Dear PM Advisor,
I was taking a PMP Prep course recently and a question used the term: "Max Crash Days." This was on a question about decreasing the critical path of a project using crashing and fast tracking. How does one determine Max Crash Days? Shouldn't you be able to crash further?
Crasher in Washington D.C.
Dear Crasher,
Crashing is the process of adding resources to an activity in the hopes of decreasing the duration. This works to a certain extent but not infinitely. The classic example is asking nine women to reach full term pregnancy in one month. Real examples are the addition of a person and another lathe to a metal shaping activity which can halve the duration but eventually you run out of people, or lathes or shifts and you reach that max crash state.
Other tasks are delayed by adding resources. Creation of a document can be an example of this where two minds add inefficency to the activity.
For the purpose of the PMP test, they need to tell you the max crash since they usually don't specify the actual activity and you just look at Activity B and say to yourself: "Let's double the resources and halve the time."
Good luck,
PM Advisor
Send your questions to Bruce@RoundTablePM.com
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