Operations Strategy and Operations Management - Assignment Example

Processes responsible for managing a project, establishing reliability and regulation that can as well allow for accountability in project scope. Retrieval and dissemination of information is an important factor in management and hence management results in records and deliberations, coming up with schedules is bent on time management. Concise follow-up of these knowledge areas will benefit the project ensuring success at the end especially in monitoring and evaluation.

Project Work Breakdown Structure

Part 2:

Scope of the project

The developers of this project need to put into consideration the various processes involved in the achievement of the appropriate technological methods to detect tsunamis in the future in Japan. Input such as obtaining capital and authentication to set up the project; carrying out information storage on the project resource expenses and use. Tools like expert critical analysis plus coming up with new ideas and improving them with the concerned team. Verdicts of the experienced and knowledgeable personnel are considered. The team manager and their team must deliberate on the possible outcome; the ending of the project should culminate into the development of a deliverable that will meet the required detector. There must be a consideration of time limitations and possible solutions.

Factors influencing the project

These factors include the availability of human resources; that is, well-trained personnel with competent skills in technical skills and know-how. The capital plus charter will authenticate its implementation considering goodwill from the Japanese government. Finally, knowledge areas such as project time management, information services, quality and/or risk, and procurement management.

Reasons for probable failure

Lack of necessary skills, technical attributes, and knowledge by the team manager and his/her team. There is a possibility that if the project manager and assigned team do not have vital competencies, skills, and concerning appraisals, then the technological approach targeted for this project may not prosper. The team needs to acquire the necessary skills, appraisals, and motivations plus the right interpersonal skills and important team networking skills. Failure to define the probable risks such as undetected malfunctioning of the technology developed, unforeseen tsunami trends that could be undetectable.  Insufficient information retrieval and dissemination may lead to misinformation and a division between project managers and the team. Communication is a vital component of any process, especially projects.

Part 3

Lists of paths shown:

B: 6, E: 3, G: 2, and H: 3 is the critical path.

These paths may include the earliest path for project completion, the Latest path for project completion, the slack path for activities that lie in the critical path, and subjective time estimate paths.

Importance of critical paths

According to Roberta R and Bernard WT (2006), the critical path has various benefits to the project team. The critical path is a path that interlinks the vital activities of a project. It helps the management to focus on the tasks that fall along with it and are critical towards the completion of a project; while helping management to identify which paths to shorten, it enables crash program in which project completion period may be reduced and hence lead to earlier finishing. In the network shown, the critical path is B: 6, E: 3, G: 2, and H: 3. It is the longest path with a minimum project completion time.

Yes. The park can be opened to the general public if a crash program is implemented in which the critical path is shortest with subsequent increased project cost but still beneficial. The crash network model would be determined as shown below:

                                                                  Start at 2 months

                                                                                             Finnish at 6 months

                                                                                             Finnish at 6 month

         Start at 3 months

Part 4: Project network                                                                                                F

             A                       B                            C                              D

                                                                                                 EF                                 

Critical paths for the project completion include paths A, C, D, and E.

Project schedule crashing

The company would resolve to crash the project schedule by increasing the cost of the various critical pathways and reducing their costs. While normal pathways may just be maintained at a lower cost to ensure that even though the time of completion is reduced, the project still remains cost-effective.

ACTIVITY

NORMAL TIME (WEEKS)

CRASH TIME (WEEKS)

NORMAL COST ($000)

CRASH COST ($000)

A

10

5

30

40

B

8

4

120

140

C

10

6

100

120

D

7

5

40

42

E

10

5

50

60

F

3

1

60

80

If we make an assumption that the relationship between the cost and time taken is of a linear prerequisite, then crash cost-normal cost divided by normal duration –crash duration is equal to the crash cost gradient for each activity is determined as shown below:

SB=20/4=$5/week

 = 10/5=$2/week

SC=20/4=$5/week

SD=2/2=$1/week

SE=10/5=$2/week

SF=20/2=$10/Week

Would be added cost/amount increment per week on the crash program is as shown above. The total amount is $25,000.