1. Best Practices in Project Management
One Day Workshop Conducted By:
Dr. Madhu Fernando, PMP
Doctor of Business Administration - DBA, (Swinburne University, Australia)
Master of Engineering - MEng. (RMIT University Australia)
Founder/Founder CEO PMI Colombo Sri Lanka Chapter
Associate Fellow – Australian Institute of Management

2. Program Objectives
Discuss the world’s best practices in project management and learn how to apply them in to your own projects, and deliver continuous success in projects.

3. Where best practices become standards…..
PMI (Project Management Institute) Global Standards, PMBoK, OPM3
Industry specific Standards : CMM, CMMI
Standards set by other professional bodies, such as APMA, PRINCE 2

4. Discussion: PMI OPM3 Best Practices Directory
Discussion: PMI OPM3 Best Practices Directory. What are the most critical one for our projects..?

5. Best Practices in Project Management PMI Standards – PMBoK®
PMI defines best practices across 42 areas, under 5 process groups, and nine knowledge areas.
These are universal, not industry specific

6. Project Management Process
Project Management process involves:
Initiating Process: authorizing the project or phase
Planning Process: define and verify requirements, objectives, goals and the way forward.
Executing Process: coordinating people and other resources to carryout the plan
Monitoring and Controlling: measuring and monitoring progress regularly
Closing: formalizing the completion of the project

7. Project Management Knowledge Areas
Nine knowledge Areas from PMI Project Management Body of Knowledge PMBoK ®
Project Integration Management
Project Scope Management
Project Time Management
Project Cost Management

8. Project Management Knowledge Areas
Nine knowledge Areas….cont..
5. Project Quality Management
6. Project Human Resource Management
7. Project Communications Management
8. Project Risk Management
9. Project Procurement Management

9. The Value of Project Management
Helps turn dreams in to reality with proper planning and active management

10. The Value of Project Management
Discussion:
Case study on projects contributing to the organisational successes…

11. How popular “Project Management” In today’s world?
This trend can be seen in the increasing numbers of PMI membership. (Data is taken from PMI Today January 2009)

12. What is a ‘Project’
According to the Webster / Oxford Dictionary, Project is, “A proposal of something to be done, plan..”
PMI defines, A Project is a temporary endeavour undertaken to create a unique product, service or a result.

13. What is Project Management?
Project Management is about applying our knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements.

14. Project Management involves…
Project management work generally include,
Identifying requirements
Establishing clear and achievable objectives
Balancing the competing demands for quality, scope, time, and cost.
Meeting and managing requirements and expectations of the various stakeholders.

15. Project Manager’s Role
Project Manager is the person responsible for the project. He or She should be involved from the project initiation.
Project Manager plans the project, and implement it, and monitor and control changes until all the deliverables are made according to the agreed plans.
Responsible for managing stakeholders, and meeting various stakeholder expectation.
Responsible for the communication of project issues, and to keep an open and honest communication with all the parties involved.

16. Project Governance and the Organisation
Project Success can be linked to two things:
Individual commitment and the capabilities
Organizational support and the structure

17. Project Organisation
Projects are run in three key types of organisational structures.
Classic Functional Organisation
Matrix Organisations
Projectized organisation
In each organisational structure, project managers have different levels of authority and freedom to manage the projects.

18. Project Management Office (PMO)
PMOs are becoming the choice of every organisation to solve many problems associated with Project Management.
Reasons for this popularity include:
PMO helps to facilitate overall project management process, and align all projects with the organisational strategy.
Improved project portfolio management, right amount of control and central monitoring of all projects

19. Project Management Office (PMO)
PMO helps;
To establish and maintain procedures and standards for project management methodologies to be used throughout the project
To evaluate project performance and facilitate escalation process

20. Project Management Office (PMO)
PMO helps with;
Project Manager training and competence development,
Benchmarking projects based on their performance,
Project manager mentoring and coaching,
Coordinate Reward and recognition at an orgasniational level

21. Project Portfolio Management and the PMO
A “ Portfolio” is a collection of projects or programs and other work that are grouped together to facilitate effective management of that work to meet strategic business objectives.
One goal of Portfolio Management is to maximize the value of the portfolio by careful examination of candidate projects and programs for inclusion in the portfolio and the timely exclusion of projects not meeting the portfolio’s strategic objectives.

22. Project Portfolio Management and the PMO
Another goal is balancing the investments and efficient use of resources.
Senior management usually take the responsibility for portfolio management in many organizations. If there is a PMO in your organisation, PMO can manage the portfolio.
Portfolio management through the PMO helps in bridging the gap between strategy and projects.

23. Project Initiation and Planning

24. Project Initiation
Project is authorized to go ahead and project manager appointed.
Processes involved here;
Identify Stakeholders
Issue Project Charter – Project Charter give the project go-ahead authority, and appoint the Project Manager and the Key members of the team

25. Project Charter Template
Project charter document will include, but not limited to:
Project purpose and the objectives
High-level Project and Product description
High-level Project requirements
High-level milestones and the Budget
Assumptions and Constraints
Name of the project manager appointed, sponsor and other key people
Approval Requirements

26. Identify stakeholders
Identify all project stakeholders at the initiation stage of the project. And, Analyse stakeholders interests and involvement and the level of influence they have on the project

27. Project Planning
Involves all aspects of planning in the project to meet the expected deliverables
Project Planning takes most of the project time, Sometimes around 30-35% of total project time.

28. Project Management Plan
The Project Management Plan document the strategies used to manage the project, which is selected by the Project Management Team
It will document all the plans and will describes how work will be executed to accomplish the project objectives

29. Project Management Plan Template
Project Scope
Project objectives
Project Life-cycle and the phases
All the subsidiary plans from all knowledge areas; scope management plan, communication management plan, risk management plan, human resource plan, etc ….
cont..

30. Project Management Plan Template
All baseline plans ; including, cost baseline, time baseline, quality baseline.
Roles and Responsibility Matrix, communication matrix, and all relevant plans

31. Planning Project Scope
There are three steps:
1. Collect Requirements : Understanding all project requirements from all the stakeholders and documenting them in Requirement Traceability Matrix.
2. Define Scope and document in Scope Statement
3. Create WBS : to include all project deliverables. If something is not in the WBS, it is outside the scope.

32. Scope Planning Exercise: Creating a WBS and defining the scope of the project
Create a WBS for a selected project and define the scope

33. Project Time Planning Steps: Define Activities - Create Activity List
Sequence Activities – Create network diagram / Gantt Chart
Estimate Activity Resources
Estimate Activity Duration
Develop Schedule

34. Project Time Planning Tools for Estimating Time Analogous estimating
Bottom-up Estimating
Parametric Estimating
Three-point estimate
Templates
Expert Judgment

35. Identifying Critical Path in a Project
The critical path is defined as the longest path through the project and has no float or slack time.
Critical Path Method calculates a single critical path for the project.
To calculate the float or slack time in other activities, it requires that you perform a forward pass, backward pass, and calculate float for the entire network diagram.

36. Identifying Critical Path in a Project
Critical Path Analysis exercise, questions and discussions

37. Project Cost Planning Processes
Estimate Cost
Determine Budget

38. Cost Planning – Estimate Cost
Estimating cost involves estimating cost to the project activities and tasks. Initial cost estimate which is called – a rough order of magnitude estimate – can be + 50% while a definitive estimate could be around + 10%

39. Project Cost Planning Some of the Tools used in Estimating Cost
Analogous estimating
Bottom-up Estimating
Parametric Estimating
Expert Judgment
Project Management Software

40. Cost Planning : Determine Budget
Cost budgeting is; aggregating estimated cost of the activities to a total budget.
The approved budget will provide the cost baseline for the project.

41. Project Quality Planning
Quality typically defines whether stakeholder expectations were met in the project.
Projects can be on budget, on-time, however if it delivers the wrong products, projects will not mean anything.
Projects should be delivered according to the specifications defined at the beginning of the project.

42. Human Resource Planning in Project
Involves developing Human Resource Plan, plan describing how people should be allocated to the project and release them.
This process also involve preparing resource calendar, and maintaining resource pool. Most of these activities can be done through the PMO at an organisational level
Project Manager is responsible in planning for human resources in individual projects

43. Project Communication Planning Processes
Plan Communications involves planning all the communication requirements in the project including how often the meeting are held, the communication media.
It also involves identifying stakeholders and defining the communication channels and the interactions.

44. Stakeholder Analysis matrix
Stakeholders
Stakeholder interest in the project
Assessment of impact
Potential strategies for gaining their support

45. Project Risk Planning Planning for Project Risk Involve:
Plan Risk Management
Identify Risk
Perform Qualitative Risk Analysis
Perform Quantitative Risk Analysis
Plan Risk Responses

46. Project Risk Planning
Risk Planning should be started as early as possible in the project with the key stakeholders
Risk should be reviewed regularly throughout the project. During this process new risk might be identified and status can be changed for already identified risks.
Risks can be positive or negative

47. Project Risk Planning Identify Risk
As soon as you get your project team together conduct a risk analysis meeting and identify all the risks which can make positive or negative impact on the project.
Document all the risks in a Risk Register

48. Project Risk Planning
Perform Qualitative and Quantitative Risk Analysis
Qualitative analysis like ; low, medium high risks prioritized risks with PI (Probability x Impact) Matrix are commonly used.
When required, quantitative analysis using modeling and simulation will be used.

49. Project Risk Planning Plan Risk Responses
Every critical risks should have a response and a risk owner
Response strategies for negative risks include; mitigation, avoidance, transference and acceptance
Positive risks you can exploit, enhance or share

50. Project Risk Planning Risk Register Template Identified Risk
Probability
Impact
PI (PxI)
Action/ Response
Responsible/
Risk Owner

51. Risk Planning Exercise
Conduct a Risk Analysis for a selected project and document in a Risk Register
Analyse the impact of risks using PI Matrix
Develop response strategies for the prioritized risks.
Nominate the risk Owner for each prioritized risk.

52. Project Procurement Planning Processes
Procurement planning involves planning to acquire goods or services from outside the organisation
Evaluate the procurement strategy in the organisation

53. Project Execution and Monitoring and Controlling

54. Executing Process
Execution is about implementing the plan and carrying out the work
Project Manager should manage all the aspects of projects across various knowledge areas during execution
Managing Scope, Time, Cost, HR, Quality, Communication all are part of project execution

55. Project Monitoring and Controlling Process
Project monitoring and control involves managing changes to the project scope
Changes should be managed through integrated change control

56. Change Control Process
Submit the form ‘Change Request’ to the Change Control Board for approval
2. If the Change Request is approved, update all the baseline plans affected by the change. This may include, time plan, budget, etc.

57. Change Control Process
3. All the change request, approved and rejected, must be listed in Change Request Log for future reference
4. Baselines + Approved Change Requests = Updated Baseline

58. Project Closure : Closing Process

59. Closing Process
A project can be closed when all the project objectives are met, and customer accept the project.
Project Closure involve two processes:
Closing the Project or Project Phase
Close Procurements

60. Closing Process - Exercise
List the activities you would perform when closing a project.
Discuss the importance of lessons learned documentation in projects

61. Further readings and reference guides:
Please visit: