Preparing for the Exam with PMBOK Guide—Fifth Edition (Part 5): Time Management

Following 20 years at a large Canadian telecommunications firm, Bruce established the project management consulting firm Solutions Management Inc (SMI). Since 1999, he has provided contract project/program management services, been a source for project management support personnel and created/delivered courses to over 7,000 participants in Canada, the United States and England.

  Career Development   Estimating   Schedule Management   Scheduling   Using PMI Standards   Work Breakdown Structures (WBS)  

This series of articles that explores each knowledge area in A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide)—Fifth Edition traditionally follows a pattern of reviewing each process and highlighting the primary tools, techniques and outputs. Given there are seven processes in Project Time Management, I’d risk having your head hit your keyboard as you fell asleep reading through each process. While I maintain there are no shortcuts (you really do have to do 100 hours of preparation to be ready for the PMP exam), let’s review what is being achieved in this knowledge area.

Six of the seven processes reside in the Planning Process Group (new readers need to go to Table 3-1 now to ensure they understand how knowledge areas, process groups and processes relate).

Plan Schedule Managementis simply about establishing how the schedule will be developed and managed through the project lifecycle. Decisions are made regarding what tool will be used (note PMI never names or supports any proprietary software), the expected level of accuracy, the units of measure (days, weeks, person-days), acceptable control thresholds and reporting formats. Think of it as getting ready to develop a schedule and/or host a schedule discussion meeting.

With more than 25 years of project management experience, I don’t always agree with the PMI approach--…

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