Chapter 3 Project Management

1) Which of the following statements regarding Bechtel is true? A) Its competitive advantage is project management. B) Bechtel was the construction contractor for the Hoover Dam. C) While helping to rebuild Iraq, Bechtel's crews had to travel under armed escort. D) Bechtel's procurement program is global in nature. E) All of the above are true.

2) Which of the following statements about Bechtel is true? A) Even though Bechtel is over 100 years old, the Kuwaiti oil fields was its first "project." B) Bechtel is the world's premier manager of massive construction and engineering projects. C) Bechtel's competitive advantage is supply chain management. D) While its projects are worldwide, its network of suppliers is largely in the United States E) All of the above are true.

3) Which of the following projects were completed by Bechtel? A) Hoover Dam B) Boston Central Artery/Tunnel C) Rebuilding Kuwait after Iraq's invasion in 1990 D) Rebuilding Iraq after the U.S. invasion, starting in 2003 E) All of the above were Bechtel projects

4) The phases of project management are: A) planning, scheduling, and controlling. B) planning, programming, and budgeting. C) planning, organizing, staffing, leading, and controlling. D) different for manufacturing projects than for service projects. E) GANTT, CPM, and PERT.

5) Which of the following is NOT one of the phases of project management? A) planning B) scheduling C) controlling D) budgeting E) All of the above are project management phases.

6) A project organization: A) is effective for companies with multiple large projects. B) is appropriate only in construction firms. C) often fails when the project cuts across organizational lines. D) is most helpful for ongoing projects with no termination date. E) is most helpful when the work contains simple and unrelated tasks.

7) A code of ethics especially for project managers: A) has been established by the Project Management Institute. B) has been formulated by the Federal government. C) has been formulated by the World Trade Organization. D) is inappropriate, since everyone should use the same guidance on ethical issues. E) does not exist at this time.

8) Ethical issues that may arise in projects large and small include: A) gifts from contractors. B) exaggerated expense reports. C) compromised quality standards to meet bonuses or avoid penalties related to schedules. D) pressure to mask delays with false status reports. E) all of the above.

9) The project organization works best when which of the following conditions are satisfied? I. Work tasks can be defined with a specific goal and deadline. II. The job is typical and familiar to the existing organization. III. The work contains interrelated tasks requiring specialized skills. IV. The project is temporary but unimportant to long-term organizational success. V. The project cuts across organizational lines. A) I, II, III, IV, V B) None of the above conditions need to be satisfied. C) I, III, V D) I, II, III, V E) I, III, IV, V

10) A project organization that becomes permanent is often referred to as a: A) fixed project organization. B) matrix organization. C) normal organization. D) standard organization. E) permanent project organization.

11) WBS stands for which of the following project management tools? A) work break schedule B) work breakdown status C) work breakdown schedule D) work breakdown structure E) work break status

12) Match the following steps in Microsoft's development of Windows 8 to their respective WBS level. Step Level Develop Windows 8 Operating System ? System Testing ? Compatible with Windows 7 ? Develop GUI's ? Module Testing ? A) Level 1, Level 2, Level 4, Level 3, Level 3 B) Level 1, Level 2, Level 3, Level 4, Level 5 C) Level 0, Level 1, Level 2, Level 3, Level 4 D) Level 0, Level 2, Level 2, Level 3, Level 3 E) Level 5, Level 3, Level 4, Level 1, Level 2

13) A combination of effective Gantt chart use and other tactics allowed Delta to cut the average time for a plane layover by what % of the original 60 minute duration? A) 33%, to 40 minutes B) 50%, to 30 minutes C) 20%, to 48 minutes D) 25%, to 45 minutes E) 40%, to 36 minutes

14) Which of the following statements regarding Gantt charts is true? A) Gantt charts give a timeline and precedence relationships for each activity of a project. B) Gantt charts use the four standard spines of Methods, Materials, Manpower, and Machinery. C) Gantt charts are visual devices that show the duration of activities in a project. D) Gantt charts are expensive. E) All of the above are true.

15) The control of projects involves close monitoring of which of the following? A) resources B) costs C) quality D) budgets E) all of the above

16) The main difference between PERT and CPM is that: A) PERT is more accurate than CPM. B) PERT assumes that activity durations are known. C) PERT ignores activity costs. D) CPM assumes activity durations can vary. E) PERT employs three time estimates for each activity.

17) The difference between AON and AOA networks is that: A) AOA networks sometimes require dummy activities. B) nodes consume no resources or time in AOA networks. C) both are acceptable in practice; however, Microsoft Project uses AON. D) nodes designate activities in AON, while arrows designate activities in AOA. E) All of the above are true.

18) A simple CPM network has five activities, A, B, C, D, and E. A is an immediate predecessor of C and of D. B is also an immediate predecessor of C and of D. C and D are both immediate predecessors of E. Which of the following statements is true? A) There are two paths in this network. B) There are four paths in this network. C) There are five paths in this network. D) There are 25 paths in this network. E) There are six paths in this network.

19) Which of the following statements regarding critical paths is true? A) The shortest of all paths through the network is the critical path. B) Some activities on the critical path may have slack. C) Every network has only one critical path. D) On a specific project, there can be multiple critical paths, all with exactly the same duration. E) The duration of the critical path is the average duration of all paths in the project network.

20) Which of the following statements regarding CPM is true? A) The critical path is the shortest of all paths through the network. B) The critical path is that set of activities that has positive slack. C) Some networks have no critical path. D) All activities on the critical path have their LS equal to the maximum EF of all immediate predecessors. E) All activities on the critical path have their ES equal to their LF.

21) A simple CPM network has three activities, A, B, and C. A is an immediate predecessor of B and of C. B is an immediate predecessor of C. The activity durations are A=4, B=3, C=8. A) The critical path is A-B-C, duration 15. B) The critical path is A-C, duration 12. C) The critical path is A-B-C, duration 13.5 D) The critical path cannot be determined without knowing PERT expected activity times. E) The network has no critical path.

22) A simple CPM network has three activities, D, E, and F. D is an immediate predecessor of E and of F. E is an immediate predecessor of F. The activity durations are D=4, E=3, F=8. A) The critical path is D-E-F, duration 15. B) The critical path is D-F, duration 12. C) Slack at D is 3 periods. D) Slack at E is 3 periods. E) Both A and C are true.

23) Activity D on a CPM network has predecessors B and C, and has successor F. D has duration 6. B's earliest finish is 18, while C's is 20. F's late start is 26. Which of the following is definitely true? A) B is a critical activity. B) C is completed before B. C) D has no slack but is not critical. D) D is critical, and has zero slack. E) F is critical, and has zero slack.

24) Which of the following statements regarding CPM networks is true? A) There can be multiple critical paths on the same project, all with different durations. B) The early finish of an activity is the latest early start of all preceding activities. C) The late start of an activity is its late finish plus its duration. D) If a specific project has multiple critical paths, all of them will have the same duration. E) None of the above are true.

25) Activity R on a CPM network has predecessors M and N, and has successor S. R has duration 5. N's late finish is 18, while M's is 20. S's late start is 14. Which of the following is definitely true? A) R is critical and has zero slack. B) R has no slack but is not critical. C) The set of times cannot all be possible. D) N is a critical activity. E) S is a critical activity.

26) Which of the following statements concerning CPM activities is false? A) The early finish of an activity is the early start of that activity plus its duration. B) The late finish is the earliest of the late start times of all successor activities. C) The late start of an activity is its late finish less its duration. D) The late finish of an activity is the earliest late start of all preceding activities. E) The early start of an activity is the latest early finish of all preceding activities.

27) The critical path for the network activities shown below is ________ with duration ________. A) A-B-D; 10 B) A-B-E; 11 C) C-E; 12 D) A-D-E; 13 E) A-B-C-D-E; 22 Activity Duration Immediate Predecessors A 4 --- B 2 A C 7 -- D 4 A E 5 B,C,D

28) The critical path for the network activities shown below is ________ with duration ________. A) A-D-E; 5 B) B-E; 6 C) B-D-E; 7 D) A-C-E; 10 E) B-C-E; 12 Activity Duration Immediate Predecessors A 2 -- B 4 -- C 6 A,B D 1 A,B E 2 B,C,D

29) The critical path for the network activities shown below is ________ with duration ________. A) A-C; 12 B) A-D-E; 19 C) B-E; 13 D) A-B-C-D-E; 29 E) none of the above Activity Duration Immediate Predecessors A 10 --- B 8 --- C 2 A D 4 A E 5 B,C, D

30) The time an activity will take assuming very unfavorable conditions is: A) the optimistic time. B) the pessimistic time. C) the activity variance. D) the minimum time. E) exactly twice as long as the expected time.

31) The ________ distribution is used by PERT analysis to calculate expected activity times and variances. A) Normal B) Beta C) Alpha D) Gaussian E) Binomial

32) The expected activity time in PERT analysis is calculated as: A) the simple average of the optimistic, pessimistic, and most likely times. B) the weighted average of a, m, and b, with m weighted 4 times as heavily as a and b. C) the sum of the optimistic, pessimistic, and most likely times. D) the sum of the optimistic, pessimistic, and most likely times, divided by six. E) the sum of the activity variances, divided by six.

33) Which of the following statements regarding PERT times is true? A) The optimistic time estimate is an estimate of the minimum time an activity will require. B) The optimistic time estimate is an estimate of the maximum time an activity will require. C) The expected time estimate is calculated as t = (a + 4m + b). D) The pessimistic time estimate is an estimate of the minimum time an activity will require. E) The most likely time estimate is an estimate of the maximum time an activity will require.

34) Which of the following statements regarding PERT times is true? A) The expected time is an estimate of the time an activity will require if everything goes as planned. B) The optimistic time estimate is an estimate of the maximum time an activity will require. C) The expected time estimate is calculated as t = (a + 4m + b)/6. D) The pessimistic time estimate is an estimate of the minimum time an activity will require. E) The most likely time estimate is an estimate of the maximum time an activity will require.

35) The beta distribution is used in project management to: A) calculate slack on activities not on the critical path. B) calculate the probability that a project will be completed within its budget. C) calculate pessimistic and optimistic activity times. D) determine which activity should be crashed. E) none of the above

36) The beta distribution is used in project management to: A) determine which activity should be crashed. B) calculate the probability that a project will be completed within its budget. C) calculate expected activity times. D) calculate slack for activities on the critical path. E) none of the above

37) In a PERT network, non-critical activities that have little slack need to be monitored closely: A) because PERT treats all activities as equally important. B) because near-critical paths could become critical paths with small delays in these activities. C) because slack is undesirable and needs to be eliminated. D) because they are causing the entire project to be delayed. E) because they have a high risk of not being completed.

38) Which of the following statements regarding PERT analysis is true? A) Each activity has two estimates of its duration. B) Project variance is the sum of all activity variances. C) Project standard deviation is the sum of all critical activity standard deviations. D) Only critical activities contribute to the project variance. E) The most likely time is equivalent to the expected activity time.

39) A project being analyzed by PERT has 60 activities, 13 of which are on the critical path. If the estimated time along the critical path is 214 days with a project variance of 100, what is the probability that the project will take 224 days or more to complete? A) near zero B) 0.0126 C) 0.1587 D) 0.8413 E) 2.14

40) An activity on a PERT network has these time estimates: optimistic = 2, most likely = 5, and pessimistic = 10. What is its expected activity time? A) 5.00 B) 5.33 C) 5.67 D) 10.67 E) 32.00

41) An activity on a PERT network has these time estimates: optimistic = 1, most likely = 2, and pessimistic = 5. What is its expected activity time? A) 2.00 B) 2.33 C) 2.67 D) 4.67 E) 14.00

42) An activity on a PERT network has these time estimates: optimistic = 2, most likely = 3, and pessimistic = 8. What is its expected activity time and variance? A) 3.67; 1 B) 3.67; 6 C) 4.33; 1 D) 4.33; 6 E) none of the above

43) A local project being analyzed by PERT has 42 activities, 13 of which are on the critical path. If the estimated time along the critical path is 105 days with a project variance of 25, what is the probability that the project will be completed in 95 days or less? A) -0.4 B) 0.0228 C) 0.3444 D) 0.9772 E) 4.2

44) A project being analyzed by PERT has 38 activities, 16 of which are on the critical path. If the estimated time along the critical path is 90 days with a project variance of 25, what is the probability that the project will be completed in 88 days or less? A) 0.0228 B) 0.3446 C) 0.6554 D) 0.9772 E) 18

45) A PERT project has 45 activities, 19 of which are on the critical path. The estimated time for the critical path is 120 days. The sum of all activity variances is 64, while the sum of variances along the critical path is 36. What is the probability that the project can be completed between days 108 and 120? A) -2.00 B) 0.0227 C) 0.1058 D) 0.4773 E) 0.9773

46) A contractor's project being analyzed by PERT has an estimated time for the critical path of 120 days. The sum of all activity variances is 81; the sum of variances along the critical path is 64. What is the probability that the project will take 130 or more days to complete? A) 0.1057 B) 0.1335 C) 0.8512 D) 0.8943 E) 1.29

47) Analysis of a PERT problem shows the estimated time for the critical path to be 108 days with a variance of 64. There is a .90 probability that the project will be completed before approximately day: A) 98. B) 108. C) 109. D) 115. E) 118.

48) A project whose critical path has an estimated time of 120 days with a variance of 100 has a 20% chance that the project will be completed before which day (rounded to nearest day)? A) 98 B) 112 C) 120 D) 124 E) 220

49) A project whose critical path has an estimated time of 820 days with a variance of 225 has a 20% chance that the project will be completed before which day (rounded to nearest day)? A) 631 B) 689 C) 807 D) 833 E) 1009

50) Contract requirements state that a project must be completed within 180 working days, or it will incur penalties for late completion. Analysis of the activity network reveals an estimated project time of 145 working days with a project variance of 400. What is the probability that the project will be completed before the late-payment deadline? A) 0.0401 B) 0.4599 C) 0.8056 D) 0.9599 E) near 1.0000, or almost certain

51) A project manager is interested in crashing a project with variable activity times. Which of the following tools should he/she employ? A) PERT B) CPM C) Gantt Chart D) either PERT or CPM E) PERT, CPM, or a Gantt chart are fine.

52) Which of these statements regarding time-cost tradeoffs in CPM networks is true? A) Crashing is not possible unless there are multiple critical paths. B) Crashing a project often reduces the length of long-duration, but noncritical, activities. C) Activities not on the critical path can never be on the critical path, even after crashing. D) Crashing shortens the project duration by assigning more resources to one or more of the critical tasks. E) The crash time always exceeds the normal time.

53) What was the name of the construction project to rebuild the Pentagon after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001? A) Project Panther B) Project Pit Bull C) Project Python D) Project Piranha E) Project Phoenix

54) Which of the following statements regarding time-cost tradeoffs in CPM networks is false? A) Crashing shortens project duration by assigning more resources to critical tasks. B) Crashing sometimes has the reverse result of lengthening the project duration. C) Crashing must consider the impact of crashing an activity on all paths in the network. D) Activities not on the critical path can become critical after crashing takes place. E) A negative crash cost per period would imply that either crashing is cheaper than not crashing or that the crash time was slower than the normal time.

55) If an activity whose normal duration is 13 days can be shortened to 10 days for an added cost of $1,500, what is the crash cost per period? A) $500 B) $1,500 C) $750 D) $13,000 E) $15,000

56) Two critical path activities are candidates for crashing on a CPM network. Activity details are in the table below. To cut one day from the project's duration, activity ________ should be crashed first, adding ________ to project cost. A) One; $400 B) One; $6,800 C) Two; $1,000 D) Two; $5,000 E) One or Two should be crashed; $1,400 Activity Normal Time Normal Cost Crash Time Crash Cost One 8 days $6,000 6 days $6,800 Two 10 days $4,000 9 days $5,000

57) If an activity whose normal duration is 15 days can be shortened to 10 days for an added cost of $2,000, what is the crash cost per period? A) $400 B) $2,000 C) $10,000 D) $20,000 E) $30,000

58) A network has been crashed to the point where all activities are critical. Additional crashing: A) is unnecessary. B) is impossible. C) is prohibitively expensive. D) may require crashing multiple tasks simultaneously. E) can be done, but all critical tasks must be reduced in duration.

59) Two critical path activities are candidates for crashing on a CPM network. Activity details are in the table below. To cut one day from the project's duration, activity ________ should be crashed first, adding ________ to project cost. A) B; $2,000 B) B; $8,000 C) C; $1,000 D) C; $2,000 E) C; $6,000 Activity Normal Time Normal Cost Crash Time Crash Cost B 4 days $6,000 3 days $8,000 C 6 days $4,000 4 days $6,000

60) Which of the following is NOT a limitation of PERT? A) Project activities have to be clearly defined, independent, and stable in their relationships. B) Precedence relationships must be specified and networked together. C) Only one time estimate can be used for each activity. D) Time estimates tend to be subjective and are subject to fudging by managers. E) There is the inherent danger of placing too much emphasis on the critical path.

61) Which of the following is NOT performed by Microsoft Project? A) drawing the project AON network B) identifying the critical path C) providing PERT probability calculations D) tracking the progress of the project E) creating the project Gantt chart