The Project Simulation Game: Simplifying PM Through Concrete Learning and the “Project Book”

  Career Development   Work Breakdown Structures (WBS)   Knowledge Shelf  

The Problem

Since  2008, a municipality in the Middle East has adopted a “management by projects” approach to all its activities and linked all its projects to a strategic plan. The strategic plan contains more than 200 projects ranging from US$50,000 to more than US$200 million. The difficulty is with the project managers, mostly fresh graduates with no or little experience in project management. They jump directly to project execution and provide excuses for bypassing the project planning stage such as “Project management is a dry subject and very difficult to learn,” and “Planning is a waste of time, and its benefits are minimal in the practical world.” The challenge is to present project management (as a science) in an innovative way that grasps the attention of those project managers.

The Method

 The project management office (PMO) started investigating ways to make project managers practice and implement methodologies and techniques of project management. It was clear that training was needed, but records showed that different project management courses were offered yearly by the training department. After analysis, it was concluded that the way training was conducted failed to transfer the knowledge gained of project management from training manuals to the actual projects, for the following reasons:

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