The Project Management Academy Blog
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PMP Certification | Project Management
Project Management Professional® (PMP) holders know it is a data-driven world. They also know data thrown at them for a project, or the data collected during a project is not always immediately clear nor easy to connect to project work. Using tools like an affinity diagram, can not only solve an immediate data problem but can also build teams through the collaborative process to create it.
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PMP Certification | PMP Exam Prep
Project management is challenging because things don’t always go as planned. Changes to your project scope or deliverables can happen through gold plating or scope creep. Avoiding these will prevent delays, increased costs, and other project management issues.
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PMP Certification | PMP Exam Prep
Ever use that old saying, “a lot is at stake” when speaking to the impact an event can have on others? Stake refers to something to gain or lose; a stake in a new business means you want it to be profitable. A stake in a game can be a bet on the final score. Within any project, there are Stakeholders; entities to which there is an impact depending on the outcome of the project. Whether you are a practicing Project Manager seeking to enhance your understanding of this important tool or a newer Project Manager prepping for your Project Management Professional (PMP®) certification exam, knowing who is a stakeholder and documenting key information in a register will benefit your work. Let’s dive in and see how to create a Stakeholder Register and explore it’s value.
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PMP Certification | PMP Exam Prep | Quality
Project Managers know how clients will react when presented with large amounts of data in the form of a spreadsheets with hundreds (better yet, thousands!) of rows of numbers with no context or clear meaning; it will not be a reaction of gratitude. On the other hand, if that same large dataset is presented using data visualization and a quality tool, like a histogram, then the client will be able to see the connection to the project decision needed. Histograms are a statistical tool included in the Project Management Professional (PMP)® certification exam as they are used by project managers to plan and manage quality.
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PMP Certification | PMP Exam Prep
The Project Management Professional (PMP)© certification is well-respected industry-wide as a credential proving project management expertise and experience. Its many benefits, including professional development and career advancement, make it a highly valued certification. However, the PMP certification is not easy to earn. The PMP exam is rigorous and challenging, which leaves many PMP exam applicants wondering: what is the PMP passing score?
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PMP Certification | PMP Exam Prep
What are the Project Management Professional (PMP) knowledge areas, and are they still relevant to the new PMP exam? In the Project Management Institute’s (PMI) most recent update to the PMP exam, some familiar concepts may seem to have “disappeared.” While the PMP exam now focuses on three domains with various tasks, enablers, and tools, this does not mean information about process groups and knowledge areas is now obsolete.
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Experiments are not just for scientists; they are in fact a tool project managers and engineers have used for years to better understand and refine processes. In the context of project management, an experiment is not in a secret lab with bubbling liquid in beakers; instead, the testing is done in a controlled manufacturing setting. In project management, the quality planning tool of setting up tests for a process is known as “Design of Experiments.”
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PMP Certification | PMP Exam Prep | Project Management
As a Project Management Professional (PMP), influence diagrams are a valuable tool for illustrating influences on a project or project element. Project Management Academy can help you break down the influence diagram PMP significance in more detail. Understanding PMP influence diagrams can help as you study for the PMP exam and manage actual projects.
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Professional Development | Project Management
As you look at your recipe and then at your motley collection of ingredients, you realize you are missing many required ingredients. No butter, but would the olive oil work instead? If ketchup is needed, and you have tomato sauce and vinegar, could you create the needed ingredient? How fast could an online delivery service come and is it worth the added cost? Perhaps you ignore it all and just order a pizza delivery. Or you give up and munch on a stale cracker until you have exactly the ingredients as listed. How would you deal with this situation? The ability to pivot effectively to evolving situations is one of today’s most sought after skill sets: adaptability.
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On November 18th, Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber released a new version of the Scrum Guide – the definitive source for Scrum. While there are a number of people who have done comprehensive reviews of the changes and debated in excruciating detail the meaning behind each of these changes (see this article by Johnannes Geske for a side-by-side comparison), that is not my intent with this commentary. Instead, I want to give you a few things that I like about the updates and a few things that will challenge most organizations as they continue to seek the most effective way to deliver value to their customers.
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