PMBOK Guide and its Foundational Concepts

00:01 In this module, we're going to cover some essential foundational concepts.

00:06 The reason we do this is some of the terminology, and the PMBOK guide may be different from how you use it in everyday life.

00:13 So we're going to go through a whole range of these concepts and definitions and make sure that we're all speaking the same language for the purposes of the exam.

00:22 Now this is a very important part of the exam.

00:26 The difficulties about medium level, but you're going to have to memorize a lot of these. Now keep in mind that the PMBOK guide says it or it offers a standardized terminology or lexicon for the profession of project management, but recognizes that there are many different ways to say the same thing.

00:43 However, on exam day, you're going to have to use the terms like this.

00:48 So let's start at the beginning.

00:50 What is a project and what is operational work in relation to the PMBOK guide? There are only two types of work in the world.

00:57 There's either project ties, work or operational work.

01:01 So a project is a unique time limited and has a defined, deliverable subject to progressive elaboration.

01:09 Operational work, on the other hand, is repetitive and ongoing.

01:14 Remember, we're dealing with the provision of project management.

01:17 So it's got those constraints of being unique time limited with a deliverable service or result subject to progressive elaboration.

01:27 Some other of the foundational concepts you need to know is the definition of what a program is.

01:31 We now know what a project is a program as a group of projects related in some way they can be using common resources or they can be working towards a common goal. And the role of the program manager in this instance is to coordinate those elements and to look out for conflict between them.

01:51 A portfolio, on the other hand, is all of the projects and programs that an organization is undertaking.

01:57 So in this instance, we can see that the dark circle represents the entire portfolio that the organization is undertaking.

02:06 We can see the projects identified by the green circles, and some projects are also part of programs.

02:13 So that's the difference between portfolios, programs and projects.

02:19 The project management office, or PMO.

02:22 Sometimes it's called the program management office as well.

02:25 Still, PMO, though.

02:28 The easiest way to think about the PMO is that it's the center of excellence, whatever that means for the organization that suits its level of project management maturity. So the PMO can take three different forms. It can be supportive, controlling or directive.

02:48 If it's a supporting form of a PMO, it may just provide some templates and some ad hoc advice to project managers in the organisation.

02:57 If it's a controlling type of PMO, it may provide the project management methodology.

03:02 It may audit to make sure that their project management methodology is being used in accordance with its description.

03:09 It may provide some training to project managers as well.

03:13 A directive form of PMO will take greater responsibility for project management than the organisation.

03:19 It may have a hand in project selection and prioritization.

03:24 It may also be where all the project managers are physically located and set.

03:28 It may assign project managers and program managers to projects and undertake all of the necessary training for project managers.

03:36 Whatever level of PMO, though, that your organisation has, it should always reflect the level of project management maturity within your organisation.

03:46 As an aside, the research tells us quite clearly that the form of PMO generally changes every two years to assist the organisation reach the next level of project management maturity.

03:58 Another key foundational concept and definition you will need to know for the exam is the project life cycle, particularly when we compare it to the Product life cycle, which we'll get to shortly.

04:09 The project life cycle begins with the idea, opportunity or challenge, which sets the project into motion.

04:18 The project life cycle concludes when the scope of the project has been delivered.

04:23 Project closure activities have been undertaken.

04:25 Things like post implementation review and benefits realisation.

04:29 There are three types of project life cycle that we recognise for the purposes of the PMP exam.

04:36 The first is a predictive project life cycle.

04:40 A predictive project.

04:41 Life cycle is usually done in the construction industry.

04:45 This is because a lot of work can be done at the beginning to define the work, and the Met defined work can be carried out as per the plan, with little change to it throughout the life of the project.

04:58 The iterative or incremental project life cycle is we are planning and executing work happens concurrently or at the same time, and there's often a lot of change to deal with.

05:09 For example, many I.T.

05:11 projects use iterative or incremental project life cycles.

05:15 The third type of project lifecycle is the adept of project lifecycle, and this is where a lot of high level work is done to define the project, and then it is delivered in short bursts based on what is known at that time.

05:30 Methodology such as scrum excel at adept of project life cycles. So for the purposes of the exam, you'll need to know all three of those project life cycles.

05:42 What Chat in the exam for the word project and product, you'll see them interchange with project life cycle and product life cycle, and later on, we'll see how they go with the project scope and product scope as well.

05:56 Here, the product life cycle is different from the project life cycle and that the product life cycle starts at the beginning with the idea for a product.

06:06 But the product life cycle goes on until the product is no longer useful, is obsolete, is recycled or sent to the dump.

06:15 That's the product life cycle from the beginning to the end of the useful life of the product. Another key foundational concept you'll need to know for the exam are phases.

06:27 Many projects can be broken down and delivered into phases.

06:31 You could have requirements gathering phase a design phase a usability testing phase. All of these phases can happen in any type of project as a guide. All of the PMBOK guide processes may occur in each phase.

06:45 You may have a phase that has a clear initiating, a clear planning executing, monitoring, controlling and closing activities within it.

06:53 And then it stops and goes on to the next phase.

06:56 Often between phases, we see hard handover or assessment points.

07:01 Things like stop go points, kill points, milestones go no go points. All separate phases.

07:08 Phases can also happen in a sequential fashion or in an overlapping fashion as well. Some of the last key foundational concepts you need to know for the PMP exam are a couple of inputs that appear all throughout the PMBOK guide.

07:26 Most of the 47 processes and the PMBOK guide feature either one or both of these key inputs.

07:33 The first is enterprise environmental factors.

07:36 You'll see this as a very, very common input into many processes.

07:42 Enterprise environmental factors are those things which are external to the project, but may still be from the wider organization that may impact the project, and the project needs to take them into account.

07:56 So within the organization, they may be such things as the organizational culture is at risk adverse or risk tolerant, wider organizational policies on on recruitment or health and safety.

08:08 Those sorts of things are examples of enterprise environmental factors still within the organization, but external to the project outside of the organisation.

08:18 There are many other examples of enterprise environmental factors as well.

08:22 These could be things like local and national laws, industry regulations, those sorts of things as a tip for the exam, enterprise environmental factors generally constrain a project.

08:36 The other key input that is used throughout most of the processes in the PMBOK guide are organizational process assets.

08:45 Now, if we break it down into its three key words, we can gain an understanding of what an organizational process asset is.

08:51 First up, it belongs to the organization that is performing the project work.

08:56 It's a sort of process it outlines a way of doing things, but most importantly, it's an asset. This means that the organization owns it.

09:06 So these are the things like the intellectual property, the policies, the procedures, the templates, the project management methodology, historical information and other elements such as that.

09:18 Organizational process assets can generally be seen as things that help a project. Some more definitions to help you get through the PMP exam, work performance data will often see this as an input or as an output throughout all of the 47 processes, we've got work performance data, work performance information and work performance reports for the purposes of the exam.

09:45 It's important that you understand how work performance data becomes work, performance information and how that work performance information gets included and work performance reports.

09:56 So let's begin with work performance data.

09:59 This is the raw, unprocessed information that you are collecting about the project.

10:03 It could be information about the costs, the time, the resources, quality, standards, risk standards, anything.

10:11 It's a simple, unprocessed metric number or data that you've gathered.

10:15 Does it make sense yet in order for it to make sense? We need to turn it into work performance information, to turn data and to information.

10:24 There's a whole wide variety of techniques throughout the Bot guide to give us this.

10:29 One of the easiest ones to understand is taking cost and time data and turning it into useful cost and time information with the earn value management technique, which will cover in another module.

10:43 Finally, work performance reports, we've seen how work performance data becomes work, performance reports with the application of the right tools and techniques. Once this information has been gathered, it now tells us something useful about the project and we can now use that work performance information and include it in our work performance reports.

11:04 We can circulate this these reports to stakeholders and the appropriate medium in order to help influence their engagement for the project.

11:14 Another key definition is the concept of progressive elaboration.

11:20 Now, a lot of people may think that you simply plan a project, then you go and do a project, and nothing changes.

11:27 Well, generally nothing could be further from the truth.

11:30 We know that project management is one of progressive elaboration, and this means we iteratively define the project as we move through it.

11:38 We may know a lot about the project at the beginning, but we don't know everything.

11:43 So as we go through the project, we keep Planning Re Planning defining redefining.

11:49 We're also subject to changes throughout the life of the project, which make us to the Planning again.

11:54 So that's progressive elaboration.

11:57 We iteratively define the project in greater detail as we move throughout the project. One of the key foundational concepts in the PMBOK guide is the value of historical information to a project manager.

12:12 Historical information should be collected throughout the life of projects in the form of lessons learned and should be kept and archived and stored in a place where project managers can retrieve it easily.

12:24 One of the key concepts of the PMP exam will assume that when you begin a project, you are able to access this historical information and read it. It will contain things that went well and previous projects and things that didn't go so well and previous projects.

12:41 But for the purposes of the exam, it is assumed that you have access to historical information and you collect historical information throughout the life of your project, particularly during project closure activities.

12:56 Another key definition, the word baseline.

12:59 Now you may use the word baseline and many different ways in your day to day job for the purposes of the exam, though, it's important that you know that the baseline is where you originally started.

13:11 Plus, any and all approved changes.

13:15 So your baseline where you originally started.

13:19 Plus any and all approved changes, that is, your new baseline baselines become very important for the profession of project management.

13:28 They represent what we plan to do throughout the project.

13:31 We can have our cost baseline, our time baseline or project schedule.

13:36 We can also have our scope baseline using these baselines, representing what we plan to do.

13:42 We can check what we are actually doing against them.

13:46 If there's variance between what we're actually doing and what we plan to do, then we act. Another definition organizational project management maturity, particularly the OPM three or organizational project management maturity model, this recognizes that different organizations are at different levels of maturity.

14:09 Maturity can be measured by such things, as do they have a project management methodology in place or do they make things up as they go along? Do they require certifications for project managers? Do they have a robust portfolio process that selects and prioritizes their projects according to define best practice? Not every organization needs to be at the highest level of project management maturity, but for the purposes of the exam, you will need to know that that's what OPM or organizational project management maturity models are about.

14:44 Now we move on to some of the more important definitions that you need to know.

14:49 First up, the project manager.

14:52 The term project manager is unfortunately used by a lot of people to mean different things. However, for the purposes of the exam, you need to know that the project manager is the person ultimately responsible and accountable for the outcome of the project. We understand that a general manager of an organization.

15:12 Manages the organization with high levels of responsibility and accountability for the organization and for the purposes of the exam.

15:20 A project manager is the general manager of a project.

15:23 They are the person ultimately responsible for the outcome of the project.

15:27 But with that ultimate responsibility comes a high level of authority and accountability as well.

15:33 Other titles we can use the project coordinator the how weaker than a project manager, but they have some decision making ability.

15:41 Their levels of responsibility, authority and accountability are slightly lower than that of a project manager.

15:47 We usually find project coordinators and weak matrix or functional organizations where the functional manager may have more of the power and authority.

15:57 Below the project coordinator, there is the Project Expediter, which is the weakest of the three roles.

16:03 Generally, they take an administrative role on the project only with little or no responsibility or authority for the project.

16:11 So for the purpose of the exam, remember this man Corps X Manager Coordinator Expediter, the project manager.

16:21 High levels of responsibility and authority.

16:24 The project coordinator.

16:26 Some decision making ability, but less than a project manager.

16:30 And finally, the project expediter generally an administrative role only.

16:35 So these definitions may differ from your current use of the terms, but in the exam, remember them like this? Some of the other basic roles in the project that you need to be aware of.

16:47 First up, the project sponsor, the project sponsor is the person within the delivering organization that provides financial and political support for the project.

16:59 The project manager should have an excellent working relationship with the project sponsor. The project sponsor doesn't take responsibility for managing the project that is the role of the project manager, but they do approve the finances to spend on the project, and they also help the project manager negotiating with internal and external stakeholders and removing political roadblocks that the project manager may encounter a stakeholder on the project as any person or group or organization that has an interest or can be affected or can affect the project in reality or perception.

17:38 So you can see with the definition that broad a stakeholder can be anybody that can affect or be affected by your project.

17:46 One of the key elements of successful project management is identifying the stakeholders, categorizing their power and influence, and then developing robust strategies to proactively influence those stakeholders.

17:59 And the key thing we want was stakeholder management is to get them to support our project or at least not oppose it.

18:09 The whole profession of project management is built upon the Shewhart and Deming plan, do, check, act cycle: the PDCA.

18:17 This is a foundational element of the profession of project management.

18:21 And what it does is it says that first up, we plan what we're going to do.

18:26 We then do what we plan to do.

18:30 As we're doing what we plan to do, we check, we check that what we are doing and what we plan to do match each other if we detect variance between what we plan to do and what we are actually doing.

18:44 We act.

18:45 We insure at all times in the project that what we plan to do and what we are actually doing match.

18:51 So this means if we do find variance between the two, we either change what we plan to do or we change what we're actually doing.

18:59 This is the key component of the plan.

19:01 Do Check Act cycle developed by Shewhart and Deming.

19:08 Stakeholder influence, we've already covered the role of stakeholders and our goal of proactively influencing them to support our project or at least not oppose it.

19:19 What we want to do is do this early on in the project.

19:23 We want to make sure that the influence of stakeholders, which is greatest at the beginning of the project.

19:28 This is where they can exert that influence to make the changes.

19:32 But the costs of those changes are smallest.

19:34 This is where we manage them best as we go through the project and move to the end of the project lifecycle.

19:41 The influence of stakeholders gets list, but the cost of the changes they may want increases.

19:48 So we put all of our effort into influencing stakeholders at the beginning of a project.

19:53 Another key component foundational component of the profession of project management is a recognition of the triple constraint.

20:00 This is often been seen as time and cost and scope or quality.

20:05 Sometimes it's described it, which means if you want things done faster, you may have to reduce the scope or increase the cost.

20:12 There's an interdependence and interrelationship between these three things, all of which can constrain it.

20:18 The triple constraint is what we historically call it.

20:20 But recently we've come to see that there are more than three elements which can constrain a project scope, cost time.

20:28 Other three, but also things like quality, risk and customer satisfaction, may cause us to trade things off if we want greater customer satisfaction.

20:38 We may have to increase the scope, decrease the cost, increase the quality, those sorts of things.

20:44 That's what the constraints are for the profession of project management.

20:50 Our final foundational concept to keep in mind is the concept of strategic delivery. The profession of project management is seen as a key organizational or strategic enabler.

21:03 We know that most organizations in the world achieve strategic or long term success with successful projects.

21:11 Therefore, a key foundational concept is you should only choose projects that align with and help deliver organizational strategy.

21:23 If you don't, then you may not have the political support or the core competencies to deliver those projects.

21:30 Therefore, only choose projects that deliver your organizational strategy.

21:36 So this has been an introduction to absolutely key foundational concepts and definitions that you'll need to take with you into the exam.