Project Evaluation and Review Technique

Although project management was certainly applied in practice prior to the mid-1950 s, the development of the critical path method and the Project Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) is considered to be the initiation of the modern practice of project management. The critical path method is a network analysis technique used to predict project duration by analyzing which sequence of activities or path most likely has the least amount of scheduling flexibility or... 

Projected schedule feasibility (IS systems), 98 Project Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT), 2305-2306 Project historical databases, 1260 Project human resource management, 1247 Project integration management, 1244 Projection virtual environments, 2507 Project life, 1242-1243 decreasing expected, 2392 and project integration management, 1244 uncertain, risk analysis with, 2371... 

PERT is an acronym for Program Evaluation and Review Technique. It is a more sophisticated form of planning than Gantt charts, and is appropriate for projects with many interactive steps. There are three components of a PERT diagram circles or other convenient, closed figures represent events arrows connecting the circles represent activities and non-activities connecting two events are shown as dotted-line arrows. (A non-activity represents a dependency between two events for which no work is required.)... 

PERT (Performance Evaluation and Review Technique) charts primarily show how the different tasks are connected by presenting these as a network of boxes (activities) linked with lines. Due to a lack of a common time scale, start and finish dates have to be added to each individual task box. Complex PERT charts are difficult to survey and are less suitable for presentation purposes of the entire project. However, they are commonly used during the establishment of a project plan and to illustrate dependencies within a selected part of the project, because they expose the logic of a project. 

Action systems will tighten up as time compresses. Project management systems such as the Critical Path Method and the Program Evaluation and Review Technique, so successfully used in the Sixties, will find wider application. 

Network analysis can be used to describe the complicated precedence relationships between the activities of a large project. The resulting description can be used to determine a timetable for the activities and to predict a completion date for the project. Examples of network planning methods (or project planning methods) are the Critical Path Methods (CPM) and Performance Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) (Chryssolouris 2006). 

A second step includes the evaluation of the identified risks. The scope of the risks depends on the probability of occurrence and the resulting consequence for the project. The probability of occurrence can be determined by experts by the network plan technique PERT (program evaluation and review technique)... 

Dhillon 1987). CPM is now widely used in planning and managing construction projects however, CPM can also be used for any project consistent with the broad definition of project presented in Chapter 5. A related, but more sophisticated method is the Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) as described by PMI (2008) and Wikipedia (2011c). PERT, which explicitly accommodates uncertainties associated with task durations, is outside the scope of this book. 

Critical path analysis and programme evaluation and review techniques are examples of project network techniques. 

The second approach requires an independent sequence for each process path. This corresponds to the generation of a network plan using methods such as CPM (criticeil path method), MPM (metra potential method), and PERT (program evaluation tuid review technique). These techniques, as part of the project management, are employable for activities such as proper scheduling (Buighardt 1988). 

As the project progresses, more information is available therefore, the review technique used can be different at each stage of the project. The use of various hazard evaluation techniques, such as checklist analyses, relative rankings, what-if analyses, ana hazard and operabil-... 

Review Techniques The review techniques used at the various stages of a project should be selected based on the amount of process information and detail available. Figure 23-47 depicts some typical review techniques at the various stages of a capital project. A detailed description, including the type and amount of process information required, for each review technique can be found in Guidelines for Hazard Evaluation Procedures Second Edition with Worked Examples (CCPS, 1992). The process information required for the review should be defined and documented in the review guidelines. Up-to-date and accurate process information is essential to conducting a successful review. 

The coordination of this entire complex process is the province of project management, the objective of which is to ensure that all the necessary parts and components of a project mate up. This discipline in its modem form was first developed for the Polaris missile project in the 1960s. Its major tool that is familiar to pharmaceutical scientists is the network or PERT (Program Evaluation Review Technique) chart, as illustrated in Figure 1.2. This chart is a tool that allows one to see and coordinate the relationships between the different components of a project. One outcome of the development of such a network is identification of the rate-limiting steps, which, in aggregate, comprise the critical path (see Table 1.3 for a lexicon of the terms used in project management). 

In FY 1973, select categories of research were designated as high priority areas forensic science manpower needs, management and evaluation practices, and laboratory technique development. Several of the projects funded are nearing completion, or have been completed, and merit a brief review. 

Powell [3] reviewed the basics of various discounted cash flow techniques for project evaluation. Discounting is a method that accounts for the time value of money to provide either for the capital or to convert the cash flows to a common point in time so that they are summed. Ward [4] proposed a new concept known as the net return rate (NRR) that provides a better indication of a project s profitability. Techniques and criteria for economic evaluation of projects are widely available in the literature and texts [5,6,7,8,9,10]. A summary of the conventional decision criteria is given here. 

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