Plan Development: Optimizing Project Plan Tradeoffs

Quick Summary
This is the sixth of a series of six templates on plan development. This template gives a list of activities that help optimize a Project Plan after the first pass Base Schedule has been developed.

What this is

This is the sixth of a series of six templates on plan development. This template gives a list of activities that help optimize a Project Plan after the first pass Base Schedule has been developed. It can help resolve the conflicting objectives in Scope, Schedule, and Resources that were initially established in defining the Project Objective Statement (POS).

Why it's useful

The first pass of scheduling a project rarely leads to an acceptable balance between the business and project objectives, the scope of work necessary to achieve those objectives, the time available, and the resources available. A series of tradeoffs must be made in one or more of these areas in order to align the schedule the project's objectives.

How to use it

Once scheduling activities have been applied to a task list to create a base schedule, apply the optimization activities listed in this template to align the schedule with the overall project goals.

• Revisit the project's overall objectives
• Revisit the Flexibility Matrix for this project
• Apply as many of the optimization activities as necessary to align the schedule with objectives
• If project objectives are changed, reaffirm the new objectives with all stakeholders.

Note that the optimization process is iterative with respect to other planning processes; it is likely to cause task definitions, ownership, and dependencies to be redefined. However, be careful about redefining task durations in tasks that have not been otherwise changed. Don't change durations unilaterally in order to "fit" the schedule. Be sure that you reaffirm commitments by the task owners when any duration estimates are changed.

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