PMP Exam Assumptions Unless otherwise stated… The Project ● Large Scale ● 200+ people ● Resources from multiple countries ● At least 1 year in duration ● Never been done before ● A budget of U.S. $10M or more ● Operating in a matrix Environment ● Has a sound business case ● A PMO is in place ● An OPM is in place ● A Change Control Board is in place ● Project proposals are formally reviewed and approved by management after comparison of all proposed projects. As the PM ● General ○ You are familiar with the Project Selection Methods of the org. ○ You have a close working relationship with contracts, procurement and/or legal departments. ○ You are involved, although not necessarily leading the procurement negotiations (the procurement manager generally leads the negotiations) ○ You have specific involvement in the procurement process and that the procurement process cannot occur without your involvement. ○ If no POV is mentioned (buyer or seller), assume you are the BUYER ○ The seller is providing all of the work external to the buyer's team rather than supplying resources to supplement the team (i.e. they are providing a whole IT department resource vs just one or two team members) ● Initiating: ○ You are included in the Project Initiation phase. ● Planning ○ The formal Project Management Plan is realistic and complete to the level appropriate for the project. ○ You have created all the necessary Project Management plans. By the time of Executing, you have plans already in place for how and when you will measure time, cost and scope performance vs the performance measurement baseline. ○ You have determined all the requirements and those requirements are ranked by order of importance. ○ You know the actual cost of labor when performing detailed cost estimating. ○ You take a structured approach to communication. ○ You understand that estimates of time or cost should be in a range. ○ You have an extensive team-building plan in place at the end of planning. ○ All major problems that could have been identified in advance as risks were determined before they occurred and that there was a plan in place for each of these risks. ○ You understand that padding is not an acceptable PM practice ● Executing ○ You have followed the best practices of project management and therefore have time to manage stakeholder engagement and expectations ● ● Monitoring & Controlling ○ You are accountable for meeting the performance measurement baseline. ○ You also measure against the other metrics included in the Project Management Plan to see how the project is performing. ○ You take action to correct any variances that warrant action. ○ Any deviations from the plan should be made up rather than requesting a change to the project to accommodate them. Submitting a change request should be the very last resort and only used if there is no other way to make up the deviation. ○ You spend time and focused effort controlling scope, time, communications, risk, etc. Closing ○ You always close out a project, no matter the circumstances under which it stops, is terminated or is completed.