PROJECT MANAGEMENT

LOGIC AND PMBOK™

PMBOK™
STRUCTURE

Vladimir Liberzon
Spider Management Technologies
Moscow PMI Chapter

E-mail: spider@mail.cnt.ru
 PMBOK™ STRUCTURE

People who lack sufficient practical experience

in Project Management meet with difficulties
when they try to get a clear picture of PM
logic from A Guideline to the PMBOK™.
Novice managers often try to divide
responsibilities among PM team members in
accordance with knowledge areas (Time
manager, Cost manager, Quality manager,
etc.).
V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 2
 PMBOK™ STRUCTURE

Most PM knowledge areas are closely

interrelated and can hardly be separated
from each other. For instance, one cannot
change project schedule without affecting
project cost. Besides, it is impossible to
control time or cost (success indicators)
directly but only through resources or
technologies.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 3

 PMBOK™ STRUCTURE

Some of knowledge areas are project success

indicators (scope, time, cost and quality),
others are management tools (human
resources, communications, risks,
procurement).

You can analyze time or cost performance and

then make corrective moves using resources
or technologies.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 4

 PMBOK™ STRUCTURE

A Guideline to the PMBOK™ can be

successfully applied to projects only at
those levels where details are not
important. But it does not provide
enough fine tools for more precise
practical project management for which
the resource management is the core
issue.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 5

 PMBOK™ STRUCTURE

I believe that ideological content of A

Guideline to the PMBOK™ can be reorganized
in a more instructive, process-oriented way.

I think that it is necessary to recognize six

main PM processes instead of five described
in a Guideline to the PMBOK™.
The additional process is Analysis.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 6

 PM PROCESSES
INITIATION

PLANNING

CONTROL PROJECT EXECUTION

MANAGEMENT
PROCESSES

ANALYSIS

CLOSING

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 7

 PM KNOWLEDGE AREAS
& PM LOGIC
PM functions (knowledge areas) activated in
each of these processes vary significantly.
Description of PM ideology could not be
complete without including Resource
management as a core separate entity.
It is necessary to connect PMBOK™ with the
logic of PM processes.
The PM logic used in the majority of projects is
shown in the next slide.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 8

 PM LOGIC

OBJECTIVES PROJECT RESULTS

SCOPE SCOPE DEFINITION

SUCCESS CRITERIA CONSTRAINTS

CRITERIA
COST TIME QUALITY SCOPE

MAIN TOOLS RESOURCES TECHNOLOGIES

INTERMEDIATE Contracts Organization Communications Human Resources

TOOLS

RISK ANALYSIS

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 9

 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
APPROACHES
Russian way of planning projects (especially
in construction industry) is frequently
based on federal, local, industrial or
corporate norms and standards. These
norms usually refer to resource
productivity, cost and material per unit of
activity volume (volume of work to be
done). Usage of these norms affects the
way of planning project activities.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 10

 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
APPROACHES
Activity Duration Estimating in A Guideline to
the PMBOK™ doesn’t employ this approach.
Actually A Guideline to the PMBOK™ does not
even employ the concept of activity volumes.
Estimation of activity volumes is associated
with resource planning, cost estimation, staff
acquisition, solicitation planning, schedule
development, cost budgeting and project
plan development.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 11

 PROJECT SCHEDULE
DEVELOPMENT
WBS LIBRARY OF ORGANIZATIONAL
TYPICAL PROJECT BREAKDOWN
LIST OF PROJECT FRAGNETS STRUCTURE
FRAGNETS AND
ACTIVITIES FIXED LIST AND QUANTITY
ACTIVITY OF PROJECT
FRAGNET AND MATERIAL RESOURCES AND
ACTIVITY VOLUMES REQUIREMENTS MATERIALS
OR DURATIONS
RESOURCE
DATABASE A: PROJECT ASSIGNMENTS
ACTIVITY TYPES - SCHEDULE
MATERIAL DATABASE B:
REQUIREMENTS PER ASSIGNMENT TYPES
UNIT OF VOLUME - RESOURCE
FIXED PRODUCTIVITIES
ACTIVITY LINKS ASSIGNMENT
MATERIAL DATABASE D:
DATABASE E: REQUIREMENTS RESOURCE TYPES –
ASSIGNMENT TYPES MATERIAL
- FIXED MATERIAL REQUIREMENTS PER
REQUIREMENTS PER DATABASE C: WORK HOUR
UNIT OF VOLUME ASSIGNMENT TYPES –
RESOURCE PERCENT
ALLOCATED

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 12

 MAIN DIFFERENCE
BETWEEN APPROACHES
The main difference between the described
approaches to the Project Schedule
Development is as follows:
if you use activity volume and resource
productivity as input into planning
process, then activity duration and cost
may be estimated only after assigned
resources have been chosen and project
schedule calculated.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 13

 ACTIVITY COST
COMPONENTS
ACTIVITY COST
 All Assignments

FIXED ACTIVITY FIXED ACTIVITY ASSIGNMENT COSTS

MATERIAL COSTS COST

 All Materials

{MATERIAL UNIT COST} * RESOURCE FIXED FIXED

{FIXED ACTIVITY MATERIAL COSTS ASSIGNMENT ASSIGNMENT
REQUIREMENTS} MATERIAL COSTS COST

 All Materials
 All Resources  All Materials

{RESOURCE RATE} * {MATERIAL REQUIREMENT {MATERIAL UNIT COST}

{ASSIGNMENT PER RESOURCE WORK HOUR} * * {FIXED ASSIGNMENT
DURATION} {MATERIAL UNIT COST} * MATERIAL
{ASSIGNMENT DURATION} REQUIREMENTS}

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 14

 RESOURCE ANALYSIS

Resource analysis is essential part of project

execution analysis. Monitoring of the actual
resource performance permits to employ
methods of adaptive forecasting to predict
trends and future resource productivity and
cost. Usage of project resources varies at
different phases and forecasting that takes
these differences into consideration is
considerably more accurate than the methods
of Earned Value Analysis.
V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 15
 RISK ANALYSIS

Methods of Risk analysis (PERT, Monte Carlo)

should include estimations and simulations
of activity volume, resource productivity,
resource availability, etc. (not only duration
and cost as in A Guideline to the PMBOK™ ).
Other sections of A Guideline to the PMBOK™
also have to be revised if low level Resource
management processes are to be considered.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 16

 RECOMMENDATIONS

 Introduction of Resource management into

A Guideline to the PMBOK™ calls for
revision of ideological content and structure
of the latter.

 It is vital to understand that some project

parameters are indicative, while the others
are the tools for project control.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 17

 RECOMMENDATIONS

 Analyzing project performance we measure

and analyze the indicative components for
making decisions on corrective moves,
while the project control tools are used for
improving project performance. It would be
helpful to divide Control processes into two
process groups - Analysis and Control.

V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 18

 BENEFITS

• Better understanding of PM logic and PM

processes.

• Establishing technological standards for

low level Project Management.

• Developing Project Management

Technological Guideline.
V.Liberzon /Spider Manage 19