Project management systems - PMBOK – part 1

PMBOK – part 1

Introduction

The next sections afford a brief summary of the PMBOK® covering some of its contents.

PMBOK® stands for the Project Management Body of Knowledge and is published as a guide by the Project Management Institute (PMI).

The comments here refer to ‘A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge’ (Third Edition).

It represents the sum of knowledge within the profession of project management.
These will be generally recognised as good practice.
It is revised at intervals and contains proven traditional practices that are widely applied as well emerging innovative practices.
The latter may be published or unpublished.

It is used as a foundation for professional qualifications approved by the Project Management Institute.

It is set out to cover:

The Project Management Framework
The Standard for Project Management of a Project
The Project Management Knowledge Areas

The Project Management Framework

This covers an introduction to the guide and briefly the characteristics of a project, operational work and strategic planning.
It provides a basic structure for the understanding of project management.

It describes key terms and the project life cycle and organization.

The Standard for Project Management of a Project

This section describes the project management processes needed for carrying out a project.
These are divided into 5 process groups and their underlying project management processes.

These are:

Initiating process group

This covers the authorisation needed to start a project.

This includes:

Development of a Project Charter
Development of a Project Scope Statement

Planning process group

This is used to plan and manage the project.

It includes:

Develop Project Management Plan
Scope planning
Scope definition
Create Work Breakdown Structure
Activity Definition
Activity sequencing
Activity Resource Estimating
Activity Duration Estimation
Schedule Development
Cost Estimating
Cost Budgeting
Quality Planning
Human Resource Planning
Communications Planning
Risk Management Planning
Risk Identification
Qualitative Risk Analysis
Quantitative Risk Analysis
Risk Response Planning
Plan Purchases and Acquisitions
Plan Contracting

Executing process group

This consists of the processes used to complete the work defined in the project management plan to achieve the project’s requirements.

It includes:

Direct and Manage Project Execution
Perform Quality Assurance
Acquire Project Team
Develop Project Team
Information Distribution
Request Seller Responses
Select Sellers

Monitoring and controlling process group

This group consists of those processes performed to observe project execution so that potential problems can be identified in a timely manner and corrective action can be taken, when necessary, to control the execution of the project.

It includes:

Monitor and Control Project Work
Integrated Change Control
Scope Verification
Scope Control
Schedule Control
Cost Control
Perform Quality Control
Manage Project Team
Performance Reporting
Manage Stakeholders
Risk Monitoring and Control
Contract Administration

Closing process group

This group includes the processes used to formally terminate all activities of a project or a project phase, hand off the completed product to others or close a cancelled project.

It includes:

Close Project
Contract Closure

Purchase the full product

other areas of interest in the series