• Length: 2 days (15 PDUs)                   Read a customer story

Call them “Accidental project managers,” “Incidental PMs” or “Unofficial project managers”. They are the staff and management that are running over half your projects – important projects that need to be delivered successfully.

Give these leaders the practical, proven tools of project management, scaled to fit their needs.

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Learn and practice specific techniques such as Stakeholder Analysis, Building an Action Plan, and Project Communication in class. Be able to perform every technique and explain how each technique contributes to your leadership ability and a successful project outcome.

The course provides the building blocks of project leadership. Participants learn how the project management tool set enables them to satisfy all their stakeholders -- sponsors, management, customers and the project team. 

Participants plan one of their own projects in class. It's the best way for individuals to learn the concepts faster to transfer the learning to their job. 

The workshop component is embedded in the course so that each lecture topic is immediately followed by the workshop component.  For example, after the scheduling lecture, teams will create their own project schedule.

Anyone responsible for leading or sponsoring projects benefits from understanding the tools of project management.  This course is particularly appropriate for leaders of part-time, internal business projects – “project management for non-project managers.”

Upon completion of this course the student will be able to:

• Identify five project success factors that apply to every project.
• Articulate the business benefit of their current project
• Develop a partnership with a project sponsor.
• Describe the cost, schedule, and quality constraints and tradeoffs for their projects
• Systematically apply the proven techniques of project management to define, plan and control a project.
• Develop a realistic project schedule that relies on team members who are less than fully assigned to the project.
• Plan stakeholder communication based on stakeholder authority and involvement
• Understand the relationship between the science of project management and the art of leadership.

I.          Why Project Management?                             

A.         Project Success Factors

B.         What is Project Management?

C.         A Successful Project Delivers Value

D.         Project Life Cycle and Product Life Cycle

Workshop: Selecting projects for the workshop   

II.         Project Definition                                            

A.         Assign the Sponsor and Project Manager

B.         Top Five Definition Questions

C.         Project Charter

Workshop: Develop a Statement of Work           

III.        Project Planning

A.         The Purpose of Planning                      

B.         Break the Project Into Manageable Units of Work                    

Workshop: Developing the Task List                                  

C.         Network Diagrams Help Visualize the Sequence of Events                                

D.         Task Estimating Guidelines                                  

Workshop: Build the Network & Visualize the Schedule                             

E.         Establish a Realistic Schedule with a Part-Time Team

Workshop: Completion of the project plan          

IV.        Project Control

A.         Stakeholder Engagement                      

B.         Plan Communication

Workshop: Identify Stakeholders                        

C.         Change Management

D.         Project Team Kickoff

E.         Monitor Schedule, Risks, and Issues                 

F.         Project Close Out

V.         Course Summary: Project Leadership            

A.         Project Manager Skills

B.         Art Based on Science

 

“Keeping it Simple” Includes Having Simple Tools. 

The question pops up in a PMI blog about tools – which is the best one? 

For the occasional project manager the question is even more difficult. 

Read the blog by Jason Westland then pull out Word and SharePoint, because those two simple tools will help you with a lot project management activities. 

When you evaluate scheduling tools, SharePoint and Microsoft Project provide the classic choice – Simple or Full Feature. As you look at all the options, be sure to ask whether it easily compares the baseline schedule to the current schedule. That is a critical piece of information for communication – on every project!! 

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You’re a Natural Leader. (But can you manage a project?) 

People tell you that you are a natural leader. (See Marco Velarde’s thoughts on leaders here.) 

Are you the natural leader who easily takes command of chaos? The one who lights up the room when you enter? But does that translate to leading projects? 

The magic of successful projects can be broken down into its parts – and it takes a willing leader to put those parts all together. 

Good project management training integrates the tools and techniques that make up the “science” of project management so that  “natural leaders” have some steak to go along with their sizzle! 

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Do You Know What You Don’t Know? 

Before searching for project management training, it makes sense to get some basics. 

Top 10 Terms Project Managers Use 

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