Critical chain (Critical Chain)

This book by Goldratt is written in the genre of a production novel. On the one hand, this format is extremely simple to perceive, but on the other hand, it seems too simplistic:) The book discusses the application of the theory of constraints in the context of project management. The concept of a critical chain is introduced, which expands the generally accepted concept of a critical path. In general, reading the book was useful and interesting.

For example, in classical project management, structural decomposition of works is used. (WBS) including to reduce the standard deviation in estimating the duration of the project by applying the law of large numbers and the central limit theorem. Let me give you an example: If we have:

1. N tasks in WBS
2. Estimate the duration of tasks in WBS of approximately the same scale 3)They are weakly dependent and randomly distributed with the same standard deviation x. (plainly) That:
3. Project duration is equal to the sum of task duration estimates
4. The standard deviation of the project duration estimate is x divided by the root of N
5. That is, theoretically, we get an estimate of the duration of the project quite accurately. But Godratt's book shows that it's common in projects: The lateness of one element is completely passed on to the next element. The time gain achieved by one element is usually squandered.” If it really is. (This is very true for many projects.)The optimistic projection of the standard deviation for project duration indicated above no longer works:) This leads to problems with project delays. There are a lot of such interesting ideas in the book, so it can be recommended for reading. Good read it easily and quickly.

#Management #Processes #Project #ProjectManagement