Question

Question 1

a. Draw a precedence diagram for the following fabrication of steel project. For each activity, show the computed values of early start, early finish, late start, late finish, total float, free float and the critical path.

Activity	Immediate Predecessor	Duration (weeks)
A	None	2
B	A	4
C	A	2
D	B	2
E	B, C	4
F	A, E	6
G	D	4
H	D, E, F	2
I	G, H	6
J	H, F	6
K	H, I, J	4

b. Evaluate how getting to know the float on a schedule precedence diagram could be an asset to the project manager.

Question 2

a. A fellow project manager has approached you for advice to manage risk in the procurement of IT services without a well -defined specification. According to the fellow project manager, he and his team does not want to entertain any risk, hence his decision in choosing a Fixed Price Contract. Are there any inherent risks in the selected contract type? Critically evaluate the situation and bring out all the inherent risks you foresee.

b. How can organizations use weighted scoring model to evaluate proposals as part of seller selection?

c. Provide two suggestions for ensuring adequate change control on projects that involve outside contracts.

Answer 1

Question 1

a)

Precedence diagram is following:

b)

Float on a schedule precedence diagram is the amount of delay that is permissible on an activity without affecting the overall completion time of the project. For example, float of activity C is 2, which means it can be started with a delay of 2 weeks from its earliest start time of 4 , i.e. it can be started anytime between week 4 and 6 and completed before week 6 without affecting the completion time of the project.

Project manager can use this information to allocate resources to other activities which are critical, as highlighted in red. There is no slack on critical activities. Therefore, these activities must be strictly completed on or before their schedule finish times, otherwise, the entire project will be delayed.

Using float information to pull resources from non-critical activities and allocate them to critical activities can help timely or before time completion of the project.