Preview
Critical Path Analysis
IB DP Business Management — Unit 5: Operations Management | HL | 5.7 Critical Path Analysis
📋 What You Will Learn
- Define critical path analysis, activities, nodes, earliest start time, latest finish time, and float
- Construct a network diagram from a list of activities and their durations and dependencies
- Identify the critical path and calculate total float and free float for non-critical activities
- Apply CPA to a real project management decision, interpreting what the critical path means for resource allocation
- Evaluate the benefits and limitations of CPA as a planning tool, linking to the concepts of change and creativity
📊 Topic Importance
| Paper | Relevance | Common Question Types |
|---|---|---|
| Paper 1 | High | Draw or complete a network diagram for the pre-seen company; identify the critical path; recommend whether to crash an activity |
| Paper 2 | High | Section B: complete a partially drawn network, calculate EST/LFT/float; Section C: evaluate CPA linked to change or creativity |
| Paper 3 (HL) | Moderate | Use CPA to justify a project timeline recommendation for a social enterprise |
🔍 Guiding Question When a business is managing a complex project with dozens of interdependent tasks, how can it identify which activities it absolutely cannot afford to delay — and where it has room to be flexible?
🌍 Why This Matters When Apple prepares a new iPhone launch, hundreds of parallel workstreams — chip fabrication, software testing, retail training, marketing campaigns — must converge on a single release date. Missing that date costs billions. Critical path analysis is the tool that tells project managers exactly which activities are non-negotiable and which have slack.
What Is Critical Path Analysis?
Large projects involve many activities that depend on each other. Some can run in parallel; others must wait for a predecessor to finish. Without a systematic method, managers guess at sequencing and routinely underestimate project duration.
📘 Critical Path Analysis (CPA) A project management technique that maps all activities in a project, their durations, and their dependencies onto a network diagram in order to identify the critical path — the longest sequence of dependent activities — which determines the minimum time in which the project can be completed.
- CPA forces managers to think systematically about what must happen before what — a discipline that reduces costly rework.
- It reveals which activities have float (spare time) and which have none — enabling smarter resource allocation.
- It is used in construction, product launches, IT projects, event management, and manufacturing changeovers.
- CPA is an HL Only tool in the IB Business Management syllabus.
Key Terminology
Every term below has a precise meaning that examiners test directly. Learn the definitions and their roles in the network diagram.
📘 Activity A task within the project that consumes time and resources.