OMIS Exam 2

37. Which of the following stages is that one in which the project's expected costs, benefits, and risks are assessed? A. executing B. monitoring/controlling C. assessment D. planning E. initiating

38. In the execution phase of a project's life cycle, activities are guided by decisions that were made in the __________ phase. A. initiating B. planning C. monitoring/controlling D. closing E. assessment

39. Which of the following is not one of the six key decisions in project management? (I) Selecting the project team (II) Deciding on the project manager's title (III) Managing and controlling project resources (IV) Deciding which projects to implement (V) Selecting the project manager A. I B. II C. III D. IV E. V

40. One upside to terminating a project that is not going as well as planned is that: A. poorly performing project team members will be kept from causing trouble elsewhere. B. no additional costs will be incurred. C. poor project managers will be weeded out. D. resources can perhaps be put to better use elsewhere. E. project completion will be hastened

41. Project risk events tend to be unlikely __________ a project, but that's also when they tend to be the __________. A. early in; most costly B. late in; least costly C. late in; most costly D. before the beginning of; most complex E. at the conclusion of; least complex

43. Project management differs from management of more traditional activities mainly because of: (I) its limited time frame. (II) its unique, defined set of activities. (III) the requirement for use of the appropriate resources. (IV) the need for planning and execution. A. I B. II C. I and II D. I and III E. I, II, and IV

44. Which of the following would probably not involve the use of PERT? A. planning and constructing a new city hall B. developing an advertising campaign for a new product C. designing and constructing a subway system D. writing a poem E. preparing for the visit of a foreign dignitary

45. Once a project is underway, the project manager usually is not responsible for effectively managing: A. the people. B. costs. C. resources. D. time. E. project priority.

46. Which of the following is not a form of risk reduction in project management? A. backup system B. outsourcing C. risk sharing D. scenario analysis E. frequent monitoring of critical project dimensions in order to catch and eliminate problems earl

47. A sequence of activities that leads from the starting node to the finishing node is called a: A. path. B. sequel. C. trail. D. critical sequence. E. time line.

48. Which of the following is not typically treated as part of a project life cycle? A. feasibility assessment B. planning C. maturity D. release resources E. project staffing

49. A hierarchical listing of what must be done in a project is called a: A. work breakdown structure (WBS). B. PERT. C. planning matrix. D. crashing plan. E. critical path.

50. A method used for establishing a logical framework for identifying the required activities for the project is called: A. work breakdown structure. B. PERT. C. planning matrix. D. crashing. E. critical path analysis.

51. A popular visual tool for planning and scheduling simple projects, and for monitoring progress, is the: A. activity-on-arrows network. B. activity-on-nodes network. C. Gantt chart. D. critical path method. E. program evaluation and review technique.

52. To _____ an activity means to shorten the time it will take. A. smash B. fund C. crash D. aggregate E. matrix

53. Concerning PERT and CPM: A. These are two different names for essentially the same technique. B. CPM tends to focus more on the critical path; PERT focuses on the parallel paths. C. PERT gives a clearer indication of activity slack, while CPM gives a better picture of path slack. D. Because of its recent discovery, much less is known about CPM than PERT. E. CPM is useful for project manager selection; PERT is useful for project team selection.

54. The advantage a precedence diagram has over a Gantt chart is: A. its ability to reveal relationships among activities. B. its difficulty in depicting networks. C. its complexity. D. its simplicity. E. its lack of riskiness.

54. The advantage a precedence diagram has over a Gantt chart is: A. its ability to reveal relationships among activities. B. its difficulty in depicting networks. C. its complexity. D. its simplicity. E. its lack of riskiness

55. In a project network, the critical path is the sequence of activities which has the: A. most activities. B. most nodes. C. most events. D. longest duration. E. greatest variance.

56. Which of the following is not true about the use of dummy activities in project networking? A. They preserve the separate identities of activities. B. They clarify precedence relationships among activities. C. They have an activity time equal to zero. D. They have an activity time variance equal to zero. E. They are used in activities-on-nodes (AON) network diagrams

57. Shortening activity durations is called: A. expediting. B. crashing. C. vendor management. D. null nodes. E. trade-off analysis.

60. Which of the following is determined as a direct result of computing the earliest starting and finishing times for the activities of a project network? A. expected project duration B. activity slack time C. which activities are on the critical path D. variance in project duration E. maximum project duration

63. In project network analysis, "slack" refers to the difference between: A. observed and predicted times. B. optimistic and pessimistic times. C. mean and modal times. D. finish and start times. E. latest and earliest times.

64. Activity C has an early start time of 8, an early finish time of 12, a latest start time of 13, and a latest finish time of 17. Its slack is: A. 0. B. 1. C. 4. D. 5. E. 9.

65. Given this information about activity 3-4: ES = 10, EF = 15, LS = 16, and LF = 21, we can determine that the amount of slack associated with the activity is: A. 0. B. 1. C. 5. D. 6. E. 11.

66. In the probabilistic approach to project network analysis, the time estimate annotated tm for any activity is the: A. mean time. B. median time. C. most likely time. D. mode time. E. marginal time.

67. The basis for use of the beta distribution in PERT is: A. essentially theoretical. B. its features that make it attractive in practice. C. its symmetry. D. It is bimodal. E. It can easily be converted to a normal distribution.

68. When developing probabilistic estimates of project duration, it is necessary to know which of the following? A. the mean and variance of every activity B. the mean and variance of activities on the critical path C. the standard deviation of activities on the critical path D. each activity's probability of completion E. the distribution of activity times

69. A PERT/CPM activity has an optimistic time estimate of three days, a most likely time estimate of eight days, and a pessimistic time estimate of 10 days. The expected time (in days) of this activity is: A. 7.0. B. 7.5. C. 8.0. D. 8.5. E. 10.0.

70. Activity 4-5 in a network diagram has an optimistic time estimate of five days, a most likely time estimate of seven days, and a pessimistic time estimate of 10 days. Its expected time (in days) is approximately: A. 5. B. 6. C. 7. D. 8. E. 9.

71. There are four activities on the critical path, and they have standard deviations of 1, 2, 4, and 2 days. The standard deviation of the critical path is: A. 3. B. 5. C. 9. D. 16. E. 25.

72. There are four activities on the critical path. Coincidentally, their standard deviations are all equal to 4. The standard deviation of the critical path is therefore equal to: A. 2. B. 4. C. 8. D. 16. E. 64.

73. The project management strategy of injecting additional resources in order to reduce the length of the project is called: A. expediting. B. rushing. C. panicking. D. crashing. E. loading.

74. In "crashing" a project, a manager will generally focus on activities which: A. are not on the critical path. B. are the least costly to crash. C. are costly to crash and are on the critical path. D. are on the critical path and are the least costly to crash. E. are the easiest to crash.

75. At which point does crashing of a project cease? A. when the project is completed B. when no additional crashing is possible C. when the cost to crash equals or exceeds the benefit of crashing D. when the project is one-half completed E. when the team has been disbanded

76. Which of the following are advantages of PERT and CPM? (I) It is visual. (II) It is automatically updated. (III) Activities that need to be watched closely can be identified. A. I and II B. II and III C. III only D. I and III E. I, II, and III

77. Which of the following are limitations of PERT and CPM? (I) Time estimates may include a fudge factor. (II) Important activities may be overlooked. (III) It is an after-the-fact analysis. A. I and II B. I, II, and III C. I and III D. II and III E. I only

78. Which of the following is not a limitation of PERT and similar project-scheduling techniques? A. They force the manager to organize and quantify information. B. One or more important activities may be omitted from the network. C. Precedence relationships may not all be correct as shown. D. Time estimates may contain a "fudge factor." E. The use of a computer is essential for large projects

79. Gantt charts are most closely associated with A. JIT. B. PERT. C. MRP. D. MRPII. E. Six Sigma.

109. Which of the following is not characteristic of good risk management? A. estimating the likelihood of chance events occurring B. planning to eliminate chance events C. identifying potential chance events D. formulating contingency plans for chance events E. analyzing the consequences of chance events

110. Which of the following leads to simulation being a useful tool with uncertain activity times? A. paths that are not independent B. networks with each activity on only one path C. activity times that cannot be crashed D. noncritical paths that have no variability E. critical paths with activities with deterministic time estimates

111. Which of the following is not an element of the project management triangle? A. cost B. schedule C. resources D. quality E. performance objectives

112. If an activity is determined to be on the critical path, that means that unlike activities that are not on the critical path, it will affect project: A. direct costs. B. performance. C. quality. D. conflict. E. duration.

113. Activity J has a duration of 7 and an earliest finish time of 21. If J's latest start time is 16, this must mean that J's slack is: A. 7. B. 4. C. 3. D. 2. E. 1.