Project Management 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.

This course will prepare candidates for CompTia's Project+ Exam.

Course Prerequisite:

To ensure your success, we recommend you first take Project Management Fundamentals and have a basic working knowledge of MS Project or equivalent knowledge

Target Student for Project Management for IT:

This course is designed to develop competency and professionalism in IT Project Management, including the necessary business knowledge, interpersonal skills, and project management processes required to successfully manage IT projects. This course will also prepare candidates for CompTia's Project+ Exam.

Format: 3 days PDUs: 18.0

Course Objectives:

After completing this course, students will know how 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

Project Management Course Outline:

Lesson 1: Project Initiation: Discovery and Analysis

Creating a Project Concept Definition, Defining Business and Functional Requirements, Define Technical Requirements, Strategic and Operational Relevance, Assessing Project Feasibility, Perform Risk Assessment

Lesson 2: Project Initiation: Estimating

Construct a Formal Estimate, Create Time Estimates, Create Cost Estimates

Lesson 3: Project Initiation: Framing the Project

Managing Change, Writing the Scope Statement, Writing the Project Charter, Writing a Statement of Work (SOW)

Lesson 4: Project Planning: Laying the Foundation

Setting Expectations for the Planning Process, Decomposing a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), Creating a Network Diagram, Identify and Analyze the Critical Path, Creating Project Schedules, Creating Project Budgets

Lesson 5: Project Planning: Developing the Plan

Develop Resource Management Plan, Develop a Risk Management Plan, Develop a Quality Management Plan, Develop an Operational Transfer Plan, Develop a Communication Plan, Compile a Comprehensive Project

Lesson 6: Project Planning: Building the Team

Assemble the Project Team, Building and Supporting the Team, Developing the Team

Lesson 7: Project Execution: Monitoring and Managing

Monitor the Project Iteratively, Calculate Earned Value, Execute Schedule Updates, Execute Budget Updates, Managing the Critical Path, Managing the Project Team, Managing Project Quality, Managing Vendors

Lesson 8: Control: Managing Chaos

Interpreting Control Techniques, Mitigating Scope Creep, Managing Variances

Lesson 9: Project Closure: Tying Up Loose Ends

Managing Documentation, Managing the Operational Transfer Plan, Write Project Closure Report, Obtain Final, Formal Sign-off, Document Lessons Learned, Managing Administrative Closure