Course length: 5 days

Course Description

With tight pressure to cut costs and yet implement technology quickly, IT project managers are under severe pressure to complete projects on time, on budget, and at the promised quality. Yet industry figures consistently show that 90 percent of major IT project initiatives fail to be completed both on time and on budget. This course delves into the unique challenges of managing IT projects, and offers a roadmap to success.
Course Objective: You will define the IT specific challenges of project management, and methods to avoid common pitfalls.

Performance-Based Objectives

Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:
perform discovery and analysis to determine the true nature of the problem or opportunity, ascertain its relevance and feasibility, and identify associated risks.
establish the high-level timetable and budget for the project.
create the project planning documents, including Scope Statement, Project Charter, and Statement of Work.
create the documents that lay the foundation for the project.
conduct the management planning activities that result in the development of the project plan, used to control the execution process of the project.
determine the ideal team composition, recruit, negotiate for, and assign team members.
define a strategy for monitoring the project iteratively, calculate schedule and budget variances, manage the critical path, team, and vendor relationships, and monitor quality metrics.
identify variances and outline corrective action, negotiate changes, and identify the proper course of action to avoid scope creep.
execute the project transfer steps, including documentation, transfer process, sign-off, final project report, and a project team lessons-learned debriefing.

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Course Content

Lesson 1: Project Initiation: Discovery and Analysis
Topic 1A: Creating a Project Concept Definition
Topic 1B: Defining Business and Functional Requirements
Topic 1C: Define Technical Requirements
Topic 1D: Strategic and Operational Relevance
Topic 1E: Assessing Project Feasibility
Topic 1F: Perform Risk Assessment

Lesson 2: Project Initiation: Estimating
Topic 2A: Construct a Formal Estimate
Topic 2B: Create Time Estimates
Topic 2C: Create Cost Estimates

Lesson 3: Project Initiation: Framing the Project
Topic 3A: Managing Change
Topic 3B: Writing the Scope Statement
Topic 3C: Writing the Project Charter
Topic 3D: Writing a Statement of Work (SOW)

Lesson 4: Project Planning: Laying the Foundation
Topic 4A: Setting Expectations for the Planning Process
Topic 4B: Decomposing a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
Topic 4C: Creating a Network Diagram
Topic 4D: Identify and Analyze the Critical Path
Topic 4E: Creating Project Schedules
Topic 4F: Creating Project Budgets

Lesson 5: Project Planning: Developing the Plan
Topic 5A: Develop Resource Management Plan
Topic 5B: Develop a Risk Management Plan
Topic 5C: Develop a Quality Management Plan
Topic 5D: Develop an Operational Transfer Plan
Topic 5E: Develop a Communication Plan
Topic 5F: Compile a Comprehensive Project Plan

Lesson 6: Project Planning: Building the Team
Topic 6A: Assemble the Project Team
Topic 6B: Building and Supporting the Team
Topic 6C: Developing the Team

Lesson 7: Project Execution: Monitoring and Managing
Topic 7A: Monitor the Project Iteratively
Topic 7B: Calculate Earned Value
Topic 7C: Execute Schedule Updates
Topic 7D: Execute Budget Updates
Topic 7E: Managing the Critical Path
Topic 7F: Managing the Project Team
Topic 7G: Managing Project Quality
Topic 7H: Managing Vendors

Lesson 8: Project Control: Managing Chaos
Topic 8A: Interpreting Control Techniques
Topic 8B: Mitigating Scope Creep
Topic 8C: Managing Variances

Lesson 9: Project Closure: Tying Up Loose Ends
Topic 9A: Managing Documentation
Topic 9B: Managing the Operational Transfer Plan
Topic 9C: Write Project Closure Report
Topic 9D: Obtain Final, Formal Sign-off
Topic 9E: Document Lessons Learned
Topic 9F: Managing Administrative Closure