A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge by Project Management Institute

One Sentence Summary

A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge is a comprehensive guide to provide best practices for successful management of projects.

Book Genre

Non-fiction guidebook.

Main Topic

Project management.

Key Ideas

• Project management process: A comprehensive guide providing best practices to manage projects successfully, from inception to completion.
• Standardised framework for success: The book contains a ten-step process to easily manage the whole project development process while ensuring the quality, quantity and effectiveness of the project.
• Expert tools: Includes expert advice, insightful exercises, quality tools, as well as templates and examples to assist a project manager in project management.
• Flexibility: The book guides project managers and team members to apply the best practice model to their specific projects efficiently and productively.

Main Parts of the Book and a Short Summary

• Introduction: Introduces fundamentals of professional project management, basic terminology, and the project management lifecycle.
• Project Integration Management: Focuses on tools and techniques to initiate, develop, execute and close project effectively. It also covers how to develop project plans, create project schedules and control and monitor project plan progress.
• Project Scope Management: Instructs on creating the project scope statement, developing the WBS (Work Breakdown Structure), monitoring scope changes and establishing and managing the scope baseline.
• Project Time Management: Covers tools to estimate the duration of project activities, identify tasks and dependencies to make up the schedule, allocate resources to activities, develop project scheduling and monitor and control the schedule.
• Project Cost Management: Describes how to estimate costs, manage budgets, assign and monitor costs throughout the project. It also explains how to control project financial costs.
• Project Quality Management: Explains how to develop quality control processes and procedures for the project, how to ensure quality and performance, and how to coordinate and oversee quality control activities.
• Project Human Resource Management: Focuses on the processes of hiring, training and understanding human resources. It helps in building effective teams, coordinating the team and understanding the needs of the organization and team members.
• Project Communications Management: Explains communication planning and strategies to ensure that teams understand their roles and objectives. It also provides information on how to identify stakeholders, analyze their input and influence and how to manage communication process.
• Project Risk Management: Covers those techniques helping to identify project risks, ways to quantify those risks, how to develop risk response strategies and how to monitor and control risks.
• Project Procurement Management: Guides on ways to request and receive information on prospective vendors and suppliers, including how to evaluate tenders, issue contracts and manage vendor/supplier relationships.
• Project Stakeholder Management: Describes how to identify, analyze, develop and manage relationships with project stakeholders.

Key Takeaways

• Proactive approach: A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge provides a ten-step process to ensure the success of project management from beginning to end.
• Standardised and Experienced Process: The book contains industry accepted best practices, and professional advice from experts that are vital to mastering the art of project management.
• Flexibility: It helps to establish an effective and achievable strategy by developing a tailored roadmap unique to your project.

Author’s Background and Qualifications

A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge is written by Project Management Institute (PMI), a programme management and certification organisation established in 1969. They have been developing standards and best practices related to project management and have certified more than 3 million professionals worldwide.

Target Audience

This book is intended for anyone interested in project management and includes essential guidance for project management novices and experienced practitioners alike.

Publisher and First Publication Date

Project Management Institute published the fifth edition of A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) in December 2017.

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