PERT

Program Evaluation and Review Technique

Tong Wang
511D ERB
 PERT Example
Consider a small project that involves the following
activities.

Precedin Completion Times (days)

g
Activit Activity Optimistic Most Pessimistic
y Likely
a - 5 6 7
b - 4 5 18
c a 4 15 20
d b,c 3 4 5
e a 5 16 18
 PERT Example (cont’d)
• (a) Determine the expected value and the variance of the
completion time for each activity.
• (b) Use the expected times from (a) to find the critical
path.
• (c) Assuming that the normal distribution applies,
determine the probability that the critical path will take
between 18 and 26 days to complete.
• (d) How much time must be allowed to achieve a 90%
probability of timely completion?
• (e)By using modified probability of completion method,
what is the probability that all paths will take before 18
weeks?
 Exercise Solution
(a)
Activit Mean Variance
6 20.5
y
9.5 24 END
a 6 4/36
0 6 E
14.5
0 6 b 7 196/36
A C D
6 14 4 c 14 256/36
START
B 20 24
7 6 20
20 24
d 4 4/36
0 7 6 20
13 20
e 14.5 169/36
 Exercise Solution (cont’d)
(b) By using the expected time (mean) of each activity, we
find that the critical path is A-C-D.
Remark: For this simple project, we can find the longest
path (A-C-D) has the largest expected time, which is the
critical path.
The mean critical path duration is
μ= 6 + 14 + 4 = 24.
The variance of the critical path duration is the sum of the
variances along the path:
σ2cp = (4+256+4) / 36 = 264/36
so that the standard deviation is readily computed as
σcp = 2.708.
 Exercise Solution (cont’d)
(c)The interval probability may be computed as the
difference between two cumulative probabilities as
follows:
P(18 ≤ t ≤ 26) = P(t ≤ 26) - P(t ≤ 18).
Two separate z computations are required. First at 26
we have
z26= (26-24) / 2.708=0.739
Then by looking up the normal table with z26=0.739,
we have one result that
P(t ≤ 26) = 0.770
 Exercise Solution (cont’d)
Secondly, at 18 we have
z18= (18-24) / 2.708= -2.216
and
P(t ≤ 18) = 0.013
Combining these two results yields the desired probability
as
P(18 ≤ t ≤ 26) = 0.770 - 0.013= 0.757.
 Exercise Solution (cont’d)
(d) For 90% probability, we must pick a z value
corresponding to 90% of the area under the normal
curve, 50% left of mean and 40% right of mean, so
z = 1.282.
Then solving for t we have
t = 24 +1.282*2.708 = 27.47 days.
Exercise Solution (cont’d)
(e)There are three paths in total. They are A-C-D, A-
E, and B-D.
mean
mean standard deviation
standard deviation
A-C-D 24 2.708
A-C-D 24 2.708
A-E 18.5 2.192
A-E 20.5 2.192
B-D 11 2.356
B-D 11 2.356

The probabilities for the three paths to be completed 18 weeks

are given below.
P(X1 ≤ 18) = P( z ≤ (18-24) / 2.708) = 0.013
P(X2 ≤ 18) = P( z ≤ (18-20.5) / 2.192) = 0.127
P(X3 ≤ 18) = P( z ≤ (18-11) / 2.356) = 0.999
Then the probability of completing all the paths in 18 weeks is
P(X ≤18) = P(X1 ≤ 18) P(X2 ≤ 18) P(X3 ≤ 18) = 0.0016.
Questions?