PM620 Unit 4 DB

Forecasting the Schedule and Cost of a Project
MT
PM620-1703B-01
Facilitator: Dr. B.G
Date: Sept 12, 2017
Unit 4: Discussion Board
Introduction
Per the instructions of the CIO, the following three questions I will address with the
members on the team project:
What are the advantages of inflating a project based on PERT estimating or incorporating
risk?
What are the disadvantages of inflating a project based on PERT estimating or
incorporating risk?
How does this technique compare with estimating or forecasting techniques you have
used in the past?
We will present these three issues to our various staff members that have involvement in
this project. The presentation will address various ways of using forecasting techniques that will
target the schedule and cost of the project. The precision of the forecasting methods and their
accuracy will greatly influence the CIOs outlook on the presentation given to our staff members
that have involvement in the E-mail upgrade system project.
The Advantages and Disadvantages of PERT Inflation on a Project

Forecasting gives an estimation that holds uncertain outcomes for future events. Ideally,
using forecasting provides many benefits in many projects to help make better decisions and with
planning. It is hard for anyone to predict how a project is going to perform along the way.
Using a Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) helps managers to use their strategic
skills to define the activities, look at how the entire project is put together and to obtain a better
forecast on start date, duration in time, cost, and resources before the start of the project. When
project managers apply forecasting, it takes the projects duration, project cost, and deliverables
to an unknown situation (Shaikh, 2017).
PERT assures a one-time conclusion of the project to avoid delays or changes in the
schedule. Forecasting allows one to use various techniques not only to evaluate the forecasting
accuracy and to use control methods on a project but also to review the risks that occurred and
the risk causes. The advantages of inflating projects based on PERT estimating is to integrate
risk components to strengthen the projects management process and to establish what efforts
need to be made to the work project to keep it on schedule, meet deadlines, revise current plans,
and evaluate any changes to the project (Kerzner, 2003). Furthermore, PERT estimation allows
the use of three concept methods that can be used to pinpoint what tasks need to be completed
with the new email update and in what order for the email project to be successful.
The three basic concept methods are, most likely (realistic), optimistic, and pessimistic.
These three give project managers an estimated average for each stage of the email update. The
key focus is on how much time will it take for each activity, under normal conditions, and how
fare will time be extended if issues happen to any activity with the email update. The optimistic
gives an estimation on the lowest time to compete the update. The pessimistic gives an
estimation by extending time to complete the projects activities when issues happened from the
start of the project until the end. Pessimistic results in the greatest amount of time that would be
needed to complete the email update. The most likely (realistic) gives an estimated time under
normal conditions. All three of the PERT estimations use the calculated formula of; E= (O
(optimistic) + 4M (most likely) + P (pessimistic)) / 6 (PMBOK, 2013).
As mentioned early in the paper, PERT will allow the project manager to schedule the
email update project tasks, show the resources, and the critical path for the email project update.
One must make sure that each task be independently self-contained with a start date, time
duration, cost estimate, and the resources needed to complete the project. The preparation of the
PERT chart would need every bit of information and data to the email update project which
would need time to complete and many labor hours by highly skilled workers.
This is one of many disadvantages that project managers will experience when
establishing a PERT chart. Other disadvantages include changing tasks and revising the PERT
chart half way through the first schedule of the project will result in having a PERT chart that no
longer is correct. At the start of the project all activity tasks must be listed prior to the beginning
of the project. There are occasions were the PERT chart will not allow all project tasks listed
because they are not dependent on each other.
How does this technique compare with estimating or forecasting techniques you have used
in the past?
The technique used with the email update project will depend on the process and tasks in
the email update system. Some of the estimates and forecasting methods which were used in the
past might or might not work better than others. In the past I have used various estimating
methods and each one compared differently from the PERT estimation used in the email update
project. Expert judgement would be one pf the past techniques that I have used in the past.
Using expert judgement requires one making a judgement decision which based upon the
experience one has accumulated in a specific knowledge or field. I acquired my expert judgment
while serving twenty years with the United States Navy.
References
A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide). (2013). Project
Management Institute. Retrieved from https://www.pmi.org/pmbok-guide-
standards/foundational/pmbok
Kerzner, H. (2003). Project management a systems approach to planning, scheduling,
and controlling (8th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Shaikh, A. (2017). Forecasting. Retrieved from
https://www.projectmanagement.com/wikis/293296/Forecasting

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Forecasting the Schedule and Cost of a Project

The Advantages and Disadvantages of PERT Inflation on a Project

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