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E-book Time Predictions : Understanding and Avoiding Unrealism in Project Planning and Everyday Life

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Penilaian

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The time prediction and planning capacity of the human race is particularly evidentin some of the early great constructions. An excellent example is the building of theGreat Pyramid of Giza, around 4500 years ago. We do not know much about themethods they used to predict the time needed and how they managed to finish thepyramid before the pharaoh’s death. Most likely, their time and resource predictionswere influenced by experience from building previous pyramids. However, even ifthey could use previous experience, they would have to adjust the predictions fordifferences in the pyramid’s size and location and the availability of resources. Thisis not an easy task, even for today’s construction planners, with better tools and morehistorical data.The achievements of the pyramid planners are even more impressive given that thecoordination of building activities required accurate time predictions of work doneby thousands of people. The building productivity of the Great Pyramid of Giza hasbeen estimated at about one block per minute during the 10 years of the pyramid’sactual construction [1]. The blocks had an average weight of 2.5 tons and had to be putin place with millimetre precision. There may have been as many as 15,000 pyramidworkers and 45,000 people to support their work with catering, administration, andtransport, which means that up to 4% of the population of Egypt was occupied withpyramid building. Without accurate time predictions of the activities involved, itwould have been impossible to coordinate and ensure the efficient use of resources.The project manager in charge was Hemineu, a relative of the pharaoh. Hemineumust have been a truly skilled project leader and also good at selecting people aroundhim able to provide accurate predictions of time usage and create realistic plans forthe work. Much of what is considered today to be good project time prediction andplanning practices was already in place at that time: the decomposition of largeprojects into smaller tasks that can be better analysed and managed, inspections andthe quality assurance of plans and time predictions, early feedback to improve theaccuracy of time predictions, and, when needed, replanning. While there are great successes in the history of time predictions, there is no shortageof time prediction disasters. In contrast to the successful construction of the GreatPyramid of Giza, several Egyptian pyramids did not finish in time, cost much morethan predicted, and were left unfinished.The early occurrence of overoptimistic time predictions is nicely illustrated by thefollowing contract on a house repair dating back to 487 BC in Mesopotamia: ‘In casethe house is unfinished by Iskhuya after the first day of Tebet, Shamash-iddin shallreceive four shekels of money in cash into his possession at the hands of Iskhuya’[3]. Clearly, people in Mesopotamia, one of the first civilizations, were familiar withcontractors not delivering at the promised time.Much later, large, innovative construction projects such as the medieval Basilicadi San Lorenzo in Florence, the Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona, and the SuezCanal experienced huge time and cost overruns. The cost predictions of the OlympicGames, have had an average cost overrun of 252% for the Summer Olympics and135% for the Winter Olympics, and no cost prediction for any Olympic Games so farhas ever been on the pessimistic side [4]. The then mayor of Montreal, Jean Drapeau,is infamous for predicting that the Winter Olympics in Montreal in 1976 could ‘nomore lose money than a man can have a baby’ [5]. The Olympics in Montreal resultedin a debt of over $1 billion, which took the Montreal citizens more than 30 years topay back.

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Ketersediaan

Informasi Detail

Judul Seri

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No. Panggil

519.2 HAL t

Penerbit

Switzerland : Springer Nature., 2018

Deskripsi Fisik

117 hlm

Bahasa

English

ISBN/ISSN

9783319749532

Klasifikasi

519.2

Tipe Isi

text

Tipe Media

computer

Tipe Pembawa

online resource

Edisi

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Subjek

Probabilities

Info Detail Spesifik

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Pernyataan Tanggungjawab

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Versi lain/terkait

Lampiran Berkas

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