Project Management Tools

Definitions for common tools used when planning a project.

Gantt Chart

A Gantt chart is a popular bar chart that aims to show the timing of tasks or activities as they occur across time. Although the Gantt chart did not initially indicate the relationships between activities, this has become more common in current use as both timing and interdependencies between tasks can be identified.

Since the initial introduction of Gantt charts, they have become an industry standard and a key project management tool for representing the phases, tasks and activities that are scheduled as part of a project Work Breakdown Structure or timeline of activities.

PERT Chart

The Programme Evaluation and Review Technique commonly abbreviated PERT is a model for project management invented by United States Department of Defense's US Navy Special Projects Office in 1958 as part of the Polaris mobile submarine launched ballistic missile project.

PERT is basically a method for analysing the tasks involved in completing a given project, especially the time needed to complete each task and identifying the minimum time needed to complete the total project.

Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

A Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) is an exhaustive, hierarchical tree structure of deliverables and tasks that need to be performed to complete a project. Work breakdown structure is a very common project management tool and the basis for much project planning.

Product Breakdown Structure (PBS)

In project management, a Product Breakdown Structure (PBS) is an exhaustive, hierarchical tree structure of components that make up a project deliverable, arranged in whole-part relationship.

A PBS can help clarify what is to be delivered by the project and can help build a work breakdown structure.

The PRINCE2 project management method mandates the use of product based planning, part of which is developing a product breakdown structure.

Logic Network

A Logic Network shows the sequence of activities in a project across time. It shows which activity logically precedes or follows another activity. It can be used to identify the milestones and critical path of a project.

S Curve

The S Curve is a well known project management tool and it consists in "a display of cumulative costs, labour hours or other quantities plotted against time".The name derives from the S-like shape of the curve, flatter at the beginning and end and steeper in the middle, because this is the way most of the projects look like.

The S curve can be considered as an indicator and it's used for many applications related to project management such as: target, baseline, cost, time etc. That's why there is a variety of S Curves such as:

-Cost versus Time S Curve;(appropriate for projects that contain labour and non-labour tasks).

-Target S Curve;(This S Curve reflects the ideal progress of the project if all tasks are completed as currently scheduled)

-Value and Percentage S Curves;(Percentage S Curves are useful for calculating the project's actual percentage complete)

-Actual S Curve;(This S Curve reflects the actual progress of the project to date)

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