1. Dr. Ron Lembke Operations Management
Project Management
Dr. Ron Lembke
Operations Management

2. What’s a Project?
Changing something from the way it is to the desired state
Never done one exactly like this
Many related activities
Focus on the outcome
Regular teamwork focuses on the work process

3. Examples of Projects Building construction New product introduction
Software implementation
Training seminar
Research project

4. Why are projects hard? Resources- Planning People, materials
What needs to be done?
How long will it take?
What sequence?
Keeping track of who is supposedly doing what, and getting them to do it

5. IT Projects Half finish late and over budget
Nearly a third are abandoned before completion
The Standish Group, in Infoworld
Get & keep users involved & informed
Watch for scope creep / feature creep

6. Pinion Pine Power Plant
DOE Clean Coal
Air-blown Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle
Kellogg/Rust/Westinghouse gasifier
GE Frame 6FA combustion turbine
$335.9m, half DOE, half SPP

7. Coal Gasification Coal Gasification (new) Gas Fed into turbine
Coal into Low Heat Value (LHV) gas 130 btus/standard foot
Crushed coal and limestone absorbs sulfur
Hot gas desulfirized
Particulate removal
Gas Fed into turbine
Tested fine on nat gas

8. Technology Development
Ash created in gasification, collected
Hot-gas cleanup (new technology)
SO2 in collected in calcium sulfate
Hot-gas filter, then to combustion turbine
Fines combustor burns particles bottom of filter
Main problem was filter-fines removal
Never operated more than 24 hrs.
Tried 24 times to start it. Eventually mothballed

9. Project Scheduling Establishing objectives
Determining available resources
Sequencing activities
Identifying precedence relationships
Determining activity times & costs
Estimating material & worker requirements
Determining critical activities

10. Project Personnel Structure
Pure project “Skunk Works”
Functional Project
Matrix Project

11. Work Breakdown Structure
Hierarchy of what needs to be done, in what order (Exhibits 2, 3)
For me, the hardest part
I’ve never done this before. How do I know what I’ll do when and how long it’ll take?
I think in phases
The farther ahead in time, the less detailed
Figure tricky issues, the rest is details
A lot will happen between now and then
It works not badly with no deadline
General Idea ? ?

12. Mudroom

13. Mudroom Remodel Big-picture sequence easy: Hard: can a sink fit?
Demolition
Framing
Plumbing
Electrical
Drywall, tape & texture
Slate flooring
Cabinets, lights, paint
Hard: can a sink fit? W D W

15. Project Scheduling Techniques
Gantt chart
Critical Path Method (CPM)
Program Evaluation & Review Technique (PERT)

16. Gantt Chart

19. What do these 3 guys have in common?
Day before Thanksgiving, 2015, late afternoon, 27ºF

20. Summary Project management is hard Critical activities
Who is doing what?
Critical activities
Determine completion date
Have to stay on top of them
Gantt charts show what should be happening
Can show the critical activities
Hard to use them to figure out what is critical