Chapter 7: Tasks – under the Microscope

Imagine reading a textbook that had no organization to it, with no logical breakup into chapters, or even paragraphs, nor use of punctuation, or a progressive story within it. Such a book would be hard to read, and even more difficult to refer to. It would be an amorphous blob of information and its real-world value would probably be lost.

This same fate often awaits project schedules that are not meaningfully organized. In this chapter, we will learn how to go from a WBS-based task list to a well-designed project schedule. There are several aspects of a schedule that will make it well-designed rather than just a functional schedule. These aspects include non-functional requirements such as being able to read the schedule easily, being able to delegate work easily, and being able to track and monitor the schedule easily. In this chapter, we will discuss the techniques you can use to organize your tasks in such a way that these non-functional...