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How many types of activity floats exist in the context of project delivery date(s)?

Alex LyaschenkoMember for 15 years 2 months
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How many types of activity floats exist in the context of project delivery date(s)? 

💢CPM recognises only one type: TOTAL FLOAT (TF). 
💢RCPM recognises SIX different types.  

In this post, we discuss four of them. 5th & 6th types require a more complex scenario and longer discussion.

When we said an 'activity can be delayed without delaying the project delivery date', we included two types of ambiguity in the definition:

💣Ambiguity N1: activity delay.
Do we mean, "activity start or finish delay?" 

It gives us two variables: 
a) activity START can be delayed without.. 
b) activity FINISH can be delayed without.. or we can say "Activity can be extended without ... 

💣Ambiguity N2: project delay.
Do we mean "...without delaying the CALCULATED (or forecasted) project delivery date or TARGET (or Deadline) delivery date? "

It gives us two more variables:
c) without delaying CALCULATED (or forecasted) project delivery date
d) without delaying TARGET (or Deadline) project delivery date
 
As a result, there are FOUR possible combinations. 
What is important: Float for the same activity may differ in each sub-definition (!) It means we need FOUR different metrics. One metric, TF, can't have four values!

We can find the definition for each metric in my paper published in the PMWorld Journal a year ago. Reference: 'Project Delivery Plan Optimisation Metrics: Recovery Gap'.

Definition N4: Total Float Start (TFs) measures the amount of time that an activity may be delayed from its early start without affecting achievable project constrained events.
 
Definition N5: Super Float (SF) measure the time by which an activity's finish can be extended without affecting the achievable project constrained events. 

Definition N6: Recovery Gap Start indicates the time required to bring start of an analysed activity back on track to meet project deadline(s) or available float when the activity start is delayed.  

Definition N7: Super Recovery Gap (SRG) indicates the time required to bring finish of an analysed activity back on track to meet project deadline(s) or available float when the activity duration is extended. 

In Spider Project, 'Recovery Gap Start' is 'Float Negative Start' and Super Recovery Gap is Negative Float Super. 

Some time ago, when I posted a Quiz with this scenario and asked to calculate TF for activity B, I received four different answers. The quiz participants couldn't agree on which answer was correct. They never would, as each one is correct from a different perspective!
 
That is why one metric isn't enough. We need more.

Try to calculate each metric for activity B. You should receive four values. Can you provide them? 
 

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