{"id":16579,"date":"2018-09-23T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-09-23T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/critical-path-what-every-project-manager-should-know\/"},"modified":"2018-09-23T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2018-09-23T05:00:00","slug":"critical-path-what-every-project-manager-should-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/critical-path-what-every-project-manager-should-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Critical Path: What Every Project Manager Should Know"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Critical Path Method has its roots in efficiency developments researched during World War 2 by the US Navy among others, with it finding its most important use on the Manhattan Project which developed the first nuclear weapons.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Far from that history, critical path in project management is now primarily <\/span>used by PMs to calculate the critical tasks<\/span><\/a> in a project and to help assess resource management and deadlines. Whether using the method purely in itself or as an aid to your project planning, critical path has many elements which can be of great assistance to project managers. <\/span><\/p>\n

Here’s a run-through of everything you need to know about using critical path in project management.<\/span><\/p>\n

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  1. Identify all the tasks<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The first part of using critical path is to <\/span>outline all the tasks that need to be performed<\/span><\/a> in order to complete the project. This can be done using a <\/span>work breakdown structure (WBS)<\/span><\/a>. A WBS sees tasks being broken down into discrete, separate and actionable activities. <\/span><\/p>\n

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    1. Draw ordered chart of tasks<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Once you know what tasks need to be completed, create a chart which lists them in a logical order, e.g. “Write program code” must come before “Test program code”. This should include how inter-related tasks are. Within any given project, some tasks may not have a relationship at all, while <\/span>others will have dependencies on each othe<\/span><\/a>r to varying degrees, such as:<\/span><\/p>\n