BUS-P 552 Project Management

• 7 weeks
• 1.5 credits
• Prerequisite(s): MBA Core

This course will introduce students to the fundamental principles of effective project management in the overall context of the enterprise. We will define how projects differ from and relate to operations and programs; introduce project portfolio management concepts, organizational structures, frameworks and techniques to explain portfolio planning as well as project alignment, definition, selection, and oversight; discuss frameworks to select appropriate project execution methodologies; and review the similarities and differences among those methodologies (primarily waterfall and agile) as well as effective techniques to manage each. Throughout the course we will touch on topics related to effective project management such as structured thinking, business and technology architecture, organizational change management, estimation, risk management, and communications.

• Project Organization: project- related organizational structures, processes, and support organizations
• Project Portfolio Management: alignment, selection, coordination, multi-year enterprise level planning
• Project Scope Management: definition, effective project change control
• Project Scheduling: Critical Path Management and Gantt charts. Crashing of activities and optimization techniques for crashing. Risk model for estimating project uncertainty.
• Resource and Budget Management: resource loading, resource leveling and constrained resource scheduling; cost/benefit estimation and budgeting
• Project Execution: management of ongoing project work and scope-schedule-budget
• Project Control: project monitoring and the role of information systems; project controls and feedback processes; project audit life cycle and project termination
• Human Factors: team building, stakeholder identification and management, communications, effective project leadership, and organizational change management.