Professional Skills Development
Professional Skills Development | Project Management
Managing Technical Projects: People, Principles and Practices
Format and Duration:
2 days
Participants will deepen their understanding of the wider competencies and skills required to effectively manage, or contribute to commercially focused technical projects. The emphasis is on the behaviours, skills and knowledge required at each stage of a project. This course challenges participants to think commercially and provides modern techniques that can help individuals prioritise their time effectively, increase efficiency and improve project execution.
Schedule
Duration and Training Method
A two-day classroom course. This course is highly interactive and will utilise best in class examples to demonstrate effective project management and will also use industry specific examples to ensure relevance and context in a technical environment.
Course Overview
Learning Outcomes
Participants will learn to:
- Understand the key attributes and competences required to successfully deliver projects on time and in budget.
- Define the key stages of the project life cycle.
- Self-assess individual strengths and weaknesses.
- Establish criteria for evaluating projects to accept or reject.
- Develop techniques to help prioritise time and make better commercial decisions.
- Recognise the difference between goals and measures.
- Recognise and overcome optimism bias in project management and reporting.
Course Content
Introduction and definitions
The role of the project manager
- Attributes and competences
Getting started: Setting priorities
- How to eliminate time wasters
- Techniques for prioritising
- Evaluate competing demands
- Make work demands manageable
Initiation
- The statement of work (SOW): Putting it in writing.
- Defining the project: What are we going to do?
- Establishing clear goals: Why are going to do it?
- Project scope: Is it realistic? How can this be successfully managed?
- Stakeholder analysis: Who should be involved?
- Risk analysis: How risky is it?
- Operating procedures: What are the rules?
Planning: the work, timetables and resources for the project
- Work breakdown plan: Breaking projects into manageable tasks
- Gant charts: Scheduling what gets done when
- Network diagrams: How long will it take to complete?
- Resources: What materials and labour do I need?
- Responsibility Assignment Matrix: Who is going to do what?
- Budgets and cash flow: How much money is needed and by when?
- The project plan: Putting it all together
Execution – it’s show time
- Project kick-off : Start as you mean to go on
- Controlling: Staying on track
- Communicating: Keeping stakeholders informed
- Conflict resolution
- Negotiation in a multi-party/multi-variable environment
Project shut down: That’s all folks!
- Steps to formally closing a project
- Evaluation
- Tips and tricks for solving common problems
Action Plan
- What are you going to do differently?
Who Should Attend and Prerequisites
Leaders of Project Teams who wish to develop or refresh the skills and behaviours necessary to deliver projects that achieve consistently successful outcomes. Project Team Members from all disciplines who wish to develop their skills to enable them to contribute individually with greater impact.
Instructors
Rob Maguire
Background
Robert is a founding director of Maguire Izatt. He provides the strategic thinking and vision for our business and for our clients. He has commerce running through his core, with a focus on delivering overall business benefits. He’s never happier than when he has the challenge of a problem to fix.
Rob is as a brilliant problem solver, inspirational and forward thinking. His innovative thinking and approach have lead to stunning business improvements and broken stalemates in many commercial circumstances.
He has over 30 years procurement and supplier management experience in both operational and management consulting roles. He established commercial consulting firm Performance Consulting Ltd in 1995, which was renamed MaguireIzatt in 2009. MaguireIzatt focuses on helping clients improve their profitability and value for money through their commercial relationships with their suppliers and customers.
Rob’s previous procurement roles include: chief procurement officer materials and subcontract Europe for household products company Reckitt & Colman (now Reckitt Benckiser); new product sourcing manager at power tools company Black and Decker; and buyer at automotive manufacturer Austin Rover Group. He has also had roles as a management consultant specialising in purchasing and supply chain issues for Price Waterhouse (now PwC) and Ernst & Young.
Rob has led assignments for a range of clients across a variety of industry groups in the private, public and not-for-profit sector including pharmaceuticals, consumer products, engineering and defence, energy and oil & gas. His consulting experience extends to Europe, the Far East and the United States of America. He is a highly engaging and inspirational speaker with extensive experience of speaking and presenting at conferences here in the UK and internationally.
Rob is co-author and editor of “Good Purchasing Practice Guide” prepared on behalf of the Universities Funding Council for England. This guide was issued to all institutions in the UK as a management guide to purchasing. A second guide was developed from the original material to support detailed operational purchasing. He is also co-author of “Procurement Benchmarking for Higher Education” - a compilation of questionnaire, workbook guide and analytical software to support the development of benchmarking and adoption of best practice in the higher education sector. He is the author of Eat the Ugly Frog, a pocket book of 101 negotiating tips.
He is a member of Chartered Institute of Purchasing (CIPS) and a founding fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing’s Sales Leadership Alliance. Rob is a contributor to the MBA programmes of London Business School and ESADE in Barcelona.
Affiliations and Accreditation
BA(Hons) Glasgow Caledonian University - Business Studies
Member of the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply and of The Professional Association of Sales
Courses Taught
N833: Principles of Effective Project Management for Oil and Gas Professionals
Accreditation and Certification
CEU: 1.4 Continuing Education Units
PDH: 14 Professional Development Hours
Certificate: Certificate Issued Upon Completion
RPS is accredited by the International Association for Continuing Education and Training (IACET) and is authorized to issue the IACET CEU. We comply with the ANSI/IACET Standard, which is recognised internationally as a standard of excellence in instructional practices.
We issue a Certificate of Attendance which verifies the number of training hours attended. Our courses are generally accepted by most professional licensing boards/associations towards continuing education credits. Please check with your licensing board to determine if the courses and certificate of attendance meet their specific criteria.