Fuzzy Critical Path Method Based on a New Approach of Ranking Fuzzy Numbers using Centroid of Centroids

Abstract

The Critical Path Method (CPM) is useful for planning and control of complex projects. The CPM identifies the critical activities in the critical path of an activity network. The successful implementation of CPM requires the availability of clear determined time duration for each activity. However, in practical situations this requirement is usually hard to fulfil since many of activities will be executed for the first time. Hence, there is always uncertainty about the time durations of activities in the network planning. This has led to the development of fuzzy CPM. In this paper, a new approach of ranking fuzzy numbers using centroid of centroids of fuzzy numbers to its distance from original point is proposed. The proposed method can rank all types of fuzzy numbers including crisp numbers with different membership functions. The authors apply the proposed ranking method to develop a new fuzzy CPM. The proposed method is illustrated with an example.