Schedule Quality, Validation, and Reporting
This domain tests whether a schedule is fit for its intended use and whether reporting tells the truth about status. CAPES expects you to apply logic and quality checks, validate calendars and resources, and interpret common metrics. The exam also covers reporting hierarchy, look-ahead schedules, and variance reporting against the baseline.
Quality and validation checks
- Logic checks: every activity except project start/finish should have a predecessor and successor; open ends are defects.
- Relationship checks: excessive lags, unusual relationship types, and hard constraints indicate poor logic.
- Float and duration checks: excessive total float, negative float, and abnormally long activities warrant review.
- Date checks: activities with actual starts in the future or forecasts in the past are invalid.
- The DCMA 14-point assessment is a recognized industry check covering logic, leads, lags, relationship types, hard constraints, high float, negative float, high duration, invalid dates, resources, missed tasks, critical path test, critical path length index (CPLI), and baseline execution index (BEI).
- Validation compares the schedule to its basis, calendars, resource plan, and scope; it is more than running software checks.
Worked example
A schedule review finds 20% of activities without predecessors, 15% of relationships with lags greater than 5 days, and a CPLI of 0.60. CPLI below 1.0 means the critical path length plus total float is less than the baseline duration-schedule compression or risk. The missing predecessors create open ends, so the calculated critical path is unreliable. The lags hide logic. Before accepting the schedule, the scheduler must close open ends, justify or remove lags, and rerun the critical path test; otherwise a favorable progress report may be based on an invalid model.
Traps that cost marks
Treating a software validation report as sufficient; reporting percent complete without baseline context; accepting many critical paths without investigating constraints; and using a look-ahead as a substitute for an integrated schedule. Also, a schedule can pass a logic check and still fail validation because calendars, resources, or scope are wrong.