Use Of Gantt
Paul says : Great to have found this forum! I am a student and they teach me how to create Gantt charts. They look nice, but does anyone actually uses them in the real world?
Thanx - Paul
Great to have found this forum! I am a student and they teach me how to create Gantt charts. They look nice, but does anyone actually uses them in the real world?
Thanx - Paul
Hi Paul,
The Gantt was designed in the 1950s as I recall my history to help monitor impossibly large projects in the US Defense Department. The need to monitor progress is no less now than then....so yes people still use them. MS-Project includes a Gantt visualisation tool.
At the end of the day, someone has to monitor progress or lack of it. Any tool that works and can communicate the status to all parties is valuable. The Gantt is probably easier to understand than many others...so yes, learn to live with and love it.
Ross
The Gantt chart is just one method of visualizing a schedule. It happens to be one of the easiest forms for visualizing a how a schedule relates to a calendar. There are other schedule charting systems, but they are mostly useful for analyzing schedule logic/networks and not so much a relationship with a calendar.
When you ask if anyone really uses a Gantt chart, I think you are really asking if anyone really uses a schedule. I can tell you that in some industries (construction, industrial maintenance, etc.), schedules and Gannt charts are indispensible.
I have noticed that there is a movement in software/IT (and other design fields) to abondon the traditional PMI/PMBOK approach to project management and adopt a more collaborative approach. IMO, this is mainly due to the difficulties in planning and estimating work that is essentially a creative process (versus work that is a manual process for construction/maintenance).
Even though the PMI/PMBOK guidelines are a bit strict on the scope that they can reach here at the company I work for we tend to use it as much as possible in colaboration with Gantt Charts. Or clients are even used to this now because they we canīt afford to let creation/development affect current progress of a project due to strict deadlines we work with.
At the end its for the best and they feel it. We are reaching a point where our clients are even more worried on getting a right specification/idea to us.
Hi I saw you were a student and needed help in writing a paper for my class as extra credit on the subject of Project Management Body of Knowledge would you be interested in making some money?
Thanks,
Craig
As a manager often responsible for project management, I never start out without a Gantt chart. To each activity, I allocate participants and % work. I also use it to follow up each activity. It is of great help.
Some systems also use a Pert chart to find the critical path, but I haven't used that for years now.
(Bas: Can you remove that "Junior" characteristic? I'm far too old to be called "Junior" :cool: )
Hey Alf, nowadays Iīm using Pert even more. The projects Iīm working on have too many paths to completion and my team was really getting of track.
When I get all the activities and milestones on a Gantt chart (at least most of them) I whip out a Pert to define their priorities.
Hey Alf, nowadays Iīm using Pert even more. The projects Iīm working on have too many paths to completion and my team was really getting of track.
When I get all the activities and milestones on a Gantt chart (at least most of them) I whip out a Pert to define their priorities.
The first time I used PERT was in 1974 for the development of the first drifting weather buoy to report its data via a satellite. That project culminated in a world wide major weather experiment in 1979/1980. Fabulous days! Except it was all drawn freehand...ugggH.
Old enough to remember, young enough to do it again
Hi Ross,
Just wondering, still using those?
I use actually only critical path, but mostly to explain management what realistic is and where they should focus on.
Cheers
Bas
Hi Ross,
Just wondering, still using those?
I use actually only critical path, but mostly to explain management what realistic is and where they should focus on.
Cheers
Bas
Hi Bas,
No, have not used PERT for a long time. These days Gantt and Critical Path are most often used....and the back of a used envelope :D
Hi Bas,
No, have not used PERT for a long time. These days Gantt and Critical Path are most often used....and the back of a used envelope :D
My boss uses a whiteboard with printer. he tells us how the project will be done...he does not like to hear our ideas. And guess who gets blamed when "we" do not deliver?
That is why I am looking for a new job.
newbie
My boss uses a whiteboard with printer. he tells us how the project will be done...he does not like to hear our ideas. And guess who gets blamed when "we" do not deliver?
That is why I am looking for a new job.
newbie
Best of luck with the job hunting.
Good luck newbie.
Nowadays tech management market has really come to a hiatus. Its a good strategy to check stock exchange values and evolution. If you want a stable company to work for its always a good sign when they are not going up and down on the charts. The more steady ones tend to have the most stable jobs and the ones that are on the rise tend to give better pays.
Funny you should mention that. Pre-bubble burst I worked on a Internet IPO that had all the shindigs you could imagine. They even set up a ping pong table and video arcade for the "stressed" internet workers. The boss drove an Audi A8 and as soon as he changed it for a beemer, top of the line, everybody thought "this company is going sky-rocket".
Two weeks later the rocket blew. And the beemer was his fatherīs. Turns up he just wanted to impress and make the workers think everything was fine.
:(
Funny you should mention that. Pre-bubble burst I worked on a Internet IPO that had all the shindigs you could imagine. They even set up a ping pong table and video arcade for the "stressed" internet workers. The boss drove an Audi A8 and as soon as he changed it for a beemer, top of the line, everybody thought "this company is going sky-rocket".
Two weeks later the rocket blew. And the beemer was his fatherīs. Turns up he just wanted to impress and make the workers think everything was fine.
:(
Yuri,
I guess that we all have examples of this thing. I used to be the PM for a company developing a pilotless aircraft for weather research. In that case the car was a blue Lotus, and it wasn't his father's :mad:
