The Wonderful World Of The Gantt Chart

Given the vast array of technological tools at the modern project manager's disposal it is easy to forget the essential building blocks of project management and the principles of the discipline that were mapped out in the early to mid twentieth century. But we ignore these foundational elements at our peril as, whilst the incredible advances in software and applications over the last few years have made project management more sophisticated and complex, there is a danger that we can lose sight of the original goals of our projects amongst all the bells and whistles.

Arguably the most fundamental innovation in the history of project management has been the Gantt chart which almost single-handedly invented the scientific method of documenting and analysing the progress that a given project has made. Before the Gantt chart there was no prescribed method of recording such data and this led inevitably to botched or incomplete projects where no single person had full control of the overall picture.

Henry Laurence Gantt, an American mechanical engineer, developed his iconic chart in the first half of the 1910s but it had its roots even earlier in the century when, in 1903, Gantt presciently identified the two key modes of work balance: the 'man's record' and the 'daily balance of work.' Put crudely the man's record is the specific amount of work required of any given individual whilst the daily balance of work records the overall amount of work required of the entire team of workers that day. It was by synchronising the two balances in a visual diagram Gantt was able to provide his foremen with a clear and easily understood representation of the progress of the project.

Of course the basic Gantt chart developed and expanded over time until it metamorphosed into the Program Evaluation and Review Technique (or PERT) that began to dominate project management in the 1950s. The original chart merely showed the progress of the tasks required against the time frame required for the entire project and the user would manually fill in the progress bar as each segment of work was completed. However, it was not long before Gantt charts started to employ a dual bar system where the actual progress was recorded alongside the projected progress thus allowing for a quick and easy comparison of whether expectations were being fulfilled.

There was also a new kid on the block in the form of the Milestone chart, a less detailed type of Gantt chart that recorded only major milestones in the course of the project as opposed to every unit of work. Combining the Milestone chart with the Gantt chart provided a more exhaustive and multi layered depiction of all the processes and objectives of a given project as well as highlighting its real landmarks and how they fit around the day to day activity of the project.

Whilst it may be easy to take these innovations for granted as crude and simplistic the very modesty of their goals and intentions is something that modern project managers would do well to remember. For in paring the objectives of a project down to the basics the Gantt chart reminds us of what is truly important in the fulfilment of a project.