Overview

Delivering IT projects is extremely difficult, and this is proven by the high failure rate. At least 65 per cent of projects are stopped before cutover, go over budget or don’t deliver the expected benefits.

In the Pathway IT Advanced Project Management course you will learn the principles of successful delivery. This course is designed to help project and programme managers understand key activities regardless of methodology.

The following items are critical elements of delivering projects on time and to budget:

• Dress rehearsals. (The most effective risk management and cutover preparation activity a project can complete.) 
• Practical risk management.
• Project initiation. (Poor project initiation is a major factor in 80 per cent of IT project failures.)
• Contingency planning.
• Budget management.  
• Holistic security, including planning, configuration, and testing.
• Proof of concept activities.
• Aligning the master data management strategy to the project. 
• Selecting methodologies and Agile frameworks.
• Use of hybrid methodology.
• Dependency management across teams.
• Coordinating infrastructure builds in an Agile environment.
• Cutover management.
• Runbook preparation.
• Managing Go/No Go meetings.
• Post go-live support.

Course objectives

 The course aims to help you:

• Learn how to implement the critical activities above in your projects.
• Understand the strengths and weaknesses of the main methodologies and how to enhance them.
• Understand dress rehearsals, have the ability to plan them, communicate the benefits and explain that they are not a rerun of any test phase.
• Understand the principles of professional project initiation.  
• Develop a risk management strategy that is commensurate with the complexity, business criticality and timescale of the project.
• Learn how to plan cutover activities.
• Understand the principles of effective project governance and how to implement it across a range of projects.
• Use governance principles to align Agile delivery with your organisation’s strategic objectives.
• Understand the role of the project board in governance.
• Understand the most effective risk management approach for Agile and Waterfall projects.

Who is this course for?

This course is designed for project and programme managers.

It will be valuable for project managers, PMO teams, business stakeholders, IT directors, programme managers, support teams, quality assurance managers, test teams, data managers, security teams, or anyone involved in IT projects.  

Learning outcomes

 At the end of the course you should:

• Have an overview of the Pathway Project Management Toolkit.
• Be able to manage budgets effectively.
• Be able to select and enhance methodologies.
• Be able to plan and manage dress rehearsals.
• Be able to explain the objectives and benefits of dress rehearsals.
• Be able to prepare and manage cutover plans.
• Understand why estimates are usually incorrect and the importance of contingency in your plans.
• Be able to plan security activities in your projects. (Please note this relates to planning and managing security activities within the context of project management. IT security strategy is not included in the course.)
• Know how to use a risk management tool that provides an objective measure of the level of risk.
• Understand how critical proactive risk management is and how to instil this approach in your team in order to minimise risk on your projects.
• Understand that risk management requires a holistic approach regardless of the methodology used on the project.
• Know how to prepare for Go/No Go meetings.
• Be able to document escalation procedures and contingency plans. 
• Understand how to communicate effectively with your stakeholders.
• Be able to plan project resources and reflect the effort in your plans.
• Be able to implement effective quality assurance on your projects.
• Be able to work effectively with project boards and have the ability to manage escalations.