Getting to Grips with Project Planning
Terms, techniques and approaches explained; allowing you to drive good project planning
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This Project Planning course is extended and updated from earlier planning courses we have offered. The course will provide attendees with a good understanding of the core concepts related to planning projects, although aimed at people who are new to projects and planning it has some elements that will reinforce planning processes for more seasoned project professionals.
We will discuss concepts like
-Handling issues
-Controlled Change
-Apply lessons learned
-Gantt Charts
-Dependencies
-Baselines
-Progress Tracking
-Work Breakdown Structure
-Top Down Planning
-Critical Path Analysis
Explaining the concepts and then using these to build a simple example project plan in Microsoft Project 2016. The steps discussed can be applied to any version of Microsoft Project and are also valid in other project planning software tools. It is not necessary to have MS Project 2016 installed but using the examples covered in some form of planning tool will aid attendees.
Course members are guided through each of the concept areas; building layers of understanding and introducing context to each subject discussed. Starting from the Gantt Chart and a review of Henry Gantt’s idea to communicate plans, confirming how modern planning approaches seek to represent and control the dependencies between tasks. Moving on to discuss how the project plan is a valuable and useful communications tool both within the project team and outwardly to stakeholders and senior management.
You will take a look at how the plan when effectively tracked can improve estimating and delivery for future stages and what steps might be taken to re-plan the project as a result of items tracked and issues that might occur.
Once the basic concepts have been covered you can see how these might be applied to a simple example project. Using a top down planning approach and giving an easy assembly of the project plan. The resulting plan shows how resources are assigned and provides an outline cost profile for the project.
The material covered will provide a base knowledge for future project planning, and further training in project management, leaving you with the skills to build and track plans in your own projects. Forming the foundation to allow you to establish a path of continuous improvement in future projects.
Your Instructor
Mike has over 25 years experience in Project Management with expertise spanning the full project lifecycle including PMO management, portfolio management, business change, project governance, risk management, project implementation and resource management. Solid knowledge and practical experience of PRINCE2, P3O, MSP, PMI PMBOK as well as other project, programme and portfolio tools, methods and processes. Mike has run tailored courses for a number of organisations, including Northern Rock, TNT, Ryder, Games Workshop, and British Polythene industries as well as a range of local government organisations.