Answer to Question #209490 in Psychology for Emmanuel Egbuagha

Question

Give a detail explanation and description of the following tools below:

1) WBS, up to level three,

2) Gantt Chart,

3) Network diagram, visual approach and indicating the critical path.

Include references in your answers

Answer 1

The Work Breakdown Structure is the project's foundation. WBS has a number of advantages that will help project teams function more efficiently throughout the project life cycle. It aids in project management, estimation, coordination, and monitoring. As part of the WBS levels, WBS Project Management breaks project deliverables and project activity into smaller and more manageable components (Spanu et al., 2018). The project title is the first and most important WBS Level. The total project scope will be fulfilled at the end of the project; thus, all project activities and deliverables will be under the project. Control Accounts is the second of the WBS Levels. Control accounts are significant project components, systems, phases, or deliverables. Database System, for example, can be the control account level in the WBS Levels for a software project. Work Packages are the third level of the WBS. Control accounts are made up of work packages that are put together. Work packages under the database system control account, for example, can include a software application, servers, and data structure.

A Gantt chart is a handy graphical tool that depicts the progress of activities or projects across time. It's also known as a visual presentation of a project, in which the actions are broken down and placed on a chart for simple understanding and interpretation. A Gantt chart is a common project management tool (Jia, Fuh, Nee & Zhang, 2007). It essentially drills down things that must be completed within a specific time frame. It's widely used to keep track of project timelines. Tasks are displayed on the vertical axis, while scheduled time-spend is displayed on the horizontal axis. Each task is represented by a bar that indicates the amount of time it will take to complete the project. The percentage of tasks performed is then represented or shown by the bar. It also displays dependencies, which are basically the interconnections between distinct project operations. Understanding the interdependencies between activities is critical for project managers to keep track of, and Gantt charts help them do just that. It offers information regarding the accomplishment of other project activities. This knowledge is crucial since multiple tasks are intertwined, and if one action is delayed, it will have an influence on others. They're widely used to schedule manufacturing processes, employee rosters, events, and production processes, among other things. Apart from other independent applications available on the market, Microsoft Excel may also be utilized to make Gantt charts.

Visual representations of a project are network diagrams. Network diagram project management are used to supplement network diagrams. In today's world, network diagrams are important in terms of planning and tracking a project from start to finish. The critical route and scope of the project are both determined. The critical path and scope of the project are both determined (Bearfield, Berman & Dubnick, 2017). A good project schedule network diagram will portray the project in a clear and straightforward manner. The two forms of network diagrams are the Arrow diagram and the Precedence diagram. Events are represented by nodes, and activities are represented by arrows, with activities portrayed in the sequence in which they occur in a Precedence diagram. Each event node in an arrow diagram represents the point at which an action begins or ends. The arrow symbolizes the action that is taking place during the event, and the event node only appears after all of the activities entering the node have been finished. You may clearly illustrate project dependencies using network diagrams that use the arrow and node method. Activity dependencies are clearly described using a Gantt chart or Sinnaps' updated ‘Gantt-flow' online project management software. Project managers and teams recognize which activities or tasks must be accomplished before moving on to the next, and can thus attribute criticality to certain, more important tasks. Furthermore, most project managers adhere to the four stages of the project life cycle and make decisions based on where stage they are in.

References

Bearfield, D., Berman, E., & Dubnick, M. (2017). Encyclopedia of Public Administration and Public Policy - 5 Volume Set (3rd ed., p. 5). Routledge.

Jia, H., Fuh, J., Nee, A., & Zhang, Y. (2007). Integration of genetic algorithm and Gantt chart for job shop scheduling in distributed manufacturing systems. Computers & Industrial Engineering, 53(2), 313-320. doi: 10.1016/j.cie.2007.06.024

Spanu, A., Nuvoli, S., Gelo, I., Mele, L., Piras, B., & Madeddu, G. (2018). Role of diagnostic 131I SPECT/CT in long-term follow-up of patients with Papillary Thyroid Microcarcinoma. Journal Of Nuclear Medicine, 59(10), 1510-1515. doi: 10.2967/jnumed.117.204636