Managing the Critical Path
Every project comprises of various tasks, which are also known as activities. And the completion of the project depends upon the completion of each of these activities. Among all of the activities in a project, there are some that have an impact on the project completion, while there are others that don’t have any impact. The former are known as the dependent activities.
In the Critical Path Methods, when activities are dependent upon each other, they are carried out in a sequence and hence, delay in one can delay its dependent activity and ultimately the entire project. In CPM Scheduling, the critical path comprises of all the tasks that have inter-dependencies. So, it is the critical path that determines what the end date in a project schedule is. It is because of this reason that it is highly important to manage the critical path of a project.
The management of the critical path is critical to the project because if any activity in the path gets delayed even by one day, the end date of the project will be delayed and this delay in the entire project can cause a lot of problems and the scope and budget of the project are likely to change. In Project Management, in order for the manager to have a successful project, it is important to understand the critical path and be able to manage and make adjustments to it when and if there is need for it.
In the management of the critical path, it is important to track its progress. Once you have made the project schedule with a Gantt Chart and CPM with the help of Project Management Software or CPM scheduling Software, it is important to review the progress as the project goes further.
Through CPM Software and other kinds of Project Management Software, it has become possible to form comparisons between the scheduled tasks, the actual work and the planned tasks. This will enable the project manager to identify the problem areas that can be potentially more problematic with further progress of the project. When a baseline has been set for the project, then it becomes convenient to identify those activities that are behind schedule.
In the management of the critical path, CPM Scheduling Software and other kinds of software for Project Management are of optimal use. In order to effectively manage the critical path, it is important to update the tasks regularly as and when they get completed. Even if a certain task is not 100% complete, you should update it with the percentage that has been completed.
With all the software available, managing the critical path is no more a complicated or difficult task and you can easily manage it with the help of software in a matter of few minutes. Once you have completed the percentages of the tasks that have been completed, you can proceed with updating the progress of the overall project. In case of this, once the activities have been updated, you can update the start and finish dates in the project accordingly, which will effectively manage and adjust the critical path.
