Project Time Management

One leg of the project triple constraint model, project time management is particularly challenging. It seems to most project managers that, no matter how realistically they try to forecast the project schedule, something happens to delay it. The goal of this 2-day instructor-led course is to examine the challenges and techniques of project time management with the goal of improving on-time performance of your projects. The class addresses the implications of uncertainty and project schedule risk, as well as managing stakeholder analysis. During the course, “best practices” will be introduced, and put into context through various exercises.

The approach will be facilitative with a combination of theory and hands on practice with project schedule development and control techniques. Course content will be supplemented with hands-on exercises.

The objectives of this workshop are to:

• Identify why the project schedule is so difficult to manage
• Increase the capability of individuals, managers and project team members to deliver projects on time
• Provide training that is consistent with best practices and the PMBOK^® Guide, Fifth Edition
• Increase the fluency of project managers to develop a defensible and realistic project schedule
• Integrate milestones and deadlines into the overall project plan
• Increase fluency in managing variances and schedule changes
• Introduce participants to the vocabulary of project time management and key time management concepts
• Engage in exercises built around a single, workshop case study designed to allow us to apply the techniques we have learned

Participants in this workshop will master several skill sets including:

• Identifying schedule activities as an extension of the work breakdown structure
• Creating a project network diagram
• Estimating activity durations and resource requirements
• Identifying the critical path
• Compressing the schedule
• Leveling resources
• Implementing schedule variance analysis and controlling changes
• Communicating project needs and status

Lesson 1: Introduction

• Context for Project Time Management
• Triple Constraint
• Project Management Plan
• WBS
• Challenges to Project Time Management

Lesson 2: Project Time Management Processes based on the PMBOK® Guide, 5th Edition

• Introduction to the 7 Project Time Management Processes

Lesson 3: Plan Schedule Management

• Purpose of Schedule Management Plan
• Elements of the Schedule Management Plan
• Establishes Schedule Control Parameters

Lesson 4: Define Activities

• Context
• Purpose of defining activities
• Relationship to the WBS
• Activity attributes

Lesson 5: Sequence Activities

• Context
• Purpose of the Sequencing Activities Process
• Analyzing dependencies
• Classes of dependencies
• Dependency relationships
• Lag and lead
• Project Schedule Network Diagram

Lesson 6: Estimate Activity Resources

• Context
• Purpose of Estimate Activity Resources
• Identifying resources for each activity

Lesson 7: Estimate Activity Durations

• Context
• Duration calculation
• Analogous estimating
• Parametric estimating
• Three-point estimating (PERT)
• Critical path method
• Critical chain method

Lesson 8: Develop Schedule

• Context
• Purpose of Develop Schedule
• Critical Path method
• Critical Chain method
• Resource leveling
• What-if scenarios – applying lead and lag
• Schedule compression

Lesson 9: Control Schedule

• Context
• Purpose
• Performance reviews
• Variance analysis
• Resource leveling
• What-if scenario analysis
• Adjusting leads and lags
• Schedule compression

This course is intended for both project team members and project managers wishing to gain a fluent working knowledge of commonly accepted best practices for project scheduling and schedule control. Team members and managers looking to improve their project time estimating and management should take this course. Students on a track to take the PMP examination should take this course.

This course provides participants with a process that introduces them to project time management as presented in the PMBOK^® Guide, 5^th Edition.