sections.
How do you Label the Node on a CPA?
Node reference EST
number LFT
What does a Critical Path look like?
Do a practice question (good examples on SME)
