Tasks w/calendars removed from critical path

[Andy]

I have some tasks that I have made a new calendar for so that they can be
completed on a Saturday. When I assigned the calendar to the task, it
removes the task from the critical path. When I filter for the critical path
it shows the summary task of those that are assiged the Saturday work day,
but none of the subtasks. I believe that it is still on the critical path as
the Saturday was required to meet the Monday deadline and there are no other
tasks that finish later that are predecessors for the Monday deadline.

Any advise would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Andy

Thak

 

[JulieD]

Hi Andy

i would choose view / table - schedule and look at the values in the total
slack column ... by default project determines that a task with 0 total
slack is on the critical path. this might give you some idea as to why
these tasks are now not on the critical path.

additionally, what version of project are you using (and what SR do you have
installed).

Cheers
JulieD

 

[Andy]

Thanks for the responce Julie,

I am currently using MSP 2002 Standard with no service pack installed.

I think you answered my question, however... I have a number of tasks that
have 0.5 days of total slack. I know that this is because of the durations
that I have entered and the dependency relationships, in addition I have a
large amount of leads put in to a number of tasks. The project is on a very
tight schedule and it has been very tricky to meet the deadline. It seems
intuitively that the 0.5 days of slack are kind of masking the critical path.
I started to take the slack out of these items, but it kind of feels like
I'm cheating and I want MSP to determine my critical path and not try to
create my own as I'm sure that the software does a better job. I'm tempted
to make a copy of the project and try redoing all of my links to see if maybe
I made an error somewhere, but this would require a fairly large amount of
work and would be hard to fit into my already tight schedule. Any
suggestions?

Thanks,
Andy

 

[JLB]

Tools | Options | General
Set "Tasks are critical if slack is less than or equal to" nnn "days".

There's a phrase: a foolish consistency is the hobgobblin of little minds.
Don't worry about changing slack from 0. Worry if your project is coming in
late or overbudget.

 

[Steve House [MS Project MVP]]

Remember "critical path" doesn't have anything to do with importance. The
critical path is the sequence of tasks whose durations determine the overall
duration of the project. That's all it means. Period. The half day
slack times aren't actually masking anything - those tasks could be allowed
to slip by up to a half a day without impacting the project finish date and
time. While monitoring the critical path is certainly essential, keeping
focus on the potential risks to the critical tasks, and if you're trying to
crash the schedule, applying resources to the critical tasks so they finish
earlier is where you're going to some "bang for your buck," there are times
I think people get a bit carried away with worry over the critical tasks.

 

[JulieD]

Hi Andy

i'm agree with both Steve's and JLB's comments ... if you'ld like to see the
"critical path" (ie those tasks that immediate affect the project's
finish) - then change the definition of critical to take into account the .5
day slack. This will show the critical path for you and allow you to
monitor these tasks as .5 of a day isn't a huge amount of slack in most
cases.

Cheers
JulieD

 

[Andy]

Thank you all very much for your input. I am still new to PM and I greatly
appreciate all of you who take the time to help out me and the others who
have questions.

Thanks,
Andy