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PGMP · Question #12

You are the program manager for your organization. You are examining the order of the activities in your program schedule and would like to change some of the ordering to alleviate scheduling…

The correct answer is B. Discretionary dependencies. Activities that can be sequenced in any order based on the team's preference or experience are called discretionary dependencies, distinguishing them from mandatory dependencies which must follow a fixed order.

Program Delivery

Question

You are the program manager for your organization. You are examining the order of the activities in your program schedule and would like to change some of the ordering to alleviate scheduling conflicts, risks, and based on your experience with the discipline the program uses. Some of the activities you can rearrange while some of the activities must be completed in a particular order. What term describes the activities that can happen in any order?

Options

  • AFinish on constraints
  • BDiscretionary dependencies
  • CMandatory dependencies
  • DBenefits management dependencies

How the community answered

(50 responses)
  • A
    4% (2)
  • B
    86% (43)
  • C
    2% (1)
  • D
    8% (4)

Why each option

Activities that can be sequenced in any order based on the team's preference or experience are called discretionary dependencies, distinguishing them from mandatory dependencies which must follow a fixed order.

AFinish on constraints

Finish on constraints are scheduling constraints that fix when an activity must end, which is unrelated to ordering flexibility between activities.

BDiscretionary dependenciesCorrect

Discretionary dependencies, also called preferred logic or soft logic, are sequencing choices made based on knowledge of best practices, experience, or team preference - they are not technically required, meaning the activities can occur in any feasible order without violating a hard constraint.

CMandatory dependencies

Mandatory dependencies are inherent to the nature of the work and cannot be changed, which is the opposite of activities that can occur in any order.

DBenefits management dependencies

Benefits management dependencies is not a recognized scheduling or dependency type in program management frameworks.

Concept tested: Schedule dependency types - discretionary vs mandatory logic

Source: https://www.pmi.org/pmbok-guide-standards/foundational/pmbok

Topics

#Program Scheduling#Dependency Types#Activity Sequencing

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