EVM Certification EVM Certification Schedule Management & Performance 1 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: What does the Schedule Variance (SV) measure in Earned Value Management?
- The difference between Earned Value and Planned Value in cost terms (Correct answer)
- The number of days the project is behind or ahead of schedule
- The ratio of work completed to work scheduled
- The time remaining to complete all project activities
Correct answer: The difference between Earned Value and Planned Value in cost terms
SV = EV – PV and expresses schedule performance in dollar terms, with positive values indicating ahead of schedule.
Question 2: A project has an SPI of 1.15. What does this mean?
- The project is ahead of schedule, earning $1.15 of planned value for every $1.00 scheduled (Correct answer)
- The project is 15% behind its planned schedule
- The project's costs are 15% higher than planned
- The project will finish 15 days early
Correct answer: The project is ahead of schedule, earning $1.15 of planned value for every $1.00 scheduled
SPI > 1.0 indicates the project is ahead of schedule, accomplishing more work than was planned for this period.
Question 3: Which EVM metric is calculated as the ratio of Earned Value to Planned Value?
- Schedule Performance Index (SPI) (Correct answer)
- Cost Performance Index (CPI)
- To-Complete Performance Index (TCPI)
- Cost Variance (CV)
Correct answer: Schedule Performance Index (SPI)
SPI = EV / PV and measures schedule efficiency by comparing the value of work done to the value planned.
Question 4: One known limitation of the traditional SPI metric is that:
- SPI converges to 1.0 at project end regardless of actual schedule performance (Correct answer)
- SPI cannot be calculated for fixed-price contracts
- SPI always overstates schedule delays on long projects
- SPI requires activity-level data that WBS alone cannot provide
Correct answer: SPI converges to 1.0 at project end regardless of actual schedule performance
Because EV always equals BAC at project completion, SPI mathematically approaches 1.0 at the end, masking late-project delays.
Question 5: What is Earned Schedule (ES) designed to address compared to traditional SV and SPI?
- It measures schedule performance in time units rather than cost units to avoid the convergence problem (Correct answer)
- It replaces EV with activity float to improve accuracy
- It calculates the schedule variance using only critical path activities
- It converts monetary SPI into calendar days automatically
Correct answer: It measures schedule performance in time units rather than cost units to avoid the convergence problem
Earned Schedule converts EV-based schedule metrics into time units, providing more accurate indicators late in the project.
Question 6: On a project, the Planned Value (PV) is $500,000 and the Earned Value (EV) is $425,000. What is the Schedule Variance?
- -$75,000 (Correct answer)
- +$75,000
- -$75,000 and the project is ahead of schedule
- +$75,000 and the project is behind schedule
Correct answer: -$75,000
SV = EV – PV = $425,000 – $500,000 = –$75,000, indicating the project is behind schedule by $75,000 of planned value.
EVM Certification EVM Certification Schedule Management & Performance 1
What does the Schedule Variance (SV) measure in Earned Value Management?