6. The Need for A Good Critical Path
“In most cases, 99.9% of the time, we
can't produce a valid critical path.”
- Mike Beattie, Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA), May 2007
7. Schedule Quality Is . . .
• Trust – Is it the truth? Are the
Tasks, Resources, Assignments, Costs, Actuals, etc. accurate?
• Fidelity – Is the critical path really the critical path?
• Detail – Does it contain the right level of detail?
Trust
Fidelity Detail
8. Schedule Quality Is Not . . .
• Performance Problems
• Defects in the Deliverables
• Scheduler Quality
Trust
Fidelity Detail
12. 3. Use of Constraints
Hard Constraints Soft Constraints
Must Start On As Late As Possible
Must Finish On Start No Earlier Than
Start No Later Than Finish No Earlier Than
Finish No Later Than
A slip here . . . . . . won‘t cause a slip here.
13. 3. Use of Constraints
Will your
schedule
pass the
push test?
16. 6. Planned Start in the Past
Task A
Hasn’t Started Yet
Task A has a planned Start
Date in the past but hasn’t
started. The existing
Planned Start Date cannot
be trusted!
Status Date
(or today if no
Status Date)
17. 7. Actual Date in the Future
Task C
Status Date (or
today if no
status date)