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When the number of activities involved in a project
increases, scheduling of activities can be better
done by using network-based scheduling
techniques. Arranging the project activities in the form of a
network and identifying the critical path is the first step in
scheduling of activities. After identification of the critical
path, the next step is the allocation of resources among all
the project activities. As resources are always scarce,
optimum utilization of the available resources (in terms of
employees and material) among the project activities is one
of the prime tasks of the project manager. While allocating
the available resources among the project activities, it shall
be ensured that the first priority is given to the activities
that lie on the critical path so that the project duration is
contained within the planned duration. When the available
resources are first assigned to the critical activities, in the
event of resource constraints, the non-critical activities may
not get their quota of resources. When the non-critical
activities are assigned with lesser resources than that is
required to complete these activities within the minimum
planned completion period, these activities will consume
more time than planned. As most of the non-critical
activities can be allowed to stretch beyond their minimum
completion time without increasing the project completion
time as a whole (which is the project duration along the
critical path), these activities can be delayed a little without
doing any harm to the project completion time, at the same
time, permitting leveling of available resources among the project activities. Management of the free time available in
non-critical activities plays an important role in making
optimum utilization of resources.
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