Project management standards:

PMI Standards - US & Global Recognition [most used]

PRINCE 2 Standards - British
IPMA Standards - European Union [least used]

Project Management Institute (PMI) is one of the world's largest professional

membership associations, with half a million members and credential holders
in more than 185 countries
It is a not-for-profit professional organization for the project management
profession with the purpose of advancing project management
Situated in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, United States

What is a project?
A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge referred to as the
PMBOK and pronounced PIMBOK defines a project as
A temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique Product,
Service or Result.
Project management is the application of knowledge skills, tools, and
techniques to execute projects effectively and efficiently.
The Project Manager is the person responsible for accomplishing the project
objectives.
Program is a group of inter-related projects, executed together to achieve a
common outcome is called a Program.
Program Management is a Program Management is the application of
knowledge skills, tools and techniques to achieve a desired result of a program.
Portfolios A group of programs, projects and other related works group together
to achieve the strategic objectives.
Portfolio Management Portfolio management refers to organizations that
manage their portfolio based on specific goals.
Project life cycle
The project life cycle defines the phases that connect the beginning of a project
to its end.
Project life cycle generally define
What technical work has to be done in each phase
When deliverables are to be generated in each phase and how each
deliverable is reviewed, verified and validated
How to control and approve each phase
 Who is involved in each phase

Project Management has Five Process Groups

Initiation To define new project and authorizing it
Planning Defining objectives and selecting the best action from alternatives
for successful implementation of project.
Execution Coordinating people and resources to implement the plan
Monitoring & Control Ensuring the project objectives are met by measuring
and monitoring project progress
Closing Formalizing acceptance of the project deliverables and bringing it to
an orderly end
Project Management has TEN Knowledge Areas
Integration Time Scope Quality Cost - Human Resources Communication
Risk Procurement Stakeholder
Different software in market | Basecamp, Asana, MSP .
Project management software is software used for project planning, scheduling,
resource allocation and change management. It allows project managers (PMs),
stakeholders and users to control costs and manage budgeting, quality
management & documentation

Primavera:
Primavera is an enterprise project portfolio management software. It includes
project management, product management, collaboration and control
capabilities, and integrates with other enterprise software such as Oracle and
SAPs ERP systems.
Primavera was launched in 1983 by Primavera Systems Inc., which was acquired
by Oracle Corporation in 2008
Primavera Products
Primavera P6 Enterprise Project Portfolio Management
Primavera P6 Professional Project Management
Primavera P6 Analytics
Primavera Portfolio Management
Primavera Contract Management
Primavera Risk analysis
Primavera Inspire for SAP
Primavera Earned Value Management
Primavera Contractor
Primavera Unifier
Primavera P6 Enterprise Project Portfolio Management is an enterprise portfolio
and project management tool.
Primavera P6 EPPM is 100% web-based, so it runs in a browser and connects to a
webserver that serves-up a visually-rich interface.
P6 EPPM also connects to a main database where all of your project information
is stored.
Primavera P6 Professional Project Management (PPM) is the Primavera Windows-
based project planning tool that is popular around the world for managing
construction projects.
Primavera P6 Professional is a tool to build, schedule and track complex project
schedules.
large project schedules of up to 100,000 activities.

The EPS (Enterprise Project Structure) is a logical, meaningful, hierarchical

arrangement of all the projects in your organization. This is a view of the
company showing its areas of operations.
EPS has a Main/Root Node (The Enterprise/Organization) and several Nodes
and Sub-Nodes defining the various fields this Enterprise is involved in.
OBS Organizational Breakdown Structure is a hierarchical arrangement of an
organizations management structure. Or in simple words the OBS determines
how people within a company are organized and what rights/access they have to
various projects.
Calendar in Primavera
In P6, calendars are used to define working and non-working days. This
calendar data is then used in
the process/calculation of Scheduling, Tracking and Resource Leveling. In
P6, we can define the following data into the calendars:-
Global project resource shift calendar

A WBS represents a hierarchical breakdown of a project into elements.

Company owners and project managers use the Work Breakdown
Structure (WBS) to make complex projects more manageable. The WBS
is designed to help break down a project into manageable chunks that
can be effectively estimated and supervised
Activity
An activity is a major unit of work to be completed in achieving the
objectives of a process. An activity has precise starting and ending
dates, incorporates a set of tasks to be completed, consumes
resources, and results in work products. An activity may have a
precedence relationship with other activities.
FS | SS | FF | SF | Lag | Lead
Lead is the acceleration of a successor activity.
Lag is the delay of a successor activity and represents time that must
pass before the second activity can begin. There are no resources
associated with a lag.
Different Types of activities in P6
Start Milestone
Finish Milestone
Task Dependent
Resource Dependent
Level of Effort
WBS Summary
A Milestone represents a point in time (event) when a pre-determined
task or goal is started or achieved, i.e. a task which has some
significance is either started or is completed
Task Dependent:
Task dependent activity is an activity which uses activity calendar
to calculate start and finish dates.
This type of activity is not dependent on any resource calendars.
So, even if you assign one or more resources to this activity, start
and finish dates will still be calculated from activity calendar.
 Task dependent activity is most commonly used activity type in
project scheduling.
Resource Dependent
Resource dependent activity is an activity which uses resource
calendar to calculate start and finish dates. Activity calendar will
not be used unless there are no resources assigned to that
activity.
A Network Diagram is a visual representation of a projects schedule.
A network diagram in project management is useful for planning and
tracking the project from beginning to finish. It represents a projects
critical path as well as the scope for the project.
There are two types of Activity Diagram
1. Activity on Node (AON)
2. Activity on Arrow (AOA)
In AOA diagrams, the Activity Name and the Activity Duration are
specified on the arrow between two nodes. Then each node contains
three numerical values the Start Time, the Finish Time and the Float.
AOA only represents Finish to start relationship.
AOA has no capability of
Finish to Finish or
Start to Start relationship.
Activity on Node (AON)
The Precedence Diagramming Method (PDM) or Activity on Node
consists of rectangles, known as nodes, and the project activities are
shown in these boxes. These rectangular boxes are connected to each
other with arrows to show the dependencies.
Critical Path
Critical path is the longest path in your projects schedule
network diagram, and is the shortest possible duration for the
project.
Any Change to the Duration or any change to the schedule of
Critical
Path, Will have an Impact on the Project End Date.
So as a Project Manager we have to ensure that we are watching
the
Critical Path daily and how each task in the Critical Path is doing
Step 1: Find Activities
Step 2: Build Schedule Network Diagram
 Step 3: Find all Possible Paths
Step 4: Calculate Duration for Each Path
Early start :
Is the earliest time that an activity can start.
An activity near the end of the path will only start early if all of the
previous activities in the path also started early. If one of the previous
activities in the path slips, that will push it out
Early finish :
Is the earliest time that an activity can finish.
Its the date that an activity will finish if all of the previous activities
started early and none of them slipped.
Late start :
Is the latest time that an activity can start.
If an activity is on a path thats much shorter than the critical path, then it
can start very late without delaying the project but those delays will add
up quickly if other activities on its path also slip
Late finish :
Is the latest time that an activity can finish.
If an activity is on a short path and all of the other activities on that path
start and finish early, then it can finish very late without causing the
project to be late.

Total Float
Total Float is the amount of time that an activity can be delayed from its early
start date without delaying the project finish date.
Formula (Late Start Early Start) or
(Late Finish Early Finish)
Critical / near critical
Monitoring near critical activities can be just as important as
monitoring the critical ones.
Once you have entered all your activities and activity
relationships, and Primavera P6 has computed your critical path,
youll know all the activities that have zero float.
 These are the activities that could cause a delay to your project if
not performed exactly according to the schedule.
But what about the activities that are near critical? That is, what
about activities that could easily become critical, even with minor
delays? These are your near critical activities, and you, as the
scheduler, need to be aware of where these activities are located
on your Gantt chart. You need to keep an eye on them in addition
to your critical activities.
Codes
Codes allow categorizing projects, activities, and resources that have
many similar attributes.
There are Three type of Codes available in Primavera:
1. Project Code
2. Activity Code
3. Resource Code
Roles: They represent a type of resource with a certain level of
proficiency, rather than a.
Specific individual
Roles can be temporarily assigned during the planning stages of the
project to see how certain resources affect the schedule. Once you
finalize your plans, you can replace the roles with resources that fulfill
the role skill levels
Resources in Primavera P6
A Resource can be defined as an entity that is assigned to an activity
and is required to accomplish the task.
The resource include people, materials, equipment and money.
It is always recommended to create and assign the minimum number
of resources to activities
Types of Resources available in Primavera P6:
Labor:
As the name indicates, this resource category will contain all
the resources that come under time-based usage.
E.g. Carpenter, Labor, Steel Fixer, Site Engineer (You may neglect
the Management Category like Engineer etc. to simplify the resources).
Non-Labor:
Like labor, we can place resources under this category which have time-
based usage. Generally Equipment and/or Machinery can be placed
under this category.
Material:
Unlike the above two, those resources which are consumables in the
project can be placed under this category.
CONSTRAINT
Constraints are used to impose restriction on activities that cannot be
realistically scheduled with logical links.
Primary Constraints
Start On constraints set the Late Start date equal to the constraint date
Finish On constraints set the Early Finish equal to the constraint date
Mandatory Start sets the Early and Late Start Dates equal to constraint
date
Mandatory Finish sets the Early and Late Finish Dates equal to the
constraint date
CONSTRAINT
Constraints are used to impose restriction on activities that cannot be
realistically scheduled with logical links.
Secondary Constraints
Start on or Before | Start on or After
Finish on or Before | Finish on or After| As late as possible
Duration Type is a setting which allows the user to control how the
Duration, Resource units, and Resource units/time are synchronized for
activities, so that the following equation is always true:
Duration x Units/Time = Units
Duration Type in Primavera P6:
1. Fixed Units/Time
2. Fixed Duration & Units/Time
3. Fixed Units
4. Fixed Duration & Units

Resource Analysis
Once the assignment of resources for activities and estimation of
the costs for activities and project are over, you have to analyze
the resources to know whether the resources are over-allocated
or under allocated.
If the resources are over-allocated, leveling needs to be done for
the resources.
You can analyse the Resource Levelling by using the following two
method:
Histogram

Spreadsheet

Resource levelling
Resource Leveling is a function in primavera Project Management that
allows you to optimize the use of resources by delaying activities and
adjusting resources to reduce the peaks in the histogram.

Types of Resource Leveling:

Automatic Leveling

Manual Leveling:

1.Delaying
2.Crunching
3.Stretching
4.Splitting

Baseline: The word Baseline has many meanings. It can refer to the
original schedule, to the project estimate.

A Baseline is a copy or snapshot of project data at a given time.

Baseline is a static representation of a project plan, it can be used

in compare against measure performance as the project
progresses.
Many Baselines can be created for a project, only two baselines
can be used at any given time to display and compare data.
These are known as the Project baseline and Users primary
baseline.

Project baseline
A project baseline is essentially the baseline that is set for all
users who will access that particular project. The project baseline
is used for comparing to a projects dates, cost and resourcing
data. It can also be used for earned value calculations
User baseline
There are 3 optional user baselines Primary, Secondary and
Tertiary. When a user baseline is set for comparison, the data
from a user baseline is only visible to the current user its sort
of like setting a private baseline for you only, whereas a Project
Baseline would be public for all users accessing this project.

Earned value analysis

Earned Value Analysis (EVA) is an industry standard method of
measuring a project's progress at any given point in time, forecasting
its completion date and final cost, and analyzing variances in the
schedule and budget as the project proceeds.
It compares the planned amount of work with what has actually been
completed, to determine if the cost, schedule, and work accomplished
are progressing in accordance with the plan. As work is completed, it is
considered "earned".
1. Planned Value (P.V) Planned Value is the authorized Budget
assigned to Schedule Work.
It is the Original base line that you put together when you Develop your
project plan .
2. Earned Value (E.V)- It is the measure of work performed in terms of
the budget authorized for that work.
3. Actual Cost (A.C) - Actual cost is the realized cost incurred for the
work performed in a specific time period.
4. Schedule Variance (S.V) Schedule Variance is a measure of
schedule performance expressed as the difference between the Earned
Value and Planned Value.
5. Cost Variance (C.V) Cost variance is a measure of cost performance
expressed as the difference between the Earned Value and the Actual
Cost.
6. Schedule Performance Index (SPI) It is the measure of schedule
efficiency expressed as the ratio of Earned Value and planned value.
7. Cost Performance Index It is the measure of cost efficiency of
budgeted resources expressed as the ratio of EV and AC.
8. Estimate at Completion
9. Schedule at Completion
 8. Schedule at
Formulas
1. Cost Variance = EV AC
2. Schedule Variance = EV PV
3. Schedule Performance Index = EV/PV
4. Cost Performance Index = EV/AC
5. Estimate at Completion (EAC) = BAC/CPI
6. Schedule at Completion (SAC) = Original date/SPI
S-Curve is a simple graph that plots costs, hours, units or other values
(depending on the subject matter) over time.
They are popular in Project Management because they give managers a
quick and easy-to-understand view of cumulative budget, actual and
remaining values over the project lifecycle.
The term S-Curve denotes the tendency of the lines to form a shallow
S shape; flatter at the start, steeper in the middle and flattening off
again towards the end. This shape is very typical of most projects as
the effort ramps up in the beginning periods, stabilizes during the main
execution phase and then starts to wind down again towards the
Projects completion.