Theory of Constraints

Project Management
A Brief Introduction into the Basics

Authored by…

Dee Bradbury Jacob

Partner
The Goldratt Institute

William T. McClelland, Jr.

Partner
The Goldratt Institute

Copyright © The Goldratt Institute, 2001. All rights reserved. This work may be reproduced or used in any
form or by any means only for non-commercial purposes and with the written permission of The Avraham Y.
Goldratt Institute.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION…………………………….. 3

THE MAIN ROOTS…………………..……… 4

IDENTIFYING “WHAT TO CHANGE?”
THE SOLUTION FOR THE MAIN ROOTS.…….. 5
IDENTIFYING “TO WHAT TO CHANGE TO?”
PUTTING THE SOLUTION INTO PLACE……….. 11
IDENTIFYING “HOW TO CAUSE THE CHANGE?”

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When one thinks of project INTRODUCTION.
environments, they mainly think
of construction, engineering, Whether your organization manages stand-alone or multiple projects,
technology development, and whether those projects are small or large, whether your customers are
telecommunications. But, more internal or external, or whether the nature of the work performed is
than ever non-traditional project product development, construction, design, IT, or service; most projects
environments expect their
managers to be capable of are difficult to manage because of two things:
managing projects and
programs. Why? 1) They involve uncertainty, and
2) They involve three different and opposing commitments: Due
Execution – the ability to execute
to plan - is essential to creating
date, budget, and content
competitive advantage. More
than ever, to execute to plan is In organizations that attempt to manage multiple concurrent projects with
to properly manage the TIME common, shared resources, the job is even more challenging. Managers
value of money and resources. can quickly find themselves on “project overload” with continual resource
In many for-cause organizations, shortages and great difficulty in determining which tasks are truly the most
the key to continued support of important.
its benefactors is the
stewardship of funds leading to If this is beginning to sound familiar, then you are probably experiencing
the successful completion of
projects that are of enduring
some of these problems in your organization:
value to society.
• There are difficulties completing projects on time, within budget
and with full content.
What are some of AGI’s • There is too much rework activity.
customers using TOC Project • Promised lead times are longer than desired.
Management for?
• Existing project work is not complete before new projects
• Design of Manufacturing require a shifting in priorities.
Systems • Project Managers and Resource Managers have frequent
• Internal SAP implementation conflicts about priorities and resource commitments.
• Maintenance, Repair and • Existing project work is not complete before new projects
Overhaul (MRO) require a shifting in priorities.
• New product development • Problems in one project cascade into problems in other projects.
• Pipeline Management
• Some projects are abandoned or completed without the
• Production and Assembly
organization gaining the promised benefit.
• Program Management
• Strategic Planning • The organization is too slow responding to important
opportunities.

This paper provides a brief introduction into the basics of TOC Project
Management, showing how the solution addresses the underlying root
causes of the problems listed above. It is organized in the context of
answering three very important questions:

1. “What To Change?”
2. “To What To Change?”
3. “How To Cause The Change?”

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 THE MAIN ROOTS
IDENTIFYING “WHAT TO CHANGE?”
What types of organizations In order to make significant and lasting improvements in the way projects
have completed AGI’s TOC are managed, an organization must effectively address the underlying root
Project Management Expert causes that lead to the above problems.
Program?

• Aerospace The dominant root cause in organizations performing multiple projects

• Automotive with shared resources is the unavoidable conflict about when to begin new
• Consulting project work. In almost every organization, there are continual internal
• Construction and external pressures to address important new opportunities. At the
• Defense same time, managers recognize that beginning new work too soon may
• High-Tech divert needed resources from ongoing project work, compromising their
• Manufacturing ability to meet existing commitments. Unfortunately, with imperfect
• Metals & Mining knowledge of the true status of current project work, ongoing pressures to
• Semiconductor increase the organization’s output, and a belief that delaying a project’s
• Telecommunications start will only serve to delay it’s finish, managers all too frequently make
• Universities and decisions that overload the organization.
Colleges
The root cause that dominates the execution of individual projects is a
planning and scheduling process that is based on several erroneous
assumptions. One such assumption is the widespread belief that placing
protection time in every task will lead to optimized project performance –
that good individual task performance will inherently lead to good overall
project performance. Couple this with the fact that today’s most widely
used scheduling algorithms don’t provide proper protection for the effects
of integrating pathways (many parallel paths of work, all of which must be
completed before a common successor task may begin), don’t correctly
address resource dependencies, and don’t properly account for task and
iteration variability, and the stage is set for almost certain disaster (See
Figure 1). These algorithms calculate overly optimistic schedules that will
almost certainly throw the project into expensive firefighting once it is
recognized that the commitment is in serious jeopardy. Rushed up-front
planning aggravates this situation by missing out important task and
resource dependencies.

B LG B LG
Y R R
B LG B
M

C
Integrating Pathways Resource Dependency

Figure 1. Today’s widely used scheduling algorithms don’t provide proper protection for the way in which
projects are mapped.

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 Ultimately, firefighting becomes rampant, most people become severely
multi-tasked, and management institutes coping mechanisms for more and
more tracking of individual task and budget performance - ultimately
resulting in more overhead and adding even more “protection time” to task
estimates in an attempt to guarantee that people’s work will meet
management’s expectations.
BEHAVIORAL REALITIES IN Under such circumstances, people begin to place a higher priority on
PROJECT ENVIRONMENTS
self-preservation. Being measured on individual task performance,
ADDITIVE RULE: people realize that it is not in their best interest to report early finishes.
The commitments for duration They may feel it will compromise their future negotiations or they may
and total cost of a project are worry about being blamed for problems in their work because they did
based upon adding up the
duration and cost of the individual
not take all the time they were given. More than likely, the task
tasks. completion criteria are also very vague and people even feel
encouraged to work well beyond what is truly good enough. At the
PARKINSON’s LAW: same time, since most people carry such heavy loads, just the
Work expands to fill its time. knowledge that the “protection time” is there makes them believe it is
3-MINUTE EGG RULE: possible to use some of that time to finish other, more time-critical
It’s not quality if it’s finished work.
before the time is up.
The net result is that work that could have been turned in early is not
STUDENT SYNDROME: and the project has little chance to take advantage of any “positive
Waiting to start a task due to
more important work at hand. variation.” The effect of late tasks accumulates day-by-day while any
potential for early task completion is almost completely masked.

Unless these two major root causes are addressed effectively, there is little
chance for any organization to make significant and lasting improvements
in project management performance.

THE SOLUTION FOR THE MAIN ROOTS.

IDENTIFYING “TO WHAT TO CHANGE TO?”
In some engineering environments, The TOC Project Management provides a comprehensive solution to
a performance measurement
address these root causes and coping mechanisms. The solution includes
baseline (PMB) is used to track
technical performance in 1) a robust planning process, 2) a more effective scheduling process, 3) a
relationship to cost and schedule. methodology for introducing work that actually leads to increased
Undistributed Budget is an element capacity, 4) execution processes that provide excellent project control,
of the PMB. It is authorized work visibility and decision support, and 5) work behaviors that are more
held at top level until it can be
planned in detail.
conducive to good project performance.

In these environments, Network TOC Project Management: Project Planning

Building is critical in establishing the
PMB, and therefore the Contract
Project planning (called Network Building) begins with a combined
Budget Base. By gaining any
needed insight and detail upfront, meeting of project stakeholders to gain complete clarity on the intended
this process helps identify and objectives, deliverables, and success criteria of the project. This gets
assess risk early on in the program. everyone on the same page at the earliest possible moment, identifies areas
where more definition may be required, and typically prevents mid-project

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 surprises and rework. This session also surfaces any constraints (boundary
conditions) within which the project’s objectives must be accomplished.

Starting with the project deliverables, the project network is constructed

backwards in time with the participation of the project manager and key
content experts. The process identifies the important task, path, and
resource dependencies. Each individual task is defined in terms of its
completion criteria and the resources and skills that will be required to
accomplish it. This results in the same clarity of path identification as
working a maze from its ending point, back toward its start, while ensuring
the project work itself is planned to deliver the complete, necessary scope.

While constructing the project networks, the leader of the network

building activity works with the content experts to define the minimum
skills required for each task, identifying the few tasks that truly need
limited, specialist skills versus the many tasks that can be accomplished by
lesser skilled personnel. This aids the reduction of resource dependencies
within the project, which can reduce project cycle time. It also helps to
reserve the highest skilled personnel for where they are truly needed.

Once the resources and required skills are defined, the network
Network Building differs from building team estimates the potential variability associated with
traditional planning by:
each task and the potential iteration variability associated with
Building precedence: specific sequences of tasks. Each task is characterized in terms
• Necessity vs. Flow of a “highly probable” time to complete and an “aggressive, but
• Starting Point possible” time to complete.
• Checks for missing
dependencies A similar process is followed for identifying iteration
variability. The team estimates a highly probable number of
Capturing time estimates:
iterations that may be required for the appropriate task
• Account for task and iteration
variability sequences. They also estimate an aggressive but possible
• Drive desired work behaviors number of iterations. Both task and iteration variability
estimates feed into the scheduling process defined below.

In all, there are six independent safety nets in the TOC Project
Management process of building project networks. People who follow the
process rarely experience difficulties that can be traced back to faulty
planning. In fact, the results of this process are frequently so dramatic that
many users report this is the first time they have truly understood the work
that needs to be done!

TOC Project Management: Project Scheduling

Upon completion of the network building process, the resulting network is

used to determine the project schedule with a process commonly called
Critical Chain Scheduling.

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 Task, resource, and iteration dependencies are analyzed to determine the
longest “chain of work,” called the Critical Chain. The process then
separates what can be thought of as the “fixed” component of the work
from the “variable” component of the work. The fixed component of each
task (and each iteration sequence) is the aggressive but possible estimate.
The variable component (also called “safety”) is the difference between
the aggressive but possible estimate and the corresponding highly probable
estimate. This safety is then removed from each task location and
aggregated with the safety from other tasks in the same chain of work. A
portion of the aggregated safety is placed in strategic locations where it
will serve to protect the project as a whole. These placements are called
buffers.

A Project Buffer, located between the end of the Critical Chain and the
project’s commitment date, protects the project from the effects of
execution variability along the Critical Chain. Feeding Buffers, located
every place a non-Critical Chain task feeds a Critical Chain task, protect
the Critical Chain from execution variability along the paths that feed it.

A2-8 A4-5

B6-5 FEEDING BUFFER

C2-8 E4-3

PROJECT BUFFER

E2-8 C4-3 FB
F6-3
LEGEND
LEGEND
G2-8 FB G4-8

Project Critical Chain

FB = Feeding Buffer

Figure 2. A simple project to illustrate

the placement of time buffers.
The mathematical properties of aggregation, combined with new ways of
The proper placement of safety working (see below) on project tasks, lead to a reduction in the total
protects project performance amount of safety that is required – much less than traditional methods
from the effects of task and path would require to protect each task separately. This leads to shorter overall
variability, and signals the start project duration and, in some cases, reduced project costs.
of work at the appropriate time.

There are two places to protect: The resulting Critical Chain schedule is both feasible and immunized.
Feasible, in that resource contention is properly accounted for and
Due date - from variability within immunized, in that safety is placed in strategic locations where it will
the longest path of dependent
events
protect the project as a whole. The insertion of buffers also staggers path
starts, leading to clearer priorities for resources, a reduction in the
Longest path - from variability of tendency for significant bad multitasking, and a reduced potential for
shorter paths that join it mistakes.
(integration)

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 TOC Project Management: Synchronized Project Work Introduction

Some AGI customers that have It turns out that just the act of introducing project work that exceeds the
applied TOC Project Management: organization’s capacity will, in itself, lead to further capacity reductions
• Air Force Flight Test Center because of increased bad-multitasking. Instead, TOC Project Management
• Air Force Operational Test & pre-selects a more heavily loaded resource to serve as a gate for work
Evaluation Center (AFOTEC) release. New project work will be scheduled to begin in an interval of
• Balfour Beatty time where its need for that resource (Synchronizer) can be
• BHP Copper accommodated.
• CAE USA
• The Boeing Company Projects must be scheduled and synchronized before a completion date can
• EATON Corporation be committed. This way, commitments are made based on feasible,
• Eli Lilly and Company
immunized schedules that are in alignment with the organization’s true
• Fairchild Semiconductor
capacity to accomplish its work. Although it seems counter-intuitive to
• F-22 System Program Office
what many have come to believe over the years, the staggering of work
• General Motors Corporation
• Herman Miller, Inc.
introduction actually increases an organization’s capacity and shortens
• Intel Israel – Platform overall project durations. More work can be accomplished in the same
Networking Group interval of time.
• Israeli Air Force Material
Management Division
• Lockheed Martin-Aero TOC Project Management: Project Control and Impact Visibility
• LSI Logic
• Lucent Technologies Project Control is accomplished though Buffer Management, which is a
• Seagate Technology process of managing the aggregated safety that was placed between the
• Shea Homes final task of the Critical Chain and the project completion date. Delays
• Smiths Industries
along the Critical Chain consume Project Buffer time. Early finishes add
to the Project Buffer.

Senior management typically watches Project (and Budget) Buffer

performance versus progress along the Critical Chain. Functional
TOC Project Management
(resource) managers assign resources to tasks, using the associated Project
has a Budget Planning and Buffer status to determine the relative urgency of the available tasks.
Execution Process that Functional managers also use resource load profiles that highlight potential
compliments Critical Chain. resource overloads early enough for effective and inexpensive resolution.

Project managers monitor their project status using Project Buffer and
Critical Chain status. A Planning Threshold initiates their planning and an
Action Threshold calls those plans into implementation. Most TOC
Project Management software tools provide powerful “what-if”
capabilities to assist project managers in their efforts to determine what
actions will help them to recover a project with a collapsing Project
Buffer.

Visibility to project status, visibility to current and future resource loading,

and powerful “what if” analysis takes all the guesswork (and emotion) out
of managing projects.

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 Senior managers, project managers, and resource managers have a clear
and factual basis from which to make their decisions. This leads to
shorter, more effective meetings that result in decisions that are more
beneficial to good project performance.
Resource: EE
Qtr3, 2002 Qtr4, 2002 Qtr1, 2003 Qtr2,
Resource Histogram
July August September October November December January February March April M
8 15 22 29 5 12 19 26 2 9 16 23 30 7 14 21 28 4 11 18 25 2 9 16 23 30 6 13 20 27 3 10 17 24 3 10 17 24 31 7 14 21 28 5 12
Current Task 8
All Tasks & Projects
Availability

Units in Days

Page [ 1 , 1 ] of [ 1 , 1 ]

Figure 3. An illustration of a
Resource Load Profile.
TOC Project Management: Appropriate Work Behaviors

As discussed earlier, the coping mechanisms that managers put in place to

deal with the variable nature of project work accomplish the exact opposite
of what was intended – safety is placed everywhere and then wasted by the
behaviors that people must adopt to protect themselves.

At the core of TOC Project Management is a work behavior called the

Relay Runner work ethic. Briefly stated, this behavior calls for people
to begin work as soon as they have been assigned to a task, to work
continuously until the task’s completion criteria have been met, and to
provide immediate notification of that completion. The project network
is based upon the aggressive but possible times, but people are held
accountable only to the work behavior, not achieving the aggressive but
possible task duration estimate. By its very definition, all concerned
recognize that there is some probability that the aggressive but possible
time can be beat, but also some probability that the time estimate cannot
be met.

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 In most overloaded, heavily multi-tasked work environments, people are
frequently shifted back and forth between tasks as priorities change. That
unavoidably results in a large number of tasks being idle for significant
amounts of time, essentially queuing to be worked on. People utilization is
very high, probably too high. Task utilization is low, definitely too low.
Suppose, for example, a person is given a ten-day task to do –one of the
many they are expected to perform simultaneously. Every other day, they
get pulled off that task to do other, more urgent task work. That means the
ten-day task will take 19 days to complete – 19 days of “elapsed time” to
accommodate 10 days of “touch time.” If that task is on the longest path
of the project, those 9 days of “task idle time” translate directly into a 9-
day delay in project completion. The unfortunate thing is that, in many
heavily multi-tasked work environments, overall “task idle time” is a
depressingly large number.

To make improvements, an organization must recognize the

The focus of change is typically on the need for work behaviors to change and make it safe for people
new work process, the new technology, or to resist unmerited requests for multi-tasking, to report early
the new strategy rather than on the people finishes, and to come forward to ask for help when they are
who must implement change. stuck without fearing a lowered performance evaluation. This
...We ignore the most important question requires a significant shift in people’s thinking at all levels of
of the three: How to cause the change? the organization but, properly executed, delivers dramatically
improved results.

TOC Project Management: Summary of Benefits

TOC PROJECT MANAGEMENT

The network building process results in up-front
SOLUTION ELEMENTS agreement of all major stakeholders regarding important
project objectives and deliverables; early identification of
SYNCHRONIZATION MECHANISM – the key interdependencies that will dominate the project;
Effectively handles the sequencing of clear task completion criteria; realistic resource needs;
committed and new projects and a much more complete understanding of the project
PROJECT PLANNING - Identifies the to be undertaken.
effects of dependencies and errors from The project scheduling process yields a feasible,
time estimates immunized schedule centered on a Critical Chain of work
that will dominate the project throughout execution - a
PROJECT SCHEDULING – Minimizes
shorter, better protected schedule that is able to absorb
errors of the Additive Rule and prevents
releasing work too early many known and unknown risks. This allows project
mangers to focus on the critical few tasks, separated from
RESOURCE BEHAVIOR – Encourages the important many.
reporting of Early Finishes, identifies “gold-
plating”, reinforces strict adherence to
The synchronization of a portfolio of projects around a
schedule and task
more heavily loaded resource staggers competing
PROJECT CONTROL and VISIBILITY - concurrent project demands on all resources, aligning
Focuses on overall project performance project work to the organization’s true capacity to handle
instead of task and milestone performance the work. This enables the organization to make realistic
commitments that can be reliably met. Projects are

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 accomplished in less time – starting later than they normally would using
traditional methods yet finishing earlier. Managers also have a tool for
assessing the impact of any major changes on the entire portfolio.

The project control mechanisms such as Buffer Management provide a

clear indication of the health of each project. This, in turn, provides a
sound basis for prioritizing the tasks for resource assignment. For the first
time, managers have a tool that allows them to always assign their people
to the task work that will benefit the organization most. Because project
managers are able to focus in the right places and quickly determine
recovery plans, project management becomes more proactive and less
reactive, with a dramatically increased ability to meet schedule, cost and
scope commitments without crisis spending.

The new work behaviors ensure high resource productivity, high task
productivity, improved overall project performance and a much higher
quality of work life.

PUTTING THE SOLUTION INTO PLACE.

IDENTIFYING “HOW TO CAUSE THE CHANGE?”
For many organizations, projects are “what we do for a living.” Projects
are their business. In such environments, changing how people manage
projects is tantamount to changing the basic fabric of the business.
Clearly, one must approach such change with great care. The right people
must be brought into the picture at the right time, in just the
The 6 Steps to Achieving Buy-In right way. The process must move slowly enough to permit
identification of essential changes, yet fast enough that it does
not lose the momentum that is necessary to sustain continued
Step 1: Secure agreement on the
problem to be solved. progress. The Goldratt Institute has developed a very robust
implementation process consisting of six distinct phases. Each
Step 2: Secure agreement on the
direction of a solution.
phase builds upon the next and each is specifically designed
around a logical progression of obtaining the true support and
Step 3: Verify that the proposed solution collaboration of the participants.
will deliver the desired results.
Step 4: Ensure that all significant In the first phase, senior management learns what changes are
potential negative side effects
have been identified and
required and what their roles need to be in facilitating that
prevented from happening. change. In order for change to succeed, they need to be in
consensus that they will continue to champion the change for
Step 5: Identify and address all
significant potential obstacles
the long term.
that could block implementation
of the solution. Once they are aligned, management needs to inform the
Step 6: Ensure that all the necessary organization about what will change, why the change is
leadership is committed to necessary, how the organization and each of its people will
making the implementation benefit, and when and how they will be “brought on board.”
successful. Following the informational briefing, the hard work begins.

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 There is a third phase, where previously trained experts begin to use the
generic solution to identify areas where customization will be required to
address the unique needs of the organization. In order to minimize
disruption to the organization, only a few necessary people are brought
into the activities of Phase three.

During the fourth phase, the rest of the organization is brought into the
picture. People are trained and begin to participate in their designated
roles. This is also the phase where the readiness of all support systems is
verified.
TOC Project Management Solution
The fifth phase is more of an event than a phase of significant time
For organizations and project duration. It is analogous to “throwing the switch” to take the system
managers who are working to “live.” This is the point at which TOC Project Management truly becomes
improve their ability to continually the “way we do our work.” If everything has been done properly up to that
meet the three seemingly illusive point, much of the chaos has now been driven out of the organization,
project commitments — budget, time
and content, the TOC Project setting up the final stage.
Management Solution provides a
comprehensive tool set that The sixth phase begins the process of ongoing improvement. A this stage,
addresses: the organization has so much visibility to every aspect of its project
management system that people can begin to systematically pinpoint and
• The nature of project planning
implement changes that will bring the most improvement to the bottom
• Project scheduling
• Resource behavior
line.
• Project visibility and control
• Multiple project synchronization

For more information regarding the

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The Goldratt Institute’s course offerings, products or
AGI’s TOC Supply Chain
Management Solution
services, please contact us at +1.800.394.GOAL, or
+1.203.624.9026, or
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and distribution managers who are
visit us at www.goldratt.com
dealing with the challenges of
ensuring availability of the right
products at the right place and time
— while maintaining profitable Copyright © The Goldratt Institute, 2001. All rights reserved.
operations, the TOC Supply Chain
Solution enables the organization to:

• Rapidly respond to actual

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• Improve on-time deliveries
• Reduce the need for overtime
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