A hybrid soft computing technique by using fuzzy Petri nets to optimise the critical path in management problem

The success or failure of any project significantly depends on the effectiveness of project scheduling and meticulous planning. Inadequate scheduling has the potential to adversely impact work quality and put the project's financial resources at risk. Additionally, more planning is needed to maintain the project's timeline, a crucial element for companies. This article introduces an innovative approach integrating soft computing techniques with an extended fuzzy Petri net to enhance project planning and scheduling within the conventional CPM/PERT framework. Our methodology employs two reasoning algorithms and establishes a fuzzy time cost trade-off soft computing (FTCTS-Net) program for identifying critical paths in the project. To address time-cost trade-off challenges, we incorporate a genetic search module that optimises the model's solutions to achieve results closest to the ideal solution. This model offers valuable insights into time and cost-related management challenges across various risk levels. Effectively mitigating time-cost problems, the proposed model clarifies achieving the best combinative optimised result between total project cost and time under different risk scenarios.