GetAhead in Project Management Skills Course Outline

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GetAhead in project Management SKILLS

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This 3 part training course will teach you all of the practical techniques needed to organize, plan and control projects of any size. This acclaimed course is the fifth revision of our original Association for Project Management accredited course.

Project Management Skills Part 1 - Organizing Projects

You will learn how to:

Tailor the management and supervisory framework to suit the needs of each project.
Apply the principles of effective matrix management to any number of project initiatives.
Recognize and address the conflicting demands placed on members of the project team.
Schedule the involvement of team members throughout the project life-cycle.
Build and motivate an effective and efficient project team for each project initiative.

Study Area 1 - Introduction

Each project initiative represents a temporary management structure, which should be able to respond rapidly to unforeseen circumstances. This section shows how the traditional organizational structure can be enhanced by managing work as projects.

Study Area 2 - The Project Environment

Project & Matrix Management - Details the types of management structure that are appropriate to projects of different sizes and describes why this should be tempered by real world requirements.
Sources of Conflict - Describes the problems and opportunities that appear when a traditional management structure is complemented by a temporary project management structure. It includes advice on how to identify sources of conflict and take action to pre-empt it or resolve it, should it arise.

Study Area 3 - Management Responsibilities

Commissioning & Ownership - Explains the duties of the bodies responsible for commissioning, funding and monitoring the project.
Project Management Roles - Explains the role of the project manager, sub-project manager and task leaders, including: planning at the project and sub-project level, exercising control, ensuring product delivery and effective people management.

Study Area 4 - Managing the Life-Cycle

Project Life-Cycles - Describes project life-cycles, which divide the project into a series of phases, the five phase life-cycle model and how this can be simplified for the purpose of applying formal organisational processes.
Managing the Life-Cycle - Introduces and explains the key components of the project initiation phase and how the project is monitored against the plans to ensure that it remains viable. It also describes the project closure processes, which ensure that the outcome is checked against the original objectives.

Study Area 5 - Motivating the Team

Motivating Team Members - Describes the common sources of anxiety among new team members and the importance of tackling these as early as possible by addressing staff concerns at the start of each project initiative.
Creating a Project Office - Describes why project oriented organisations may maintain a full-time dedicated project resource, the practical duties of the project office and its role in collecting, analysing and disseminating project information.

Project Management Skills Part 2 - Planning Projects

You will learn how to:

Use the most appropriate set of support diagrams to optimize the planning process.
Involve the relevant team members throughout the planning process.
Carry out effective scheduling of all of the resources required by the project.
Select a planning architecture that ideally suits the needs of each new project.
Develop detailed plans incorporating PERT charts and critical path analysis.

Study Area 1 - Introduction
Introduces a standard series of diagrams and documents that are essential for effective project planning, together with a detailed but flexible planning architecture that can be adapted to suit the needs of projects of any size.

Study Area 2 - Basic Planning Principles

Identifying the Products - Introduces the main processes that comprise an effective approach to project planning, based upon the production of clearly identified and specified deliverables.
Introducing Planning Diagrams - Demonstrates the application of a series of planning diagrams and documentation to support efficient product based planning. These include: work breakdown structures, product descriptions and product flow diagrams.

Study Area 3 - Scheduling Project Activities

Drawing & Analyzing PERT Charts - Describes how the PERT chart, or activity network, is developed. It shows how to identify the critical path and how any slack time can be used to introduce flexibility into the work plans.
Resource Planning - Describes the effective and efficient scheduling of the resources required. The techniques explained include: resource aggregation, levelling and smoothing which together ensure that the project makes optimum use of the resources available.

Study Area 4 - Structuring Project Plans

Selecting a Suitable Plans Framework - Describes the selection of an appropriate planning framework to ensure effective planning and control. The different levels of plan available include: project plans, sub-project plans, detailed plans, individual work plans and remedial plans.
Understanding Tolerances – Explains how project tolerances define performance limits within which different areas of the project can retain autonomy.

Project Management Skills Part 3 - Controlling Projects

You will learn how to:

Select and apply a practical and effective series of project controls to each project.
Integrate appropriate quality assurance procedures into all phases of the project.
Implement effective reporting and change control regimes for each project initiative.
Schedule the involvement of project team members at each control point.
Apply proven techniques, including variance and EVA to measure project progress against the plans.

Study Area 1 - Introduction
Explains the importance of applying effective control mechanisms to ensure that project costs are controlled, and how to tailor the control framework to reflect the size and complexity of each project initiative.

Study Area 2 - Project Control Framework

Designing Management Controls - Introduces a flexible management control framework that can be tailored to suit the needs of projects of any size, and describes the implementation of each review and report needed to ensure that the project maintains its business integrity.
Designing Product Controls - Describes a series of product controls designed to ensure the accurate and timely delivery of the deliverables required by the project.

Study Area 3 - Data Collection & Analysis

Data Collection & Over-Reporting - Describes how to specify a cost effective data collection regime that reflects the size and scope of the project and explains why it is often difficult for a project team to admit that reported progress has been exaggerated, and how management can act to minimize this problem.
Variance & Earned Value Analysis - Describes techniques for calculating the difference between the costs detailed in the plans and the actual costs incurred by the project. This section also explains how EVA overcomes many of the intrinsic delays associated with variance analysis and illustrates the plotting of cumulative cost curves and the use of these curves to establish key project performance parameters.

Study Area 4 - Assuring Project Quality

Quality Planning – Describes the incorporation of the required quality activities into the PERT chart and the importance of using objective quality criteria.
Quality Control – Describes how the required qualities can be built into all of the products and how this can be exercised via the detailed planning of an appropriate quality control regime. Includes: change control procedures, quality reviews, project reviews and product testing.

Study Area 5 - Project Change Control

Controlling Change - Describes the use of standard change control forms to raise all project concerns, to analyse and classify them and provides a proven method for controlling change.
Configuration Management - Explains how configuration management can be applied to the control of an evolving set of products and project documentation and its use in verifying that the actual progress is in line with that being reported.