Project Management

A schedule has been finalized to facilitate the delivery of the Huntsville Power Plant project. It coordinates the activities with the resources that are readily available to the Project Manager, contractors and stakeholders to begin the project. Thus, a series of tasks as well as the duration of each activity has been assigned with its predecessors to effectively deliver the project.

The Huntsville project schedule specified that the required duration of all activities and when they will be accomplished during the project lifecycle. Currently, the projected completion date for the Huntsville power plan to be fully operating is July 30, 2012. Therefore, there are certain critical success factors that should be considered when developing a project schedule (Gido, p.179):

* The estimated duration for an activity must be based on the types and quantities of resources required to perform the activity.

* Activities should not be longer in estimated duration than the time intervals at which the actual progress will be reviewed and compared to planned progress.

* The key to effective schedule control is to address any paths with negative or deteriorating slack values aggressively as soon as they are identified. The amount of negative slack should determine the priority for applying these concentrated efforts.

* When attempting to reduce the duration of a path of activities that has negative slack, focus on activities that are near term and on activities that have long estimated durations.

It's often pointed out that throughout a project lifecycle, changes may occur, some required activities will be completed as planned, some will be accomplished ahead of schedule, and others will be finished later than their completion date. Nevertheless, those critical aspects of the project are faster or slower than planned they could possibly have an effect on the project schedule of the remaining, incomplete activities of the projects.

The estimated duration time for the Huntsville Plant Project completion is 62 days, thus it would begin by April 18th, 2011, be ready by the June 30, 2012, which is the deadline set by the boards of directors. However, according to the Huntsville Plan task list, it's indicated that it would take 64 days for the project to cover all its areas necessary in its planning. Therefore, The Huntsville Power Plant will not be ready to start up production on its completion time.