Introduction to Project Crashing

Project crashing occurs when project time is reduced and one or more tasks are overloaded. Basically, project crashing is done by adding more resources to the project as planned to reduce the time. Therefore, the primary objective is to keep the cost to a minimum when the project is shortened.

However, the result of the project crashing can be on a critical path. The project management team expects to deliver the project on time with the changes made.

 Project crashing steps help the project management software work easier and deliver the project within budget.

Examples of Crashing in Project Management

Here are some project crashing examples:

Project delay: Project penalties are applicable if the project is delayed. It is better to add more resources to the project to bring it back on track. Project delay would meet the ‘critical path’, not the ‘deadline’ of the project.

Avoid delay in the upcoming phase: Project delay impacts the project penalty and the results of the project. It is better to add additional costs than go into bigger cost overruns.

Project Team moves to another project: if the project is getting executed and, at the same time, the project team receives a new project with good resources and costs,  the team would prefer to take the new project to work. Hence, it is important to provide enough resources.

Free resources: if the company or organisation contains free resources, it might help the project team to add them to their project.

Resource for training: sometimes, new resources are available in the company for the training period. This may interest and contribute to the project's training process. And this might increase the rate of the project.

Time bonus: The project follows a certain infrastructure to complete the project. In this big process, the client doesn't want to stop or impact the ongoing project. Therefore, the project receives a time bonus that can compensate for the project's cost.

Different Interpretations of Project Crashing

Project crashing is not fixed with this issue. It could refer to spending more money on the project to get things done faster. And it exactly shows the critical path, which provides efficient resources. It is always better to review the critical path that can provide any activities to shorten the resources.

Another crashing method is called fast-tracking and is used when the project overlaps. The project crashing crashed was originally scheduled to run separately.

Advantages of Project Crashing

• Project crashing connects the short deadlines in the project
• The project crashing is works faster in execution.
• It receives the schedule crashingprojects on tracks

Disadvantages of Project Crashing

• Project crashing increase the risk on resources and cost
• It may require re-work
• It is not suitable for all types of projects.
• Cost is increased for re-work

Project Crashing should be avoided if,

• It threatens the elements of the work or accommodation of health and safety.
• It is cost-effective, better to avoid using longer.
• It creates another path to critical.
• Time reduction is not achievable.

‘Fast-track construction’ works alternative for crashing pmp. It is scheduling that is used to compress the entire project schedule. This decides the beginning of the project to organize and design to construct the phases. This means the activity works sequentially or it needs to reschedule to work parallel. It reduces the overall program and increases the cost and risk.

What Prompts Crashing in Project Management?

With a lot of effort and cost, the project goes through planning and scheduling. The project's crashing requires a higher cost to promote it. It is not used unless there is an emergency. The main reason for the project crashing would be that it was not scheduled realistically. And it would not work until the project is executed. It is possible at the planning stage if the customer or stockholder disagrees with the project plan due to a date that isn’t achievable.

Another reason for a project crashing is; it might change or attempt to control the project during the process. This issue needs to go immediately to the concerned team to decode the problem. The impact of this issue is a waste of time, cost, and other project factors. The project management team faces this issue with the project. Hence, the project manager should figure out the issue and go back to the scheduled baseline.

Project crashing is a fast-track method. It may seem easier to execute the process sooner. But it depends on the budget.

The project crashing is important when:

• The programming plan is inaccurate.
• When there are unseen events that cause delay, such as defects being discovered.
• As per the client's request, the project needs to be completed on time as planned. Hence, time extension is needed. But the client would wish to receive the project before the completion date.

Project Crashing Management Stages

Once the decision is made to use project crashing, there are a few steps that follow to get the expected results.

Critical Path:

The first step in the project is to analyze the critical path. This helps to finalise the shortened method paths for the project to minimize the time. Calculate the critical path to discover the essential tasks needed for secondary project success.

Identify Tasks:

Gather the list of tasks to complete that have been assigned. And when complete information is collected, it is easy to identify the task to complete. If any task is responsible for a critical path, cut it off and start looking at tasks that are lighter.

What Are the Trade-Off:

We might think that the critical path task is shortened in order to make the project final. It is a waste of cost and time if this opportunity does not work for the final crashing project schedule. Hence, calculating and adding more resources would cost more in the trade-off method.

Decide Upon:

For any project planning the budget needs to be decided. And for project crashing cost in project management, they need to be finalized later. To initiate for any new planning, the ‘baseline’, ‘schedule’, and ‘‘resource plan’ need to be updated.

When to stop crashing a project?

Sometimes it is necessary to stop the project from crashing in project management. It helps the project crashing to reducing schedule time as much as possible to bring the cost low. It is better to stop the project from crashing when it is not cost-effective. And the basic rules are:

• Compress only crucial activities.
• Crash from the cheapest to the most expensive activity.
• Crash activity until reach the minimum time reduction.
• Crash activity until it gets more costly to crash than not to crash.

Aim to achieve crashing:

• Use the current resources to improve and increase efficiency and address productivity issues.
• Increase the resource for critical path activity. This can work internally for the resources.
• Using different techniques might include off-site prefabrication, scaffolding, temporary weatherproofing, and so on.
• Fast-tracking activities.
• Working longer for the process.
• Additional Administration.
• Changing the design or specification.
• Limiting the range.
• Early obtainment of items.

Many of these strategies are necessary to reduce some additional costs. At the same time, a number of tasks need to be performed in a shorter period of time by using the resources. Time pressure may be increased by purchasing costs in addition, and this can lead to incomplete information and complexity.

It is important to complete the client's or contractor's project on time, or else you will need to bear the additional cost. There are various risks associated with the project crashing when resources are focused on the critical path.

And there are possibilities for the noncritical paths too. But quality, safety, and compliance should not affect the results of the critical path entity crashing. Hence, the project programme of the task might not suit the resources with which it is unfamiliar.

Conclusion

Project crashing works in project management by using the resources in a critical path in order to reach the goal. By using the resources, it is possible with the noncritical path, but it impacts the crashing time in project management, cost, and other project factors.

Fast-tracking activities involve crashing. And the project crashing helps execute the project faster. Hence, project crashing is necessary to use in project management.

To become a project management expert, enroll with Sprintzeal to get training and certification.

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