Introduction to Project Management - Practical & Real World
A practical introduction to project management with key concepts, real-world techniques and worked examples
Description
Overview
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If you're just starting out in project management the amount of information on the internet is huge. I mean, where do you start? You might be asking the following questions....
How do I figure out what's actually useful information and is of value to me?
How do I know the course content is produced by qualified people who do this for a living?
What's relevant and what is not at this stage?
This beginner-level course is aimed at anyone who needs to run a project but has NO previous project management experience or knowledge. Please note this is a general project management course (rather than IT). So doesn't include agile methodology/techniques or compare this with waterfall. Please check out the In Scope and Out of Scope sections below.
You'll learn the basic terminology and techniques of project management in non-technical language, so that you can run your own project.
We explain the methods step-by-step, and how to put these into practice, using clear and concise language. The methods shown are real-world and practical.
Why would I choose this course?
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#1: It's produced by practicing, qualified project managers. We run projects all day, every day (apart from the weekends...:-) and we know what content is useful; what works and what doesn't.
#2: Before you do your certification, such as PMP or Prince2, it's really helpful to learn project management fundamentals. It will make passing your exams easier.
#3: Our content is real-world and practical. We're only giving you relevant information that is of value and you will be able to use on your own projects to deliver effectively. There's lots of concepts and approaches out there that no-one actually uses!!
#4: We show you how to apply what you've learned using worked examples. The same tools we would use ourselves. You may find some courses give you a talking head and some bullet points (i.e. a lecture), but ours additionally shows you how to put the techniques into practice.
#5: We keep it as simple as possible. We use straightforward language and don't try to make it more complicated than it needs to be.
Who has produced this course?
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Our team is from the UK and Canada. Between us we have decades of project delivery experience, delivering projects such as events, construction and IT. We've managed projects ranging from small to huge multi-million programs of work with multiple project managers, workstreams and development teams. We've made lots of mistakes along the way - which we can help you to avoid...!
We have PMP, Prince2 and Masters Degree (in project management) qualifications.
We are currently producing a project management blog and podcast to help you work in a smarter and more effective way.
What am I going to get from this course?
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Our course is broken down into 6 sections.
Section 1: This is a foundation section - we cover PM fundamentals, the key concepts and terminology. This provides you with a good basis to move into the next sections.
Section 2: We then go into the startup phase - again we'll cover some principles and fundamentals of what you'll absolutely need in order to be able to move forward. We'll also talk about what documentation you'll need to produce and walk though an example.
Section 3: In this prepare section we cover the detailed preparations you'll need to undertake before you're ready to start delivering. This includes defining the overall scope, breaking it down into separate items, working out the detail and developing a plan/schedule. In fact we cover planning in a lot of detail as there are some key concepts which you need to understand, and to reinforce this we've added a module which walks you though creating a schedule. We also look at risk; how we assess and manage this, plus identifying what resources you'll need. We walk you through how to deal with external suppliers using a brief, and cover other items that you'll absolutely need to do (such as a kickoff meeting) in order to ensure you are ready.
Section 4: For the delivery section we'll focus on how to keep things on track, how to manage problems you'll experience along the way, making sure you get the quality you expect, and really importantly how to communicate with your team, suppliers and stakeholders.
Section 5: The closing section is quite short, but there are some key tasks you'll need to do. We explain what these are and how do do them in an easy straightforward way.
Section 6: We then provide a summary, we'll provide a recap on the key things you've learned and point you to other sources of information and learning. You can also download the free templates which you can use on your own projects.
At the end of the course you should have enough knowledge and information to be able to confidently run your own small project.
Our course includes:
Over 20 step-by-step modules, which walk you through the fundamental concepts and process
Real-world experience and content, with tips and tricks.
Walk-throughs of how to complete documents using a made-up company – such as project estimates, requirements capture, project logs, reports & plans
Bonus: Exclusive project delivery checklist – to help you deliver your projects after you have completed the course
What is covered: (In Scope)
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Fundamental principles of project management
How to assess and document project scope
How to break down a project using stages and WBS
How to capture the detail which is vital to project success
How to identify who should be involved
Producing the key description document(s)
What to use to estimate costs
Key planning concepts and how to develop a plan/schedule
The process to identify and manage risks
How to work with suppliers and obtain quotes
How to keep the project delivery going through effective communications
How to deal with problems
The tasks in closing a project down
What isn’t covered: (Out of Scope)
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Note: This is a starter/beginner level course. If you are already familiar with project management you may find there is not enough detail and should perhaps choose an intermediate level or PMP/Prince2 course. Although we've had feedback from students who have said they are PMP qualified and still learned something!
How to manage large or complex projects
This is a BASIC level course so does not go into a huge amount of detail on each topic
More advanced project management techniques or concepts
Training for professional PM certification (such as PMP or Prince2), but you will find much of the course content helpful for this
Agile methodologies such as Scrum & Kanban
We don't go into much depth on execution/delivery - this is an intro course and isn't intended to provide you with everything you would do in this phase.
How to use PM Tools such as Microsoft Project
What You Will Learn!
- Key project terminology
- How to break your project into stages
- The key activities that are undertaken in each stage
- How to define who needs to be involved in your project
- How to define and produce the key project document
- How to assess project risk using a standard system
- How to define the overall project scope
- How to get the detail you need to ensure project success
- How to develop a plan / schedule
- How to decide what approach to take when resourcing your project
- How to write a project brief to get supplier quotes
- How to manage and motivate your project team
- How to define what communications are needed
- How to provide regular project updates
- How to ensure you get the expected quality
- How to close the project
Who Should Attend!
- You need to run a project and don’t know where to start or how to approach it
- How is project management done in the real-world? You want to understand this.
- You may be considering project management as a possible career option
- You are a manager who has to supervise someone delivering a project and needs to understand the process
- You are a beginner or a more experienced project manager wanting a refresher
- You are a student doing a PM module or course