The Critical Path Method (CPM) provides a way for project managers to determine which tasks are critical (zero slack time) and which tasks can be delayed (and for how long). Normally, you would need specialized software such as MS Project, but not any more. Now you can simply download my CPM spreadsheet that implements the CPM algorithm in Excel. If you can copy and paste, enter data into cells, and follow a few simple guidelines, you can do a critical path analysis with almost no learning curve.
