A method is provided that includes receiving process-related information describing a logical sequence of tasks to produce respective internal products of a process for production of a product. At least some of the tasks have a precedence relationship whereby the internal product produced by one task is an input utilized or required by another task. The method includes for at least some of the tasks, separating each of the at least some of the tasks into a closure portion that requires availability of the last input of its task before being initiated, and a distinct precursor portion capable of being initiated before the respective last input is available; and constructing a schedule for execution of the at least some of the tasks. Construction of the schedule includes temporally sequencing the closure portions of the respective tasks without intervening precursor portions, and prepending the precursor portions to respective, temporally-sequenced closure portions.