Bespoke Training Services

Duration: 2 DAYS
A 2-day workshop designed to introduce people to a structured approach to planning, managing and controlling a project.  Individuals currently working for less than 12 months as project managers, team leaders and those working on the periphery of projects and project management will benefit from attendance. 

Who will benefit?                                                                                 

• Those who are new to project management who want to gain an understanding of the principles of project management
• Project team members with no project management training who would like to understand standard project management terminology
• Existing project managers who wish to refresh their understanding

The course is interactive and includes several ad-hoc and more formal exercises which are run either as group discussions or in syndicates. These exercises are designed to re-enforce concepts introduced during the two days and are based on a supplied case study.

Delegates will learn how to

• Understand the main project management principles
• Recognise the ways that your organisation addresses the factors which enable successful projects
• Identify the key pieces of project information
• Understand and use a common terminology
• Define the project lifecycle
• Understand how the method could be scaled and tailored to suit different projects
• Understand the need for project risk analysis and management

Course Outline

DAY 1

Project Definition:  What is a Project?  What are the elements that require managing and how does this differ from Technical/Line Management?  Why do projects go wrong?

This session is to give the delegates the initial thoughts on how technical delivery is a very different concept to managing a project.

Project Life Cycle: What is the journey a project should go through from concept through to termination?

This will provide a framework for the remainder of the course in terms of giving context to when the various tools and techniques are relevant to a project.

Project Context and Stakeholder Management: Understanding how the environment in which the project is run and the people who have an interest in it, can significantly affect its outcome.

This session is designed to open up the delegates thought process away from just the technical delivery and understand a little more about the bigger picture

Project Organisation and Roles; Session on roles and responsibilities of Sponsor, Project Manager and Team Managers.

This session is designed to highlight the differences in roles and responsibilities within a project and understanding that managing is different from delivering.

Business Case
Understanding why capturing the justification for a project is very important.

Whilst the delegates may not be involved in creating and approving business cases, they should understand the importance of them and how a projects performance, particularly financially can affect them.

Project Planning; Defining Requirements, including scope definition:

Session to show the importance of understanding the end objective of a project; the size of the task, and how this will influence costs and timescales Included would be how to use work, product and cost breakdown structures.

Estimating, including methods of estimating, difficulties in estimating:

This is designed to show how different methods of estimating can influence accuracy of cost and schedule estimates and how estimating methods may vary through the project lifecycle.

Scheduling: How to build a schedule; including activities, dependencies, durations and networks.

This session is to show delegates how to sensibly understand and build a schedule including critical path analysis, understanding of float and creating Gantt Charts. Whilst software will do this for them to speed up the process it is essential to understand these principles in a practical environment.

Resource Management: including allocation of resource, dealing with resource/ schedule conflict.

This session is to give the delegates the ability to use resource management techniques including allocation, smoothing and levelling.

DAY 2

 Quality including quality planning, assurance and control;

Session to convey to the delegates the importance of a quality outcome in a project; and how this is achieved through good planning.  Also covering the cost implications of poor quality in projects.

Risk Management including risk analysis and managing risks:

This session is designed to show the delegates how thinking of what could affect their projects and how they might deal with or react to these uncertainties can impact on the successful outcome of a project.  Risks that turn into issues can prove to be costly and cause delays. These may have been avoidable in the first place.

Communication including communications planning with stakeholders

This session is designed to show delegates the importance of communication and information management within a project. As a project manager you are only as good as what you know at the time.

Monitoring and Controlling including reporting, measurement, cost control and the basics of using earned value analysis to gauge the efficiency of a project:

This session is designed to show the importance of being able to track progress and performance within a project including schedule, cost and quality. Earned value session will show a technique that can be used for forecasting budget and schedule outcome. You can have the best plan in the world but the project is only as good as how it is progressing against that plan.

Change/ Issues Management including impact analysis and decision making:

Uncontrolled change can cause major delays and cost overruns on projects. Having a process for dealing with changes, understanding the impact and making a decision on them is vital within a project environment. This session is designed to convey that message.
Project Completion and Review including handover of deliverables, signoff and formal closure of a project.

There is a real tendency for projects to drift into the operational environment with no clear ending. This session is designed to show the delegates the importance of gaining acceptance for deliverables, end project reporting and lessons learned.

Tailoring the Courseware
The training approach and supporting materials can be designed so it can easily (and at minimum cost) accommodate any customisation which does not affect the basic approach. 
Typical options for customisations may include:

• Addition of your logo and other ‘look and feel’ elements giving the courseware your own organisational identity to help generate buy-in
• Modification of role names and terminology to support you current operational standards
• Tailoring certain elements of the project management processes to suit your particular needs
• Defining management products according to your current templates (i.e. Business Case, Communication Plan, Project Brief, Approach etc.)

Download PDF.

 

This is a ½ day course which introduces the project management method from a senior management perspective.

The course is designed for:

• New employees who will be involved in project decision making at Project Board or senior management level
• Existing Project Board members or senior managers who wish to understand the method and their responsibilities
• Existing project managers who are moving to a more senior role
• External suppliers, consultants, or other external project team members who need to interface with public sector projects as Senior Suppliers, or Senior User representatives

Prerequisites
Ideally course attendees should be currently at a decision making level within the organisation or involved in projects at project board member level.

Delegates will learn how to:

• Understand the main project management principles
• Recognise the ways that your organisation addresses the factors which enable successful projects
• Understand and use a common terminology
• Identify the key pieces of project information on which decisions are made
• Define the project lifecycle and the decision points within it
• Understand how the method could be scaled and tailored to suit different projects
• Understand the need for strong leadership and direction setting

 Course Outline

• Programmes and projects
• What is a project
• What makes a project successful?
• Project failure factors
• The project lifecycle
• Starting up a project activities
• The project initiation workshop
• The Project organisation structure, senior roles and responsibilities
• Risk Management principles and responsibilities
• Initiating a Project activities
• The Project Initiation Document
• Monitoring progress and reporting
• Handling project issues and changes
• Stage boundaries
• Closure of the project

Tailoring the courseware
We understand that organisations may have their own requirements regarding the method.  The training approach and supporting materials can be designed so it can easily (and at minimum cost) accomodate any customisation which does not affect the basic approach. 
Typical options for customisations may include:

• Addition of your logo and other 'look and feel' elements giving the courseware your own organisational identity to help generate buy-in
• Modification of role names and terminology to support your current operational standards.
• Tailoring certain elements of the project management processes to suit your particular needs
• Defining management products according to your current templates (i.e. Business Case, Communication Plan, Project Brief, Approach etc.)

Download PDF.

 

Duration: 2 days

Who will benefit?
Project Support and people working towards or within a PRINCE2® project environment will benefit from attending the workshop.

Pre-requisites
No prerequisites for attendance

Overview
Overview of the Project Management process and discusses the work that supports the Project Manager during the management of the project.  Also details possible project assurance requirements.

Content

• Overview of the method currently used (PRINCE2®/bespoke solution)
• Project Documentation
• Managing the Project/Technical Products
• Meetings
• Project Logs
• The Communication Plan

Download PDF.

 

• Programme Management
• Risk Management
• Benefits Management
• Stakeholder Management
• Project Planning