It signifies that they are trying to plan and manage the work, rather than the project.

Most tasks, when ready, wait either to start being worked on or wait for significant periods of time while actively assigned to a resource.

Assign only one task to an individual at a time to eliminate multitasking.

Determine which projects to freeze (cease all activities on). Typically, we expect to freeze the lowest priority projects that are responsible for about 25% of the current project load.

Step 4 is not complete until all pathways have had the forward pass performed.

At the end of each workday* (see top of next page for an explanation), the resource manager talks with the resources that have been working the task (or to a task manager if there is a more senior, supervisory person assigned to the task). There are at most two questions asked: “How much time (workdays) until you reach the task completion

This means that most projects and tasks are not in a red zone, and project goals can be achieved without excessive expediting.

The steering committee, which controls the master project schedule, is responsible for activating new projects and communicating this to all concerned.

However, even when project managers suspect there is a problem, they don’t want to be accused of micromanaging, so they often find themselves in a conflict—call now for help or wait until the disaster is proven!