Innovative projects scheduling with scenario-based decision project graphs

Abstract

Decision project graphs – DPG are treated as a combination of deterministic and stochastic networks. They are designed for projects where at some stages at least one activity from a set of alternative activities is supposed to be performed. A given alternative task may differ from other activities belonging to this set in respect of times, costs and even sets of successors. Decision project graphs are used in project planning, scheduling and management. Due to the fact that especially in the case of innovative projects many factors are not completely known before the project execution, the DPG issue has been already investigated both under certainty and uncertainty. In this contribution we present a novel scenario-based DPG rule which takes into consideration possible scenarios, dependent activity durations, the decision-maker’s attitude towards risk and the distribution of parameter values connected with particular activities. The procedure is especially designed for totally new (innovative) projects where it is complicated to estimate probabilities of particular scenarios since no historical data are available. The decision rule is assisted with an optimization model which can be easily solved with the use of diverse optimization computer tools. The model may support both reactive and proactive project management.