Description

The course is designed to provide a basic knowledge and understanding of applied project management approaches, tools and techniques. The course specifically tries to develop a knowledge and understanding of project management to a level where a senior manager can (a) understand what his or her project managers actually do and (b) improve his or her likelihood of adding competitive advantage. The course does not attempt to produce qualified project managers although the course syllabus is based on the syllabus produced by the UK Association for Project Management (APM). This syllabus itself is based on the international syllabus produced by the Swiss-Based International Project Management Association (IPMA).

Skills-based objectives

A project manager has to be able to consider a range of different success criteria at the same time and balance performance in one against performance in others. For example most projects have a time limit, a cost limit and some kind of specification or minimum quality limit. The project manager has to achieve certain targets or standards in all of these if the project is to be considered a success.

Learning outcomes

The course is designed in such a way to ensure that, on completion, students will be familiar with:

• the concept of project management;
• how project management differs from traditional management and the different organisation structures employed;
• the potential benefits and challenges of using a project management approach;
• the typical position and role of the project manager;
• the essential project management skills;
• the concept of what a project team is and how it works;
• project team staffing and profiling;
• project team life cycles and evolution;
• project team communication and motivation;
• project team stress and conflict.