The first morning provides a solid foundational understanding of project management and project organizational and stakeholder management.  The following topics will be explored through interactive discussion, case studies and exercises:   

The Fundamentals of Project Management
-What is a project, why are projects different to business as usual, what are the key objectives for a project?
-What are the key steps to a project’s lifecycle?
-What are the main roles and responsibilities in project management?

-What are the main global standards in project management
• PRINCE2
• PMI
• Agile and Scrum

-What are the main areas of project management? What are the main objectives and benefits of;
• Project organization and people management
• Planning, estimating and controlling time, cost and resources
• Quality management
• Risk management
• Change control
• Business case and benefit realization management
 
Project Organization and Stakeholder Management at your organisation
• Who are stakeholders? Stakeholder identification and mapping techniques
• How to engage with stakeholders throughout a project
• Creating a project organisation structure
• The roles and responsibilities of a project board and a project sponsor
• The roles and responsibilities of the project manager
• Other typical project roles such as super users, senior suppliers, scrum masters.
 
The afternoon will focus on understanding how to successfully start a project and the essentials of planning a project. The following topics will be explored through interactive discussion, case studies and exercises:   

Ensuring a Successful Start to a Project
• Identifying the business reasons for a project and creating a business case
• Creating a project charter to scope and define a project.
• Using the 5W and BOSCARD method to create clear project objectives
• Running a successful project kick off meeting

Planning
-Exploring the different possible formats of a plan
• Gantt charts
• Burndown charts
• Kanban boards
• Product checklists

-Discussing different software planning tools:
• Microsoft project
• JIRA
• Basecamp
• Trello
-Creating a Work Breakdown Structure

Planning (continued)…
-The importance of estimating within planning.
-Exploring the different types of estimating techniques:
• Top down versus bottom up estimating
• Three point estimating
• Parametric estimating
• Delphi estimating
• Planning poker and agile estimating
• Using estimating ranges and forecast accuracies

-Understanding the key barriers to effective estimating and how to overcome them
-Using network diagrams to identify the critical path of the project
-Resource planning and resource dependencies
-Resource planning in a matrix environment
-Cost planning approaches such as the earned value approach.
-Using milestones to identify significant points in a project
-Scheduling tasks

Monitoring and Controlling a Project
-The key metrics to use to track a project
-Using stand ups and pulse calls to evaluate progress
-Using Gantt charts, burndown charts and earned value indicators to track time and cost
-Creating and using escalation processes
-Managing the projects by stages and running end stage reviews
-Using progress reporting and designing project dashboards
 
The second afternoon will cover topics of risk management, change management and how to effectively close a project.
 
Risk Management
-Understanding the key objectives of risk management
-Exploring the risk management process
-Techniques to use to identify risks such as risk breakdown structures and PESTLE
-Estimating the probability, impact and expected value of a risk
-Planning countermeasures and mitigation strategies for risks
-Evaluating the project’s overall exposure to risk
 
Change Management
-Understanding the key objectives of change control
-Exploring the change control process
-Using issue and change registers
-Evaluating change and creating change authorities
 
Closing a Project Successfully
-Reviewing the success of a project
-Running a successful end project meeting
-Creating a benefits realization approach
-Reviewing lessons learned and feeding the experience back into future projects