Planning the Project #

The Goal: “Create a Clear Map for Smart Decision-Making”

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 75). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Scoping the Project #

Identified Need/Problem.
Interview Key Stakeholders.
Developed Scope Statement.
Signed Off on Scope.

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 75-76). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Like a Compass, the Project Scope statement provides the direction to go.
Project Planning involves scheduling activities & assigning resources.

According to the PMBOK: The plan document, “identifies the strategies & actions required to promote productive involvement of stakeholders in project decision-making & execution.

There are two foundational aspects With Building a Flexible Project Plan: -Build a Risk Strategy -Create a Project Schedule

Build a Risk Strategy #

Murphy’s Law: “Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.”

Identify Risks #

Identify the risks; & asses their impact.

Prioritize Risks #

Formula for assessing risk: Actual Risk -> Impact x Probability Each item is on a scale of 1-5.

Risk	Impact	Probability	Score
Example 1	2	1	2
Example 2	4	6	24
Example 3	8	4	36

Link to Tools

Plan for Risks #

Any risks rated higher than 12 need to be TAMED.

TAME #

T: Transfer: Shift to 3rd Party.
A: Accept: Acknowledge It!
M: Mitigate: Reduce Probability/Impact.
E: Eliminate: Remove It!

Once we TAMED our risks, we can then plan our steps.

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 77-81). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Risk Management Plan #

Create a plan for who will own, their, strategy, Score, & the Risk Itself.

Risk	Score	Strategy	Who
Example 1	2	Accept: Letting it affect us if it does.	N/Aa
Example 2	24	Mitigate: Attempt to stop the issue from occuring.	Person 2
Example 3	36	Eliminate: Stop this from occuring, 30% from it happening.	Person 3

Link to Tools

Create a Project Schedule #

This schedule shows you where your going & how to get there; all while adapting to changes as they come. From this project schedule, we derive the “critical path”, the longest sequence of activities from start to finish.

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 82-83). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

gantt
    title Project Schedule
    dateFormat  YYYY-MM-DD
    section Planning
    Task 1          :a1, 2025-07-01, 30d
    Task 2          :after a1  , 20d
    section Development
    Task 3          :2025-08-01  , 40d
    Task 4          :after a1  , 25d
    section Testing
    Task 5          :2025-09-15  , 15d
    Task 6          :after a3  , 10d
    section Deployment
    Task 7          :2025-10-01  , 5d

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Here are the steps we follow to create the project schedule:

Develop WBS.
Sequence Activities.
Identify & Assign Stakeholders.
Estimate the Duration of Each Activity.
Identify the Critical Path.

Develop WBS #

THE list of deliverables that make the project a success. Each activity is an action that will help create the deliverable.

flowchart TD
    PN[Project Name] --> D(Deliverables)
    D --> C1(Component 1)
    subgraph Component-1
    C1 --> C1A1(Activity 1)
    C1 --> C1A2(Activity 2)
    end
    D --> C2(Component 2)
    subgraph Component-2
    C2 --> C2A1(Activity 1)
    C2 --> C2A2(Activity 2)
    end
    D -..- n(noun)
    Component-1 -..- v(Verb)
    Component-2 -..- v(Verb)

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Brainstorming Guidelines #

Go Quickly
Quantity
Don’t Judge Ideas, get other’s perspective
Build on top of Ideas & Others

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 84-89). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Sequence Activities #

Once we have identitidied our WBS, we can “sequence” our work:

Note: Task A is first task, Task B is Current task for the following examples:

Finish -> Start: Task A must be finished before Task B.
Start -> Start: Task A must be started before start of Task B.
Finish -> Finish: Task A must be finished before Task B can be finished.
Start -> Finish: Task A must be started before Task B can finished.

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 91). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Identify & Assign Stakeholders #

The Principle: “The defines the Team.”
Pick those who can contribute & Can Do!

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 94). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Estimate the Duration of Each Activity #

Once we build the estimation, we will be able to estimate the budget & know what the schedule will look like.

Some Terms we need to get out of the way:

Work: Amount of timeit takes to perform a task.
Duration: Period of time it took from start of task to end of task. Note: Work!=Duration!

Realistically Underpromise & Overdeliver.
-Colleagues at Alight

Parkinson’s Law: Work takes exactly the amount of time alloted for. This alloted for could mean that we could expect the task to take A amount of time but inevidability take B amount of time; B is the average amount of time it takes other people/groups to complete.

PERT (Program Evaluation & Review Technique) #

Formula/Tool to help cope quickly with uncertianty.
D = (O+4N+P)/6

O: Most Optomistic Duration
P: Most Pressimistic Duration
N: Normal/Nost Likely Duration
4: Balances Estimations
6: Six Data Points

Milestones = Checkpoints

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 98-103). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Identify Critical Path #

Duration & Comments #

#	Task	Duration (Hrs.)	Comments
1	Example 1	1.5	This is text for Example 1.
2	Example 2	3	This is text for Example 2.
3	Example 3	3.5	This is text for Example 3.
4	Example 4	3	This is text for Example 4.
5	Example 5	1.5	This is text for Example 5.
6	Example 6	1	This is text for Example 6.
7	Example 7	1.75	This is text for Example 5.

Dates #

Tasks	07-01	07-15	08-01	08-15	09-01	09-15	10-01
Task 1	X	X
Task 2			X	X	X
Task 3			X	X	X
Task 4		X	X	X
Task 5						X
Task 6						X
Task 7							X

Link to Tools

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 104 - 107). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Summary #

Basics of Project Scheduling:

Identify Tasks & Duration
Identify Dependencies between Tasks
Assign Resources for each Task
Define the Critical Path
Track Progress & Adapt as Needed

Kogon, Kory; Blakemore, Suzette. Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager (Updated and Revised Edition) (p. 108). BenBella Books. Kindle Edition.

Sequence Activities #

Once we identified our WBS, we can “Sequence” our work.

gantt
    title Project Schedule
    dateFormat  YYYY-MM-DD
    section Task 1
    Component 1 :a1, 2024-01-01, 2024-01-02
    Component 2 :a2, after a1, 7d
    Component 3 :a3, after a2, 14d
    section Task 2
    Component 1 :a4, 2024-01-01, 2024-01-20
    Component 2 :a5, after a4, 7d
    Component 3 :a6, after a5, 14d

Link to Tools