Even a good plan cannot account for all subcontracting-related delays. Intuitively it might seem that a plan of such magnitude could not be completed on time, at least not with so many subcontractors. When in doubt, common sense should 'win out' when allowing for delays.
The only conceivable way for a good baseline plan to have accounted for more contingencies within the project would be to work with all subcontractors involved on the various projects and create a master timeline. Provided the contractors were honest about the real deadlines for their deliverables, the various arms of the project could have been better-coordinated. The time-sensitive nature of the project, designed to take advantage of a critical business opportunity suggests it may have been too ambitious to do the company real financial good, and a more feasible and moderate production line expansion might have better achieved the designed goal.
Better coordination would not necessarily have improved the final results given the incompetence show by Woody's lower-level managers. Miscommunications were rife amongst critical organizational actors. It was not simply that the deadlines were unclear or that there were delays in material delivery -- individuals designed to make authoritative decisions were effectively 'asleep at the wheel.' For example, when two of the company's executives were on vacation, manufacturing drawings for long-lead equipment awaited approval. There was no contingency plan for a junior official to approve the plans, nor was anyone contacted to sign the papers. The delay was two weeks, but the time costs...
How should float on the critical path have been managed? Would this have helped to complete on time?
In project management 'float' is the amount of time a project can be delayed. In this instance, there was almost no 'float' on the project -- the new production train and the new software system, for example, had to be designed in conjunction with one another, not separately. This was one of the fundamental failures of the Woody project. Even if details, such as project float had been better managed, the project would likely have met with delays. Too few contingencies were allowed for in terms of time and costs. Even if all of the mangers had signed the necessary papers on time, if something else went wrong there was little elasticity within the schedule.
References
Wideman, Max. (1993). Woody 2000. Expert Project Management.
Retrieved October 5, 2010 at http://www.maxwideman.com/papers/woody2000/intro.htm
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