Meantime, over at SmithKline & French …
Jim Snyder, on the other hand, had been instrumental in introducing network
planning to the SK & F operation in Philadelphia. His interest in the technique
was not assuaged by his frustration with what could then be done versus the obvious
potential in such fields. His frustration and determination were heightened by
having completed some course work at Georgia Tech under Dr. Gordon Davis. At
the time, Gordon was also running a series of short courses which included PERT/CPM.
These "academic" topics were being conducted under the auspices of
the Department of Industrial Engineering in an attempt to convey this sort of
material to the working level in industry through the college's Extension Service.
In Jim's case, he was using CPM in the scheduling of drug development, testing,
FDA approval, physician awareness programs, marketing and some construction projects.
He had established a small team from a bright but relatively untrained group
of people and found that with a little training and exposure he could make fair
schedulers out of them for the SK & F environment.
However, Jim was also frustrated and upset that he and Susan had to do all
the training; that he could not offer SK & F personnel the professional ambience
and experience of such industrial roles as say, engineers, accountants, cost
engineers, or even managers; and that there were no impartial and objective criteria
against which he could judge the quality and merit of his programs and personnel.
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The
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