Even experienced project
managers need help making the most of the tools at their disposal. Project
managers at every level are asked to manage projects with short schedules,
tight budgets, and scarce resources. This hands-on course focuses on the
critical planning stage of a project and how to set a project up for success. Hands-on
exercises with Microsoft Word and Project will demonstrate effective and
easy-to-implement techniques to better plan, schedule
and allocate resources. The goal of this course is to enable project managers
to increase their productivity, which means they have more time to stay on top
of the critical project management tasks that increase the chances of project
success.
This course is designed for
career project managers and those professionals for whom project management is
an integral part of their daily jobs, and who have a vested interest in
improving the effectiveness of project management and the success of projects
often under complex or difficult circumstances. This audience has experience
managing projects, but is looking to enhance its project management skills and
its ability to handle more concurrent projects or to manage larger and more
complex projects.
After completing this
course, students will be able to:
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Explain how effective
project plans facilitate project success. |
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Quickly set up project
plans that communicate key project information to the entire project team. |
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Develop schedules in
Microsoft Project that communicate the project tasks effectively and
accurately. |
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Assign resources to tasks
to obtain the desired results. |
Before attending this
course, students must have:
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Experience participating
in project teams as a project manager, manager, supervisor, team leader, or
consultant. Note that students do not have to carry the title of project
manager or possess a degree or certification in project management. |
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Basic understanding of
project management concepts, such as task lists, work breakdown structures,
Gantt charts, task dependencies, scheduling constraints, and resource
allocation. |
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Hands-on experience with
Microsoft Project, including the ability to: |
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Create tasks and subtasks
to build a project schedule. |
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Link tasks to create
dependencies. |
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Assign resources to tasks. |
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Change task properties. |
Module 1: An
Introduction to Project Planning
This module introduces the
student to the components of project plans, explains how project plans
contribute to the success of projects, and identifies factors that contribute
to a projects success or failure.
Topics and Activities
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Why Project Plans Are
Important |
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Components of a Project
Plan |
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Expert Video: Jump-Start
Project Success with Planning |
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Discussion: What Makes
Projects Succeed or Fail? |
After completing this
module, students will be able to:
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Describe the components
of project plans and their purposes. |
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Explain how project plans
contribute to the success of projects. |
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Identify factors that
contribute to project success or failure. |
Module 2: Preparing an
Effective Project Plan
This module explains why
effective communication is important to project success and introduces the
student to techniques that help communicate project plans effectively. In this
module, you will create a project plan template to facilitate the creation of
future project plans.
Topics and Activities
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Why Effective Communication Is Important |
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Techniques for Communicating Effectively |
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Demonstration: Using the
Outline View in Word to Organize Project Plans |
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Walkthrough: Communicating
Project Information |
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Demonstration: Creating a
Project Plan Template |
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Building Project Budgets |
After completing this
module, students will be able to:
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Recognize why effective
communication is important to project success. |
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Examine techniques that
effectively communicate project plans. |
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Organize project plans by
applying the Outline command. |
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Explore techniques that
effectively communicate project information to all stakeholders. |
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Create a project plan
template to facilitate the creation of future project plans. |
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Improve project
communication by applying the features of Microsoft Office applications in
creative ways. |
Module 3: Building
Better Project Schedules
This module focuses on how
to build a project schedule that helps stakeholders and team members understand
the work that must be performed to complete a project. In this module, you will
modify an existing project schedule to explore techniques for communicating
project schedules effectively.
Topics and Activities
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Building an Effective
Overall Schedule |
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Building an Effective
Gantt Chart |
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Exercise 1: Clearly
Communicating Phases, Tasks, Milestones, and Deliverables |
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Best Practices for
Communicating Task Detail |
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Exercise 2: Documenting
Work Packages |
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Exercise 3: Linking a
Task to a Work Package Document |
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Demonstration: Preventing
Inadvertent Schedule Constraints |
After completing this
module, students will be able to:
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Explain how
easy-to-understand project schedules help team members contribute to project
success. |
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Create a project schedule
with tasks that emphasize the phases, deliverables, and key milestones of the
project. |
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Create a project schedule
that makes it easy to identify the deliverables that result from tasks. |
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Differentiate tasks that
represent work from tasks that represent tangible results. |
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Choose effective methods
for communicating the details of work associated with project tasks. |
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Avoid unintentional
schedule constraints and remove any that may have been added by mistake. |
Module 4: Allocating
Resources to Project Tasks
This module introduces
techniques for assigning resources to tasks and leveling
resources to remove over-allocations. In this module, you will modify existing
resource assignments to obtain the resource allocations you want. You will also
apply different techniques in Microsoft Project to resolve resource
over-allocations.
Topics and Activities
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Problems and
Opportunities in Resource Allocation |
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How Microsoft Project
Calculates Task Values |
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Exercise: Mastering
Tricky Resource Assignments |
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How Microsoft Project
Levels Resources |
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Putting It All Together:
Presenting Project Plans More Effectively |
After completing this
module, students will be able to:
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Recognize why reasonable
resource assignments make it easier to manage projects during project
execution. |
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Evaluate which Project
task fields to modify to obtain the resource allocations you want. |
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Assign resources to tasks
without changing the desired characteristics of the tasks. |
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Describe the algorithm
that Microsoft Project uses to level resources and how that can lead to
unexpected leveling results. |
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Apply different
techniques in Microsoft Project to resolve resource overallocations. |
Bonnie Biafore
is a PMI-certified project management professional (PMP) and project management
consultant. She helps clients learn how to manage projects more effectively and
how to have fun while doing so. She is a nationally-known speaker and trainer,
renowned for presenting project management and personal finance topics in an
entertaining and engaging way. Bonnie is also an award-winning author of
several books, including QuickBooks 2005: The Missing Manual (OReilly 2005,)
Online Investing Hacks (OReilly 2004,) the NAIC Stock Study Handbook (NAIC
2003,) and Troubleshooting Microsoft Project 2002 (Microsoft 2002.)