WINCHESTER (23rd June 2014) – As providers of leading project, programme and portfolio management (P3M) training worldwide under the UK Cabinet Office Best Practice standards, p3m global today welcomes the news that AXELOS have removed the Foundation Only pre-requisite for takers of the PRINCE2 Practitioner examination.
AXELOS Global Best Practice announced last Thursday that from 1st July 2014, they would waive their “requirement for project managers seeking the PRINCE2 Practitioner qualification to obtain the Foundation level first.”
p3m global particularly applauds this update for its active inclusiveness of other leading project management standards of top practice. These include the Project Management Institute and the US and UK chapters of the International Project Management Association (IPMA) – the American Society for the Advancement of Project Management and the Association for Project Management, respectively. As recognised ATOs for both PMI and AXELOS (through APMG-International) certifications – and with aspirations for similar ATO status within IPMA via the APM – this is a significant development.
“With this initiative, we hope that project managers worldwide will consider how obtaining this higher level best practice management standard can improve project management within their organizations and develop their own careers without having to revisit a more elementary level of study beforehand,” said Frances Scarff, Product Development Director at AXELOS.
Inclusion opens up new windows for expanding the AXELOS customer-base that had once been closed or viewed as filled with a requisite re-learning of competencies. PMI and APMG-International Accredited Training Organisations (ATOs) like p3m global welcome this opportunity to reach out to customers in the PMI realm.
“It’s good to see cross-standard recognition in the industry as we have long advised are clients that these two credentials are complimentary rather than conflicting,” said Ray Mead, CEO of p3m global. “I hope this will encourage some of our clients on the PMI side to look at what they can use from the AXELOS stable to further their role in project management, and vice versa.”
Dan Strayer is the Marketing Coordinator for p3m global. A native of Manchester (by way of the US), Dan currently edits all forms of p3m global Media, including this blog, the monthly newsletter (subscribe here), and all forms of social media output by p3m global that you can see in the icons below. Other recent ventures from p3m global Media include Slideshare and Prezi. Get in touch with Dan on Twitter via @p3mglobal or @danlstrayer.
Steve Butler PMP lays out what Project Management means to him (and PM-Partners) in conjunction with the exciting Shim Marom-inspired #pmflashblog initiative. In short, Steve feels that project management requires a lot of planning, and some common sense, too.
Project management is all about change. Strip out all the latest fads, standards and gimmicks and at its heart all project management really boils down to is a risk mitigation exercise when you are trying to effect change – be it deliver a product or a service or an update. Keep that thought at the front of your mind when managing a project, and everything becomes common sense. You are changing something, and you want to get it right. So what do you need to consider? Well, you need to make sure “it” is the right thing…so some sort of requirements gathering exercise and scoping exercise is needed so you can hit the target. To do that you need to make sure you are talking to the right people to find out the right information, and to make sure you are keeping the right people up to speed with what you are doing – so some sort of communications management and stakeholder happiness plan needs to be in place. Obviously when you gather the requirements and define the scope, a budget and a timeline needs to be defined and managed, and how they progress needs to be communicated (hence having a communications plan). Within the timeline will be milestones and deliverables and some sort of mechanism for delivering them and reviewing the milestones. Part of making sure you hit the target is making sure the quality of what you are doing is acceptable, so some sort of plan to manage that is necessary. You can think about assembling the team, and keeping them happy and efficient. If you’re not sure exactly what you’re doing, maybe deliver in bits and make sure you are heading in the right direction by regularly reviewing with someone who knows what is required. Maybe regularly review with the team to make sure they are doing the right thing and have no blockers you don’t know about. We could call that basic concept, oh I don’t know, Agile? A concept that has been around for decades, but now has a name! Project Management – an exercise in common sense.
