Jewelry Store Robbery Exercise

Based on Walker II, Edward D., (2004),

“Introducing Project Management Concepts
Using a Jewelry Store Robbery”, Decision
Sciences Journal of Innovative Education, Vol. 2,
No. 1, pp. 65-69
Cat Burglary Scenario
You and two “business partners” are planning
a “job” (robbing a local jewelry store).
The scheme requires split-second timing but
you feel that you and your partners can get
away with it.
Cat Burglary Scenario
You plan to do this at night because the
police have a longer response time and
because the night patrolman comes by
every 50 minutes.
Cat Burglary Scenario
The store has an external alarm; a jewelry
safe; an office alarm; and a safe full of
securities in the office.
Display Area Office Area

Jewelry
Office
Safe
Safe

Legend
Protected by alarm system Locked safe
 Cat Burglary Scenario - Tradeoffs

In this scenario “what trumps

what”?

Time ! (being “late” = prison!)

(this “project” must be completed in under 50 minutes)
WBS & Network Diagram
1. Given the jewelry store layout, prepare a
list of tasks that need to be accomplished
and the precedence relationships
 The office safe is small so “cracking” it and
“clean out the office safe” can be combined
into a single task

2. Using your criminal mind, draw a network

diagram for the “project”
Task Duration Estimates
 Your business partners are experienced in
this sort of operation and they have
estimated the following task durations:
A. Disarm the exterior alarm 20
system minutes
B. Disarm the office alarm 7
system minutes
C. Crack & clean out the office 7
safe minutes
D. Crack the jewelry safe 14
E. Clean out the jewelry safe minutes
F. Pick up the loot & exit 4
Cat Burglary Scheduling
3. Given the estimated task durations,
determine how long “the project” will
take.
How Long is the Project going to
take?
B C

7 7 F
A

Start 20 10 End
D E

14 4

Path Length (min)

 Gantt Chart Schedule of the
Project

Disarm
Exterior
Disarm
Office
Crack 48 minutes to
Office complete the
Crack project
Jewelry
Clean
Jewelry
Exit

20 25 30 35 40 45 50
Cat Burglary – Risk Management
 Given your calculated project duration,
what might you want to ask about the task
durations?
“how can you be so sure?”

 Your fear of prison is stronger than your

fear of statistics so you ask your team to
scout the location and come up with
“optimistic, most likely, and pessimistic”
task duration estimates with which you
can “run some numbers”.
A Word on Activity Times
 Most activities do not take some EXACT amount
of time, but rather have some associated
variability.
 Activity durations are assumed to follow a Beta
distribution:
Pessimistic
Optimistic Most likely
a m b
a  4m  b
ET 
ba
2 6
  Beta
The mean of the  
2
distribution is:
 6 
 The variance is:

We can then use this data to calculate the

Variability of Project
Activities
 Your business partners have come back
with the following estimates:

 Turns out they were bang on for the

estimated time per task, it is the variance
that has you worried.
 Calculating Path
Completion Probabilities
The probability of completing a project path by a certain duration
can be determined by the Standard Normal Distribution:
Dp  ETp
Z
p
Dp = Desired completion date for the path
ETp = Expected completion time for the path
σp = Standard deviation for the path
Table: Areas under
the
Standardized
Normal Curve
from - ∞ to +z
 Calculating Path
Completion Probabilities
4. What is the probability of completing the
project in under 50 minutes?
Path Total Total Standar Z-value Prob. of
Expected Varian d Calculatio under 50
Time ce Deviati n min
(min) on
50  48
Z Z  1.45
1.378

50  44
Z Z  3.91
1.533

 Thus, there is a _____% chance of finishing in under 50

min.
Cat Burglary - Resources
 In this case, the project is being performed
by you and two accomplices selected for
their special abilities. You know about and
can defeat any alarm system. Your first
accomplice can crack open any safe, and
your second accomplice can carry the
great weight of the loot. As you are all in
this together, you decide that all of you
must exit at the same time (no one leaves
early.)
Project Duration considering
resources
5. Revisit your network diagram
considering the resource allocations
provided. How long should it take to
complete the “project”?
Project Duration considering
resources
6. Given the resource allocations, what is the
probability of completing the “project” in under 50
minutes?
CRITICAL Total Total Standar Z-value Prob. of
CHAIN Expected Varian d Calculatio under 50
Time ce Deviati n min
(min) on

 We need options to “speed up” (crash) certain tasks

 Keep in mind that 48 min total (critical path) ~ 92% prob.
 Thus, we need to speed up the critical chain by 3 minutes
 
 

Activity Crashing Options

Equipment Total Cost / Affected Activity Mean O ML P σ2
option Cost minute
crashed
#1 $1000 $1000 A – Exterior alarm 19 14 20 20 1.00

#2 $2000 $1000 A – Exterior alarm 18 13 19 19 1.00

#3 $500 $500 B - Office alarm 6 4 6 8 0.45

4
#4 $750 $750 C - Office safe 6 6 8 0.45

#5 $1500 $1500 D - Jewelry safe 13 12 12.5 16 0.45

#6 $3000 $1500 D - Jewelry safe 12 11 11.5 15 0.45

  What is the cheapest way to speed up the “project” by 3 minutes?

 Which Activities should be
Crashed?
7. Which activities would you crash? Why? How
much would it cost to speed up by 3 minutes?