Why critical paths are critical

• January 14, 2008

By Jill Pyle

In a business environment, people often give their immediate attention to the tasks and projects with the fastest approaching deadlines. Whether deadlines are set for internal purposes or imposed by clients, they often guide our priorities and motivate us to make the best use of available resources.

When more than one person or several groups of people are working together on a project, problems can arise if roles and responsibilities are not clearly defined. There may be a deadline by which a project is scheduled for completion, but if everyone has a different piece of the puzzle to contribute, you’d better hope they aren’t all delivered at the last possible moment. It’s incredibly important to leave some time for the puzzle assembler to work some magic.

When launching a client to the media or analyst community, there are many tasks that must be completed before the news release can be sent over the wire or the first reporter is called. In advance of the launch, the media kit and news release copy are drafted and approved, the media list is researched and contacts are confirmed, and customer quotes are signed off. The only way to ensure all of these pieces come together in time for the launch is to come up with a plan on which our team and the client can agree. We call this a critical path.

We use critical paths to outline all the tasks that need to be done in preparation for a launch, defining by when they need to be completed, and who is responsible for completing them. With a document containing all of this information, we can break up what might seem like a large project into small, manageable steps.

While critical paths may be a total nightmare for procrastinators, they are a godsend for the rest of us. They help to ensure that as long as everyone involved does what they have agreed to do, by the time they agreed to do it, all will run smoothly and deadlines will be met.