Hi,
What's the best way/technique to build in extra time buffer in the schedule
for hiccups? I am curious how other folks do this in MS Project 2007 &wud
love to hear your thoughts?
Thanks,
Cheers,
Kendra
Hi Kendra,
I've seen these ways done;
1. You can use the PERT entry form (search help on PERT and it gives
you the instructions) to give a three point estimate (Optimisitic,
Expected, Pessimistic) which the system will use to calculate a
determistic duration. You are building in extra time here because some
tasks will take their pessimistic, some their optimistic, etc, etc so
it should average out.
2. You can divide the durations by 50% and enter the resulting
duration against each task. You then take the time you removed from
each task and calculate the square root of the sum of the squares of
the amount removed from each task. You create a new task called
"buffer" that starts on the finish of the project and use the result
of this calculation for the duration of the buffer. You will then
expect most tasks to actually take longer than their duration in the
schedule (50% remember), but overall you hope not to exceed the
duration including the buffer. This comes from a theory called
"critical chain" if you want to google, which is more complicated than
what I have writtent here.
3. Think of an arbitrary time and tell the team you want that much
buffer. Ensure your schedule finishes "end of project -1 month" or
something. Accept any cost or quality implications that come with
this.
I'm sure there are many more...
Paul
