Question

Case #2 Table 2 Family Planning Research Center Costs Activity A В. Crash Time (days) 3 4 2 1 3 Normal Time (days) 6 8 4 3 7 5 3 6 7 10 10 Dr. John Watage, deputy director of the family planning Research Center in Nigeria's Over-The-River Providence, was assigned the task of organizing and training five teams of field workers to perform educational and outreach activities as part of a large project to demonstrate acceptance of a new method of birth control. These workers already had training in family planning education but must receive specific training regarding the new method of contraception. Two types of materials must also be prepared: (1) those for use in training the workers and (2) those for distribution in the field. Training faculty must be brought in and arrangements made for transportation and accommodations for the participants. Dr. Watage first called a meeting of his office staff. Together they identified the activities that must be carried out their necessary sequences, and the time that they would require. Their results are displayed in Table 1. Louis Odaga, the chief clerk, noted that their project had to be completed in 29 days. Whipping out his solar-powered calculator, he added up the time needed. "no," Dr. Watage replied, "some of these tasks can go forward in parallel." "Be careful, though." warned Mr. Oglagadu. the chief nurse, "there aren't that many of us to go around. There are only 12 of us in this office." "I can check whether we have enough heads and hands once I have tentatively scheduled the activities," Dr. Watage responded. "If the schedule is too tight. I have permission from the Lathminder Fund to spend some funds to speed it up, just so long as I can prove that it can be done at the least cost necessary. Can you help me prove that? Here are the costs for the activities with the elapsed time that we planned and the costs and times if we shorten them to an absolute minimum." Those data are given Table 2. D E F G H I 1 Cost per day to crash ($) 3,000 4,000 3,000 2,000 6,000 2,000 3,500 10,000 7,000 5,500 4,500 1 4 1 J 9 5 K Discussion Questions 1. Some of the tasks in this project can be done in parallel. Prepare a diagram showing the required network of tasks and define the critical path. What is the length of the project without crashing? Do not just answer, but show the whole process. Table 1 Family Planning Research Center Activities Activity Immediate Predecessor 2. If the critical path is longer than 29 days, what is the least additional amounting that Dr. Watage can spend and still achieve this schedule objective (29 days)? Do not just answer, but show the whole process. --- --- A. Identify faculty and their schedules B. Arrange transport to base C. Identify and collect training materials D. Arrange accommodations E. Identify team F. Bring in team G. Transport faculty to base H. Print program material I. Have program materials delivered J. Conduct training program K. Perform fieldwork training A A BE AB с H D, F, G, I J Time (Days) 6 8 4. 3 7 5 3 6 7 10 10

Answer 1

8 4 1 Here to see what all jobs can be done in parallel we will prepare a gantt chart where in we will list the activities to be performed on the vertical axis and time intervals in days in this case on horizontal axis. Also on the right hand side of the chart we will calculate Earliest Start - Es, Earliest Finish - FS, Late Start - LS, Late Finish - DF, find out the Slack & the actiivities on critical path Immediate Time Slack = Path Yes if Activity Activity Description Predecessor (Days) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 ESEF LS LF LS-ES Slack = 0 Identify faculty and their A schedules 6 a|a|a|a|a|a| 1 6 1 6 O Yes B Arrange transport to base BBBBBBBB 1 8 8 15 7 Identify and collect с training materials CCCC 1| 4| 25 1 D Arrange Accomodations 7 9 16 18 E Identify Team A EEEE 713 7 13 O Yes F Bring in Team BE 14 18 14 18 0 Yes G Transport Faculty to Base A,B GGG 9 11 16 18 H Print Program Material с HHHHHH 5 10 11 Have Program Materials Delivered H 7 11 1712 18 J Conduct Training Program D,F,G,1 10 1928 191 28 o Yes K Perform fieldwork training 10 KK 2938 29 38 O Yes Here we can see that the total length of the project without crashing is 38 days and activities A,E,F,J & K are on critical path. A 3 DDD 9 7 5 3 7 1 6 1 K K

2 Now let us examine Table 2 to find out the additional amount to be spent to achieve the schedule objective of 29 days. This means we need to crash by 9 days. 4 D 3 Cost per day to Crash Time crash Activity Normal Time (Days) (Days) ($) A 6 3 3000 B 8 4 4000 C 2. 3000 1 2000 E 7 3 6000 F 5 1 2000 G 1 3500 4 10000 1 7000 J 10 9 5500 к 10 5 4500 Now here if we have to crash the schedule we have to crash the activities on Critical Path. Let us now evaluate each acitivity on critical path. Amongst all the activities on critical path A,E,F,J&K, activity F has the lowest cost of crashing @ $ 2000 but it has to be crashed from 5 days to 1 day. This means we have to spend 4*2000=$8000 on it. This will result in crashing the project schedule by only 1 day as activity I will not allow the crashing of activity F by more than 1 day. As soon as we crash F, I will also come on critical path. Next activity on critical path with lowest cost is activity A. This activity can be reduced to 3 days at a cost of 3 * 3000 = $ 9000. But here again the over all project schedule will be crashed by 1 day only as This is because here again activitiy I will come on critical path and will not allow project crashing by more than 1 day. 3 H 6 - 7

Next activity on critical path with lowest cost is activity K.Here it is simple as there are no intereferences on any other activities we can reduce project schedule by crashing this activity to 5 days and we have to spend 4500*5= 22500 USD. Next activity on critical path with lowest cost is activity). Here it is again simple as there are no interferences and we have to spend $ 5500 to crash this activity by 1 day. Next activity on critical path is activity E. Here again the resultant cost is 6000*4=$24000 as will crash this activity to 3 days and net result in crashing will be only 1 day as again activity I will become critical and will not allow project schedule crashing by more than 1 day. Now based upon this analysis we will crash activities K, J&F as these three put together provides the least cost to us of crashing project by 5+1+1 = 7 days at a cost of 22500+5500+8000=$36000. Now let us reprepare the chart and find out how we can reduce the project schedule by another 2 days. 6 Immediate Time Activity Activity Description Predecessor (Days) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 Identify faculty and their A schedules A|A|A|A|A|A| B B- Arrange transport to base 8 BBBBBBBB Identify and collect с training materials cccc D Arrange Accomodations A 3 DDD E Identify Team A EEEEEEE F Bring in Team BE G Transport Faculty to Base A,B 3 GGG H Print Program Material HHHHHH Have Program Materials Delivered H 7 J Conduct Training Program D,F,G,1 9 K Perform fieldwork training 5 7 1 6

Now from the above chart we can see the critical path is now C,H,1,J&K And activity C provides the lowest cost alternative for reducing the project schedule by 2 days at a cost of 2*3000= $ 6000 So we have crash activity K by 5 days, J by 1 day , F by 4 days and C by 2 days at a total additional cost of 22500+5500+8000+6000=$42000 And our chart will look like as below: 6 2 Immediate Time Activity Activity Description Predecessor (Days) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 Identify faculty and their А schedules A|A|A|A|A|A| B Arrange transport to base 8 BBBBBBBB Identify and collect с training materials 2 CIC D Arrange Accomodations A DDD E Identify Team A F Bring in Team BE 1 G Transport Faculty to Base |A,B GGG H Print Program Material с HHHHHH Have Program Materials Delivered H 7 J Conduct Training Program D,F,G,1 K Perform fieldwork training 5 KKK KK 3 6 - 9