What Is A PERT Chart?

‘PERT’ which is short for ‘Program Evaluation and Review Technique’ is an event-oriented planning aid. A PERT Chart is usually computerised and is used in order to estimate project duration when there is any hesitation in estimates of time duration for individual activities. It helps the project team to order the activities that must be completed so that a decision can be implemented.

The PERT Chart demonstrates the critical path of the project and the dependencies between the tasks and activities. The critical path helps the project team to identify the minimum set of tasks to be completed. This is called the critical set.

This may seem to be a contradiction in terms because you might think that the completing all tasks is required to complete a project. However, the critical path represents not the ideal set of tasks to be completed for your project but rather the minimum set. It is this path which you must go through in order to reach completion of your project on time.

Other tasks, while important to the overall completion, do not influence the final delivery for the project. These can, therefore, be rescheduled if time is tight or circumstances change.  This being said, tasks on your critical path will affect the delivery time of the project and therefore should only be modified in extreme conditions.

What Are The Advantages Of A PERT Chart?

A PERT chart gives managers the opportunity to evaluate the time as well as resources which are required in order to manage a project. This evaluation encompasses the ability to track required assets during any stage of production during the course of the entire project.

What Is Critical Path Analysis?

Critical Path Analysis is a method which formally identifies tasks which must be finished on time for the whole project to be done on time. It also recognises which tasks can be delayed for a while if resources needs to be reallocated in order to catch up on missed tasks.

A benefit of this analysis is that it assists you with identifying the minimum length of time that is needed in order to complete a project. Where you need to run a fast-tracked project, it helps you to identify which project steps you should hasten in order to be able to complete the project within the available time. This helps you to minimise cost while still achieving your objective.

What Are The Benefits Of Critical Path Analysis?

There are a number of advantages to critical path analysis. Here are some of them:

• It demonstrates the graphical view of any project.
• It helps to identify the most important tasks that you have to manage.
• It helps to save your time and reduce timelines.
• It helps to compare planned and actual progress.
• It helps to make dependencies visible and clear.

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