Project Management Using the Buffers of Time and Resources

Abstract One of the reasons to distinguish project management as a separate field of knowledge is the uncertainty. The way we manage the uncertainty in the project (and risk management in particular), has direct influence on the project duration and its success. According to multiple studies performed for the traditional project management methods, only 44% of the projects finish in time. 70% of the projects reduce the amount of planned work, 30% of the projects simply die unrealized. Even so nowadays, with new tools and techniques, that numbers tend to decrease, the overall picture says that we, as a project manager, perform our work poorly. This article examines the use of a relatively new method of project management, Critical Chain Project Management (CCPM), comparing it with the traditional approach to project management.

[1]  Eliyahu M. Goldratt,et al.  It's Not Luck , 1994 .

[2]  Lawrence P. Leach,et al.  Critical Chain Project Management Improves Project Performance , 1999 .

[3]  Jeff Cox,et al.  The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement , 1984 .

[4]  Nan Li,et al.  Scenario-Based Proactive Robust Optimization for Critical-Chain Project Scheduling , 2015 .

[5]  Lei Fu,et al.  Critical chain and evidence reasoning applied to multi-project resource schedule in automobile R&D process , 2014 .

[6]  Robert C. Newbold,et al.  Project Management in the Fast Lane: Applying the Theory of Constraints , 1998 .

[7]  Herman Steyn.  An investigation into the fundamentals of critical chain project scheduling , 2001 .

[8]  Sheng-Hung Chang,et al.  Due-date performance improvement using TOC's aggregated time buffer method at a wafer fabrication factory , 2009, Expert Syst. Appl..

[9]  Azar Izmailov,et al.  Effective Project Management with Theory of Constraints , 2016 .

[10]  Paijit Pawan,et al.  A Fuzzy-Based Integrated Framework for Assessing Time Contingency in Construction Projects , 2016 .

[11]  Paul H. Selden,et al.  Sales Process Engineering: A Personal Workshop , 1996 .

[12]  Mahdi Ghaffari,et al.  Current status and future potential of the research on Critical Chain Project Management , 2015 .

[14]  Erik Demeulemeester,et al.  Incorporation of activity sensitivity measures into buffer management to manage project schedule risk , 2016, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[15]  Boaz Ronen,et al.  Critical Chain: A New Project Management Paradigm or Old Wine in New Bottles? , 2005 .

[16]  T. Raz,et al.  A Critical Look at Critical Chain Project Management , 2003, IEEE Engineering Management Review.

[17]  Lawrence P. Leach,et al.  Critical Chain Project Management , 2000 .