The original critical path was B – E – F which resulted in a 16-week duration for the project. By reevaluating with actual progress, the critical path changes to A – D – F and adds 2 weeks to completion resulting in 18 weeks. This project can be completed on time if either tasks C and D or task F is crashed which means that more resources are added onto the task for the least amount possible. By doing so, the project can be decreased by 2 weeks resulting in the 16-week project deadline.The original resource chart gave, at most, 7 workers on a given day and, at minimum, 1 worker on a given day. Having the completion date stay at 10 days, resource leveling can change the maximum workers to 5 in this duration and minimum to 3 with the proposed schedule below.The value of work by week three is less than expected based on the CV value calculated, this shows that by week three the project is already over budget. Looking at this, the resources should be reallocated moving forward from week three to try and conserve the budget. Looking at this, the project can be completed ahead of time and over budget but that is not the desirable solution Instead, resources should be monitored more carefully and reallocated as necessary to reduce cost. One conflict I was involved in was requarding upgrading a software to the newest version. When looking at the current version and the problems we had encourntered, it was clear, through research, that the best idea was to move the platform to a containerized solution for portability and ease of future upgrading. Once discussing this with the rest of the team to guage interest, we all agreed it was the right move going forward. Taking this information to our supervisor, he had one meeting with the rest of the team to discuss it (in which they all discussed why they agreed with it) and then had a meeting with me lying about how no one agreed with it and we wouldn’t move forward with that idea. In the end, the upgrade was moved forward without containerization.
Through this situtation I believe the supervisor was in a competing position in which he felt it was his way or no way in order to complete the upgrade, a win-lose situation, as was common with him. The information was not presented in whole for the research done and he had separate meetings with different areas of the department. The first major thing that should have been done was to have a team wide meeting about the idea before coming to a decision. This would have allowed for more open discussion on the benefits of the project as well as presenation of the research alreadydone, along with a demo, to show the worth the change would bring. Moving on from this, it would have been a more effective solution to work towards a compromise on containerization, starting in small steps towards the upgrade that would benefit the company in the long run instead of outright haulting upgrades. By doing so, it would show the benefits of quick deployment and upgrades for the project.
After reading this case, the first thing I noted about Bob was his attitude towards some of the woman in which he felt because they had families they could not perform the work as well or be trusted to perform the work. Last May started a full time position as an engineer over the summer and no one looked at me like they looked at every other engineer because I was the only woman in a department full of men. All of the men, like Bob, constantly looked at differently from others, if the “men” were talking then they would settle down the conversation, switch topics or constatly apoligize for swearing in the room with me. And to be honest, I have probabaly said worse things than they have. Every day was a challenge with them. At times they would turn around and go “oh, I forgot you were there” and then go about there day.
The most remarkable instance would be my 90 day review. That was the day I realize just how much different they thought I was. I was given a project the first day I started and honestly, it was boring, so I completed it before my 90 days and was working on testing it the rest of the time there. Being a large upgrade it would need to withstand months of testing after my 90 days before moving forward. This was accompanied by even more documentation before I could hand it off to the next person. Starting that phase, I walked into my 90 day review and what happened? My superviser laughed at me because he gave me the project to set me up to fail and get rid of me. He didn’t think I could complete it. After laughing, he had nothing to say, and we parted ways for a few more months as I continued to test and document. A few months later I had the last laugh when I handed over all my work to the next job, and quit my job to go back to school full time. It was amazing how many men could underestimate a woman.
During my time at this job the one thing I wish they had done differently was just treat me as they treated all of the other engineers, not thinking that my gender/sex had any impact on my work ethics or quality of work. Having my work critiqued and spoken about just like the other engineers would have been much appreciated, as well as being given the same type of work. The work critiques should not have been based on gender/sex, but solely based on quality so that I could receive a 90 day review that was not just some guy laughing in my face because he thought I wouldn’t be able to finish the project. Having fair reviews of work that are based on the quality, time management, and testing of the project needed to be in place.
After reading this case I had a hard time finding a situation in which I struggled to accept another team member but I finally found one. When I first started as an intern at Company A, we’ll call it, I worked in many different departments. Being in the electrical engineering department, I always saw these two men, let’s call them Matt and James, sitting in the testing department. Matt had a huge personality, was outgoing and loved to talk. He was easy to get along with, but James was his exact opposite, always keeping to himself and quiet. Honestly, at first, I was much like Bob in which I judged him based on his quietness and thought he was a bit of an odd guy, but when I began working with him over my winter internship, I was amazed about how kind and gentle he was. He took in troubled kids and transformed their lives, he went sailing on his days off, and he was overall just a genuine human being.
One thing I find to be valuable at this point in my life is effective communication and networking with those around you. Using this strategy, I would have avoided my Bobish tendencies and started by introducing myself and talking with James just like I had talked with Matt. Through this, I could have developed a better work relationship with James and could talk with him about work related problems that I was facing. Using this experience, I am more likely to communicate with individuals I have met to get to know what they are good at before judging them based on an assumption. Knowing what each person is best at can then be leveraged later when a problem arises, then I know who I can talk with. This would have been a good strategy for Bob to follow instead of assuming the whole project depended on just him, Brad and Bill.
...(download the rest of the essay above)