

The budget is generally displayed as a column beside the task name. Additionally, if earned value analysis is used to track the schedule, the budget is instrumental in identifying problem tasks that need attention. And because the Gantt chart is an amazing visual tool for the project schedule, adding a side-by-side visualization of project costs adds a tremendous degree of project management and control. Adding time to the project tends to increase costs, and adding costs tends to increase the time required. Budget: Although the gantt chart is primarily focused on time rather than budget, these two variables are generally speaking, inseparable.They can be displayed as a column on the left side (beside the task name) or beside the bar on the right. That way, the project manager can be keenly aware of the need to manage those resources in order to ensure the task finishes on time. Resources: Because the availability of resources can make or break a project schedule, some gantt chart software lists the resources beside the task name.Any simple identification of a task on the chart will work.Common ways to show the critical path tasks on a Gantt chart include: Thus it is important that those tasks are highlighted in some way. Critical Path: Defined as those tasks that define the completion date of the project, the tasks that are on the critical path must receive a favorable share of the project manager’s attention because of their larger influence on the overall project completion date.Start-to-Finish: Task B cannot finish until Task A has begun.


A bar representing start and end dates for each task.This Gantt chart was created with Microsoft Excel.Īs a minimum, to be considered a Gantt chart it must contain the following two things: This example was created in Tom’s Planner ( Gantt Chart Example 3 Here is a Gantt chart that was created with Microsoft Project. It can have many other pieces but these are the basic building blocks.

It shows the tasks on the vertical axis and time on the horizontal axis. A Gantt chart is a horizontal bar chart showing the start and end dates of each task within a project.
