177TRENDS AND EMERGING PRACTICES IN PROJECT SCHEDULE MANAGEMENT With high levels of uncertainty and unpredictability in a fast-paced, highly competitive global marketplace where long term scope is difficult to define, it is becoming even more important to have a contextual framework for effective adoption and tailoring of development practices to respond to the changing needs of the environment. Adaptive planning defines a plan but acknowledges that once work starts, the priorities may change and the plan needs to reflect this new knowledge.Some of the emerging practices for project scheduling methods include but are not limited to:u u Iterative scheduling with a backlog. This is a form of rolling wave planning based on adaptive life cycles, such as the agile approach for product development. The requirements are documented in user stories that are then prioritized and refined just prior to construction, and the product features are developed using time-boxed periods of work. This approach is often used to deliver incremental value to the customer or when multiple teams can concurrently develop a large number of features that have few interconnected dependencies. This scheduling method is appropriate for many projects as indicated by the widespread and growing use of adaptive life cycles for product development. The benefit of this approach is that it welcomes changes throughout the development life cycle.u u On-demand scheduling. This approach, typically used in a Kanban system, is based on the theory-of-constraints and pull-based scheduling concepts from lean manufacturing to limit a team’s work in progress in order to balance demand against the team’s delivery throughput. On-demand scheduling does not rely on a schedule that was developed previously for the development of the product or product increments, but rather pulls work from a backlog or intermediate queue of work to be done immediately as resources become available. On-demand scheduling is often used for projects that evolve the product incrementally in operational or sustainment environments, and where tasks may be made relatively similar in size and scope or can be bundled by size and scope.Copyright © 2017. Project Management Institute. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except fair uses permitted under U.S.or applicable copyright law.EBSCO Publishing : eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) – printed on 1/25/2021 3:35 PM via SOUTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE UNIVAN: 1595321 ; Project Management Institute.; A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK(R) Guide–Sixth Edition / Agile Practice Guide Bundle Account: shapiro
178Part 1 – Guide TAILORING CONSIDERATIONS Because each project is unique, the project manager may need to tailor the way Project Schedule Management processes are applied. Considerations for tailoring include but are not limited to:u u Life cycle approach. What is the most appropriate life cycle approach that allows for a more detailed schedule?u u Resource availability. What are the factors influencing duration’s (such as the correlation between available resources and their productivity)?u u Project dimensions. How will the presence of project complexity, technological uncertainty, product novelty, pace, or progress tracking (such as earned value, percentage complete, red-yellow-green (stop light) indicators) impact the desired level of control?u u Technology support. Is technology used to develop, record, transmit, receive, and store project schedule model information and is it readily accessible?For more specific information regarding scheduling, refer to the Practice Standard for Scheduling [16]
