General Flashcards
Types of PMOs
Supportive - low level of control over projects
Controlling - moderate level of control over projects
Directive - high level of control over projects
Supportive PMO
provides policies, methodologies, templates, and lessons learned for managing projects within the org (low level of control over projects)
Controlling PMO
provides support and guidance on how to manage projects, trains others in PM and PM software, assists with specific PM tools and ensures compliance with policies (moderate level of control over projects)
Directive PMO
provides project managers for different projects, and is responsible for results of those; all projects or projects of a certain size, type or influence are managed by the PMO (high level of control over projects)
Types of Organizational structures
Functional Matrix (weak) Matrix (balanced) Matrix (strong) Project-Orientied
Functional organization
- think “silo”
- grouped by functional areas such as accounting, marketing, sales, etc.
- projects generally occur within a single department
- if information or project work is needed from another department, employees transmit request to head of department who communicates request to other department head
- team members complete project work in addition to normal departmental work
- the project manager’s role might be a project coordinator or expediter
- low responsibility for project manager, resource availability and budget accountability
Matrix organization
- think “two managers”
- project team members report to project manager and functional manager
- team members complete project work in addition to normal departmental work
- in a strong matrix power rests with the project manager
- in a balanced matrix the power is shared between project and functional manager
- in a weak matrix the power rests with the functional manager and the power of the project manager is comparable to that of a project coordinator or expediter
Project-oriented/Projectized organization
- think “no home”
- entire company is organized by projects
- team members only complete project work and when the project is over they have no department to go back to
- communication primarily occurs within the project
- also called “hybrid” or “composite”
- very high or full responsibility for project manager, resource availability and budget accountability
Organizational Project Management (OPM)
provides a strategic framework to use and guide portfolio, program and project management to achieve the organization’s strategic goals
Project expediter
The project expediter acts primarily as a staff assistant and communication coordinator. The expeditor cannot personally make or enforce decisions.
Project coordinator
The project coordinator acts primarily as a staff assistant and communication coordinator. The coordinator has some authority and power to make decisions, and reports to a higher-level manager.
Organization Process Assets (OPAs)
Mainly two types:
- Processes, procedures and policies that apply to aspects like quality, procurement or compliance and are generally owned by the PMO or other departments.
- Organizational knowledge repositories include historical information such as WBSs, reports, baselines, risk response plans and lesson learned. Other knowledge repositories include configuration management (naming conventions, templates, etc.), financial data and issue logs.
Types of Internal Enterprise Environmental Factors (EEFs)
- Organizational culture, structure and governance (vision, mission, values, leadership style, ethics, CoC, etc.)
- Geographical distribution of facilities and resources (factory locations, virtual teams, shared systems, cloud computing)
- Infrastructure (existing facilities, equipment, organizational communication channels, IT hardware, capacity, etc.)
- IT software (scheduling software, configuration mgmt systems, web interfaces, work authorization systems, etc.)
- Resource availability (contracting and purchasing constraints, approved providers subcontractors, collaboration agreements)
- Employee capability (existing expertise, skills, competencies, etc.)
Assumption Log
- is a repository of assumptions and constraints
- frequent input to planning processes
- updates to the log are outputs of many planning and control processes
Constraints
- part of the assumption log
- usually clearly imposed by management or the sponsor
- limit options during planning and beyond
- areas: schedule, cost, risk, scope, quality, resources, customer satisfaction
- examples: project end date, maximum allowable risk, budget, etc.
Work Performance Data, Information and Reports
Work performance data: initial measurements and details about activities gathered during the ‘direct and manage project work’ process (executing phase).
Work performance information: the result of work performance data being analyzed to make sure it conforms to the project management plan and being assessed to determine what the data means for the project as a whole (monitoring and controlling phase)
Work performance reports: work performance information that has been organized into reports which are distributed to various stakeholders
Data Gathering Tools and Techniques
To collect input from stakeholders, e.g. benchmarking, brainstorming, prompt lists, checklists, interviews, market research, questionnaires and surveys
Data Analysis Tools and Techniques
- Alternatives analysis
- Assessment of other risk parameters
- Assumption and constraint analysis
- Cost-benefit analysis
- Cost of quality
- Decision tree analysis
- Document analysis
- Earned value analysis
- Influence diagrams
- Iteration burndown chart
- Make-or-buy analysis
- Performance reviews
- Process analysis
- Proposal evaluation
- Regression analysis
- Reserve analysis
- Risk data quality assessment
- Risk probability and impact assessment
- Root cause analysis
- Sensitivity analysis
- Simulation
- Stakeholder analysis
- SWOT analysis
- Technical performance analysis
- Trend analysis
- Variance analysis
- What-if scenario analysis
Data Representation Tools and Techniques
- affinity diagrams
- cause-and-effect-diagrams
- control charts
- flow charts
- hierarchical charts (WBS, OBS, ReBS)
- histograms
- logical data models
- matrix diagrams/charts
- mind mapping
- priorization/ranking
- probability and impact matrices
- responsibility assignment matrix
- scatter diagrams
- stakeholder engagement assessment matrix
- stakeholder mapping/representation
- text-oriented formats
Decision Making Tools and Techniques
- Voting
- Autocratic decision making
- Multicriteria decision analysis
Communication Skills
- communication competence
- feedback
- nonverbal
- presentations
Interpersonal and Team Skills
- Active listening
- Communication stles assessment
- Leadership
- Team building
- Motivation
- Influencing
- Emotional Intelligence
- Facilitation
- Decision making
- Observation/conversation
- Negotiation
- Networking
- Nominal Group Technique
- Meeting management
- Political awareness
- Cultural awareness
- Conflict management
Estimating Techniques
- Analogous estimating
- Bottom-up estimating
- Parametric estimating
- Three-point estimating
Project Management Information System (PMIS)
- part of enterprise environmental factors (EEFs)
- include automated software such as scheduling software, configuration management system, shared work spaces for file sharing and collaboration, work authorization software, time-tracking software, procurement management software as well as repositories for historical information.
Enterprise Environmental Factors (EEFs)
- provide context within which to plan the project
- are usually outside the control of the project team
- there are internal and external EEFs (e.g. governmental or other rules and regulations that apply to the organization)
- EEFs related to the project management may include a resource management system, procurement system and a quality management system.
Types of control within the ‘Integrated Change Control’ process
Configuration control: focuses on the specification of deliverables and processes
Change control: focuses on the identification, documentation and approval or rejection of changes to project documents, baselines and deliverables.
Product vs. Project scope
product scope: the features and functions that characterize a product, service, or result - To determine if product scope was achieved, the resulting product is compared to the product requirements (recorded in requirements documentation and project scope statement)
project scope: the work performed to deliver a product, service, or result with the specified features and functions (encompasses product scope) - To determine if project scope was completed, the work accomplished is measured against the scope baseline.
Project Life Cycle vs. Project Management Process
Project Life Cycle: What you need to do the work - separated into phases (development life cycle) e.g. analyze, design, code, test, implement. There are plan-driven, change-driven and hybrid project life cycles.
Project Management Process: What you need to do to manage the work - i.e. Initiate, plan, execute, monitoring and controlling, closing
Types of Project Life Cycles
- Plan-driven/waterfall/tradition life cycle (predictive)
- Change-driven life cycle
- Incremental: delivers a complete,
usable portion of the product for each iteration
- Iterative: the complete concept is built in successive levels of detail
- Adaptive/agile: fixed schedule and fixed costs, work is planned in short increments based on customer’s prioritization of requirements - Hybrid development life cycle: combination of predictive and adaptive
Progressive Elaboration
process of continually refining estimates and scope definition
Rolling Wave Planning
earliest parts of the project are planned in sufficient detail for work to begin; later phases of the project work are planned at a high level (form of progressive elaboration)
Reasons for entering ‘project initiation’
- business need/start of a new project
- project has so many problems that you reevaluate the business need
- start of a new phase of the project
Business Documents
The type of documents that comprise the business case, benefits management plan, etc.
Initiating - Processes
- Develop Project Charter
13. 1. Identify Stakeholders
Planning - Processes
- 2 Develop Project Management Plan
- 1 Plan Scope Management
- 2 Collect Requirements
- 3 Define Scope
- 4 Create WBS
- 1 Plan Schedule Management
- 2 Define Activities
- 3 Sequence Activities
- 4 Estimate Activity Durations
- 5 Develop Schedule
- 1 Plan Cost Management
- 2 Estimate Costs
- 3 Determine Budget
- 1 Plan Quality Management
- 1 Plan Resource Management
- 2 Estimate Activity Resources
- 1 PlanCommunications Management
- 1 Plan Risk Management
- 2 Identify Risks
- 3 Perform Qual. Risk Analysis
- 4 Perform Quant. Risk Analysis
- 5 Plan Risk Response
- 1 Plan Procurement Management
- 2 Plan Stakeholder Engagement
Executing - Processes
- 3 Direct and Manage Project Work
- 4 Manage Project Knowledge
- 2 Manage Quality
- 3 Acquire Resources
- 4 Develop Team
- 5 Manage Team
- 2 Manage Communications
- 6 Implement Risk Responses
- 2 Conduct Procurement
- Manage Stakeholder Engagement
Monitoring and Controlling - Processes
- 5 Monitor and Control Project Work
- 6 Perform Integrated Change Control
- 5 Validate Scope
- 6 Control Scope
- 6 Control Schedule
- 4 Control Costs
- 3 Quality Control
- 6 Control Resources
- 3 Monitor Communications
- 7 Monitor Risks
- 3 Control Procurements
- 4 Monitor Stakeholder Engagement
Closing - Processes
4.7 Close Project or Phase
Integration Management - Processes
- Develop Project Charter
- 2 Develop Project Management Plan
- 3 Direct and Manage Project Work
- 4 Manage Project Knowledge
- 5 Monitor and Control Project Work
- 6 Perform Integrated Change Control
- 7 Close Project or Phase
Scope Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Scope Management
- 2 Collect Requirements
- 3 Define Scope
- 4 Create WBS
- 5 Validate Scope
- 6 Control Scope
Schedule Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Schedule Management
- 2 Define Activities
- 3 Sequence Activities
- 4 Estimate Activity Durations
- 5 Develop Schedule
- 6 Control Schedule
Cost Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Cost Management
- 2 Estimate Costs
- 3 Determine Budget
- 4 Control Costs
Quality Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Quality Management
- 2 Manage Quality
- 3 Quality Control
Resource Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Resource Management
- 2 Estimate Activity Resources
- 3 Acquire Resources
- 4 Develop Team
- 5 Manage Team
- 6 Control Resources
Communication Management - Processes
- 1 PlanCommunications Management
- 2 Manage Communications
- 3 Monitor Communications
Risk Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Risk Management
- 2 Identify Risks
- 3 Perform Qual. Risk Analysis
- 4 Perform Quant. Risk Analysis
- 5 Plan Risk Response
- 6 Implement Risk Responses
- 7 Monitor Risks
Procurement Management - Processes
- 1 Plan Procurement Management
- 2 Conduct Procurements
- 3 Control Procurements
Stakeholder Management - Processes
- Identify Stakeholders
- 2 Plan Stakeholder Engagement
- 3 Manage Stakeholder Engagement
- 4 Monitor Stakeholder Engagement
Activities during ‘Control processes’
- Follow the change management plan
- Measure scope/schedule/cost/etc. performance against the performance measurement baseline
- Influence the factors that cause changes
- Control scope/schedule/cost/etc changes and the impact of those changes
- Analyze work performance data and variances
- Request changes
- Update the baseline (scope/schedule/cost, etc.), other parts of the project management plan and other related documentation with approved changes
- Document lessons learned
- Manage the schedule and cost reserve
- Use earned value analysis to create schedule and cost forecasts
- Obtain additional funding if needed
- Validate changes to make sure they do not over or undercurrent problems
What triggers Monitoring and Controlling?
- Requested changes (incl. recommended corrective actions and preventive actions and defect repair from all sources)
- Work performance data
- Deliverables
Process Groups triggered by Monitoring and Controlling
- Project Initiating to review project charter
- Project planning to elaborate plans as new information is learned
- Project executing to repair defects and implement approved changes (incl. corrective or preventive actions)
- Project closing if the project is completed or terminated
What triggers ‘Project closing’?
- Project phase is complete
- Project is complete
- Project is terminated
Activities during Planning
- Determine development approach, life cycle, and how you will plan for each knowledge area
- Define and prioritize requirements
- Create project scope statement
- Assess what to purchase and create procurement documents
- Determine planning team
- Create WBS structure and WBS dictionary
- Create activity list
- Create network diagram
- Estimate resource requirements
- Estimate activity durations and costs
- Determine critical path
- Develop schedule
- Develop budget
- Determine quality standards, processes and metrics
- Determine team charter and all roles and responsibilities
- Plan communication and stakeholder management
- Perform risk identification, risk analysis (qual. & quan.) and risk response planning
- Go back-iterations
- Finalize procurement strategy and documents
- Create change and configuration mgmt plans
- Finalize all management plans
- Develop realistic and sufficient project management plan and baselines
- Gain formal approval of the plan
- Hold kick-off meeting
- Request changes
Leaderships styles
- laissez-faire: allowing team to make their own decisions and establish their own goals (“hands-off-style”)
- transactional: focus on goals, feedback, and accomplishment to determine rewards; management by exception
- servant leader: puts other people first and focus on other people’s growth, learning, autonomy and well-being; leadership is secondary
- transformational: empowering followers through idealized attributes and behaviors, inspirational motivation, encouragement for innovation and creativity
- charismatic: able to inspire, is high-energy, enthusiastic and self-confident
- interactional: combination of transactional, transformational and charismatic
- autocratic: top-down-approach, manager may coach or delegate, but everyone does what the manager tells them to do
Voting techniques
- Unanimity: Everyone agrees
- Majority: more than 50% agree (uneven number ensures decision)
- Plurality: option with largest number of supports wins (even if not majority)
Decision-making techniques
- Voting: collective decision-making
- Autocratic decision making: one individual takes responsibility for making decisions for the group
- Multicriteria decision analysis: decision matrix is used to provide a systematic analytical approach for establishing criteria
Nominal group technique
- part of Interpersonal and Team Skills
- structured form of brainstorming that is enhanced with a voting process used to rank most useful ideas for further brainstorming and prioritization
- steps: question/problem is posed to group; everyone silently generates ideas; moderator writes ideas on flip chart; ideas are discussed until everyone has a clear understanding; individuals vote privately to prioritize ideas; voting may be repeated many times to reduce and focus in on ideas
Project management components developed during ‘Develop Project Management Plan”
- configuration management plan
- change management plan
- performance measurement baseline
- development approach
- project life cycle
- management reviews
Decomposition
only used in ‘Create WBS’ and ‘Define Activities’
Patterns/commonalities in outputs
- outputs of all monitoring and controlling processes: PMplan updates + project documents updates + work performance info (except for ‘Perform Integrated Change Control’ and ‘Monitor and Control Work’ -> Work performance Reports)
- inputs to all monitoring and controlling processes (except ‘Perform Integrated Change Control’ and ‘Monitor and Control Work’): Work performance data (‘Monitor Risks’ also uses Work performance reports)
- outputs of all executing + monitoring and controlling activities: CRs (except for ‘Manage Project Knowledge’ and ‘Perform Integrated Change Control’ -> approved CRs)
Work performance reports (as input & output)
- output of ‘Monitor and Control Work’
- input to: ‘Perform Integrated Change Control’, ‘Manage Project Team’, ‘Manage Communications’, ‘Monitor Risks’
Forecasting methods
- time series
- scenario building
- simulation
