Project Time Management - Define Activities

This process identifies and documents the specific actions to be performed to produce the project deliverables. By breaking down the work packages into activities it will provide the basis for estimating, scheduling, executing, monitoring, and controlling the project work. Work packages are decomposed into smaller components that are called activities.

Let's look at the Inputs, Tools and Techniques, and Outputs of this process:

1) Schedule Management Plan

• Establishes the criteria and activities for developing, monitoring and controlling the schedule.  

2) Scope Baseline

• By using the documented baselines of the project WBS, deliverables, constraints and assumptions will help define activities. 

3) Enterprise environmental factors

• Factors that may influence defining activities may include:
• Organizational cultures and structures
• Published commercial information from commercial databases
• Project Management Information Systems (PMIS) 

4) Organizational Process Assets

• Factors that may influence defining activities may include:
• Lessons learned knowledge base
• Standardized processes
• Templates that contain standards
• Existing planning related polices, procedures and guidelines

5) Decomposition

• Technique used to divide and subdivide the project scope and deliverables into manageable chunks. Activities are the effort needed to complete the work package and this process defines the final outputs as activities. 

6) Rolling Wave Planning

• Technique in which the work to be done in the near term is planned in detail while the work in the future is planned at a high-level. Work can be decomposed into activities. 

7) Expert Judgement

• Meet with the experts that can help you define the activities.

8) Activity List

• Includes all schedule activities required
• Includes the activity identifier
• Detailed scope description for each activity 
• Activity titles that describes its place in the schedule

9) Activity Attributes

• Extends the description of the activity over time to include:
• Activity identifier (ID)
• WBS ID
• Activity label or name
• Activity codes
• Activity description
• Predecessor activities
• Successor activities
• Logical relationships
• Leads and Lags
• Resource requirements
• Imposed dates
• Constraints
• Assumptions

10) Milestone List

• A significant point or event in a project is called a milestone. 
• A milestone list identifies all the milestones and indicates if it's mandatory, required by contract, or optional. 

Source: PMBOK 5th ed.