Project Report: Critical Path and Baseline of ABC Company's Project

This project report provides a detailed analysis of ABC Company's office extension construction project. It begins with an executive summary and an overview of the project, which spanned approximately four and a half years, with the construction phase taking the majority of the time. The report evaluates the critical path, highlighting the complexity of the project due to its long-term nature and the use of the CPM method. Baseline derivations are discussed, emphasizing the importance of resource management and project timeline adherence. The report also includes recommendations for improving project management, such as consulting project consultancy firms, addressing schedule delays, and focusing on quality management. The project's evaluation covers various aspects, including external development and podium works, with insights into the critical path and baseline derivations. The report concludes with a discussion of the project's complexity and the importance of effective project management strategies.

PROJECT REPORT: ABC COMPANY
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Executive summary
In the world of business planning of a project is one of the most critical and important task for
company’s managers. An Australian based organisation named as ABC Company has executed a
long-term project during the year 2012 has been taken for the current report. The report have
discussed about the requirements and overview of the project along with evaluating the critical
path evaluation. Moreover, various project baseline derivations have been discussed in the
current report. A list of recommendation to improvise the project also been discussed through the
report in the concluding part.
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Table of Contents
Introduction 4
Project Overview 4
Critical Path Evaluation 6
Baseline Derivations 9
Control Measures (Recommendation) 10
Conclusion 10
References 12
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Introduction
Project management is one of the most important and critical process of any business while
considering a specific task. ABC Company has planned to have new construction into their
organisation to extend their work place within the premises. The expansion has been done on
every sector of the business it is external developing, internal development, sales office
extension and others. The current report is based on evaluating various aspect associated with
only the construction part of the current project. Analysis of critical path and project baseline
derivation involved with the project is also has been discussed throughout the study.
Project Overview
The whole project is estimated for 1730 days long out of that construction part have taken the
most of the time. The whole construction for the project has taken approximately 1656 days.
This construction part has segmented into few forms, which are external development and
podium works. The external development part is also sub divided into two different parts one is
pilling and the other one is tie beam & rock anchoring. On the other side podium works is
comparatively a longer activity that is also involved with several sub tasks. Excavation and
backfilling after that project have constructed PCC and soling. Apart from the activities anti-
termite treatment, RCC work, Retaining wall and Col & slab are some other activities that are
involved with the main construction process. The main process of construction has started from
Q3 of 2013 and it has been completed in Q4 during the year 2014. During the period of
construction, some other factors including with the project are pilling and tie beam that comes
under external development. Under the construction of excavation and backfilling, building
muhurat is another important aspect. During the RCC work soling and PCC is some important
criteria. However, during the building of retaining wall and slab both the activity will be done
according to three segments, which are ground floor level, B1 level and B2, level. The lat
activity is Col & Slab that has been estimated to take about 183.1 days.
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Figure 1: Project overview
(Source: created by author)
Critical Path Evaluation
Critical path is nothing but a project schedule, which have less potential errors. The current
project has taken a time frame of 1730 days which is approximately four and a half years. A
project operating for more than two years are considered as long-term project (Neos-guide.org,
2017). While looking after the project layout it has been observed that pilling requires 5SS and
32 days on the other side rock anchoring require 14FF and 15 days. As per critical path model, to
complete shore piling and excavation executors required to complete the 5SS and 14FF sector
first, that leads to project delay. If a project need to go through CPM model then expected
delivery of the project will be longer (Kelly et al. 2014, p.12). However, as the current project is
a long-term project therefore critical path of the project is comparatively complex and results are
uncertain. As per the current project, first element of critical path method is pilling after that
excavation. After completing the excavation part PCC and Vertical rock anchoring comes to the
picture. After building vertical rock, anchoring RCC for footing and raft is the next element. The
last two elements of critical path are col & slab and retaining wall. Hence, it can be said that the
critical path here is of about 447 days.
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Figure 2: Critical path
(Source: created by author)
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Baseline Derivations
Conducting the whole project require some type of resources. As opined by Sherekar et al.
(2016, p. 6771), the resources required for a project can be categorised into two different factors
one is material and the other one is time. During the process of implementing project, it can be
noticed that, whole construction process required 1656 days. Estimation of the project deadline is
primarily depends on baseline of a project. In case if a project manager fail to give a proper
structure on the baseline of a project then actual estimation will not be fulfilled by the project. As
cited by Mok et al. (2015, p. 447), estimation of a project can be improved by restructuring the
baseline of a project. Monitoring performance of a project is one of the most important tasks for
project managers. In that context, if baseline plan of a project have not been executed properly
then performance of that project have been deteriorated. Taylan et al. (2014, p.111) discussed
that, project manager set an estimated project outcome moreover they compare those project
outcomes with the actual project. If actual outcomes rate is closer to the estimated value then it is
known as better-earned value however if the actual outcomes are lesser than the estimated value
then it is considered as less earned value generated by the managers (Svejvig and Andersen,
2015, p. 284).
While looking at the baseline, some negative deviation can be assumed throughout the project.
The first one is project delivery estimation, in that context project management team assume that
project will be working as per the predetermined schedule. However, some uncertain situations
are always part of a well-structured project schedule therefore; it is assumed that delivering a
project as per the pre announced date is always not possible. In current project’s timeline, it can
be noticed that during the work of excavation, thirty days delay has been occurred moreover
during building of RCC work and retaining work, another thirty-seven and 70 days delay has
occurred respectively. Another assumption relating to negative deviation is amount of resources
required for a project. According to Serra and Kunc (2015, p.61), various cases have been
noticed that while executing a project management go through resource shortage. However, the
project plan is finalised after consulting with a good project consulting firm still these issues are
some common issues, therefore presence of adequate resources is another major negative
deviation assumed in that project.
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Control Measures (Recommendation)
The project of construction by ABC Company could have been gone through some type of
issues, which can have negative impact during the project execution project. The list of
recommendation for further improvisation of the project is presented in the following part.
● ABC Company should have taken consultation from project consultancy firms before
executing the main project.
● In various cases in has been observed that, project is have not went as per the plan. Some
schedule delays has been occurred during the project execution. Therefore, project
planner of ABC Company should have gone through various aspects like material
delivery, procurement of goods and others.
● Quality management is another issue faced by the ABC Company during the project
execution process. Quality management should have taken care by quality management
team in order to provide better qualities to each segment of the project.
Conclusion
The report has evaluated various aspect of the office extension project by ABC Company. While
looking at the period it has been observed that the project was a long-term project and took
around four and a half years to complete it entirely. Out of so many segments, construction part
of the project has taken most of the time. The study has observed that as the project is quite
lengthy therefore CPM method used by the project management team has leaded to more
complexity. While evaluating project baseline derivation it has been noticed that performance
assessment and earn value are the most important elements while developing baseline of a
project. A list of recommendations to improve the project management have been presented and
well explained throughout the report.
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References
Books
Kelly, J., Male, S., and Graham, D. (2014). Value management of construction projects. New
Jersey, US: John Wiley & Sons.
Journal
Mok, K. Y., Shen, G. Q., and Yang, J. (2015). Stakeholder management studies in mega
construction projects: A review and future directions. International Journal of Project
Management, 33(2), pp. 446-457.
Sherekar, V., Tatikonda, M., and Student, M. (2016). Impact of factor affecting on labour
productivity in construction projects by AHP method. Int. J. Eng. Sci. Comput, 6(6). pp. 6771-
6775.
Svejvig, P., and Andersen, P. (2015). Rethinking project management: A structured literature
review with a critical look at the brave new world. International Journal of Project
Management, 33(2), pp. 278-290.
Taylan, O., Bafail, A. O., Abdulaal, R. M., and Kabli, M. R. (2014). Construction projects
selection and risk assessment by fuzzy AHP and fuzzy TOPSIS methodologies. Applied Soft
Computing, 17,pp. 105-116.
Online articles
Serra, C. E. M., and Kunc, M. (2015). Benefits realisation management and its influence on
project success and on the execution of business strategies. International Journal of Project
Management, 33(1), pp. 53-66. Available at:
sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0263786314000519 [Accessed on 21st October 2018]
Website
Neos-guide.org (2017). Project scheduling. Available at: https://neos-guide.org/content/project-
scheduling-critical-path-method [Accessed on 21st October 2018]
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