Campaigning Wiki

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Summary

The timeline / critical path makes the campaign plan visible on a calendar: which tasks come first, which depend on which, and which cannot slip without delaying the whole campaign.

Body

A campaign timeline is the WBS laid out on a calendar, with dependencies marked between tasks. A Gantt chart is the standard visual: each task is a horizontal bar with start and end dates, and arrows show which tasks depend on which. The People Power Manual’s Creating a tactical timeline exercise is a working example — it walks a campaign through sequencing named tactics with explicit conditions for revision [source: people-power-manual]. The Community Tool Box pairs the timeline with milestones so each named date triggers a measurable check [source: community-tool-box].

The critical path is the chain of dependent tasks whose total duration determines the earliest the campaign can finish. A task is on the critical path if any slip in it slips the whole project; a task is off the critical path if it has slack — extra time it can absorb without affecting the finish date.

The Commons Library’s organising modules run the timeline at the workstream level: each workstream has its own critical path, and the campaign manager’s job is to keep the workstreams synchronised at the points where they touch (e.g. research finishes before communications uses the findings, fundraising closes before spend is committed) [source: commons-library]. The People Power Manual’s tactical-timeline exercise applies the same discipline to specific tactics: each named tactic has a trigger that determines when it runs [source: people-power-manual].

A useful campaign timeline has five properties:

  • Backwards from the win date. Fix the decision, vote or deadline the campaign is aimed at, then plan backwards from it so escalation peaks at the moment of maximum leverage rather than burning out early.
  • Slack before fixed external dates. Build buffer before any external deadline you cannot move (a parliamentary vote, a court hearing, a press cycle).
  • Milestones as checkpoints. Each named milestone is a re-evaluation point — the team should pause at each one and decide whether the strategy still holds.
  • Critical path protected. Identify the small number of tasks that cannot slip and protect them with extra capacity.
  • Visible to the team. The Commons Library recommends a one-page visual the team can re-read in 60 seconds, not a multi-sheet spreadsheet [source: commons-library].

A common failure mode is to build a Gantt that lists every task but does not mark dependencies — the chart is decorative. The Community Tool Box treats the dependency arrows as the entire point of the timeline: without them, the chart cannot tell you which tasks cannot slip [source: community-tool-box]. A second failure mode is to plan only the launch and call the timeline done. The People Power Manual’s tactical-timeline exercise is explicitly structured to cover the whole arc, not just the first action [source: people-power-manual].

Use it for

Converting a WBS into a calendar with dependencies; identifying which tasks cannot slip; aligning a coalition on the same dates; running a structured mid-campaign re-plan.

Open Questions

None yet.

Sources & verification

  • sources/commons-library — grounding: secondary — RAW (5257 chars)
  • sources/people-power-manual — grounding: secondary — RAW (7977 chars)
  • sources/community-tool-box — grounding: secondary — RAW (833 chars)

Verified 2026-06-23 by llm-qc.

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