• Work policies are rules about when to start work and rework, and when to allow crashing and overlapping, in projects.

• They give a project manager a big lever to affect project duration and cost.

• Findings:

  • As activity iteration increases (from zero to 20 to 40 to 60 feedback loops in the figure on the right), the work policies (P1, P2, P4, P5) diverge, exposing increasing time-cost tradeoffs. (P3 not shown)

  • Crashing is most beneficial with an aggressive work policy that precipitates iteration and rework (P5).

  • Ironically, overlapping is better with a work policy that defers rework (P4).

  • No single work policy dominates in all situations, although an aggressive policy that precipitates rework (P5) may often be worth its added cost for the speed benefits.

  • Faster work policies are more expensive.

Key Publications: P32, P35

Appropriate work policies help manage complex time-cost tradeoffs in projects.