Project Management Level 3

About this course

Project management is a fascinating area of study because it is so wide ranging. During this course you will look at a tremendously diverse range of subject areas from management, quality, finance, health and safety, planning etc., all of which you will have to know something about in order to be a good project manager.

Course Description

We do not intend this course to be the absolute final word in project management; it should rather form part of your learning. You should supplement it with your growing and developing experience that will be gained in the light of what you have learned here. Don’t forget the experience you already have though, and remember you can take a lot from projects you have already been involved with, even if you were not the project manager. This can be both good and bad. Don’t ignore the bad experiences as these can often teach you more than the projects that went well.

Course Content

• What is project management?
• Why use project management?
• Benefits of project management
• What do project managers actually do?
• History of PM
• Project management old and new
• Modern scientific project management
• Gantt charts
• The Fayol management model
• Network diagrams
• Critical path method (CPM
• Program evaluation and review technique (PERT)
• Organisational Structure
• The four basic organisational structures
• Project Life Cycle
• The four stage project cycle model
• Milestones and hold points
• Project close-out
• Feasibility Studies
• The client's feasibility study
• Stakeholders
• The client
• Define the constraints on the project
• Value management
• Financial models for project selection
• Payback period
• Return on investment
• Discounted cash flow
• Net present value
• Project Estimating & Scope Definition
• Ball-park cost estimate
• Feasibility study
• Costing
• Subdivision of project costs
• Direct costs
• Indirect costs
• Time related costs
• Labour and staff costs
• Material and logistics costs
• Miscellaneous costs
• Initiation
• Project charter
• Defining the scope
• Changing scope
• Scope Management
• Project closeout
• Project closeout report
• Project Procurement Plan
• What is required?
• Sourcing
• Communication of requirements to potential suppliers
• Evaluation and selection of supplier
• Review and evaluate tenders
• Manage the Contract
• Closeout
• Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
• Presentation
• Producing a WBS
• WBS numbering system
• WBS and costing
• Further breakdown of WBS
• Critical Path
• Network diagrams: WBS and critical path
• Logic
• Activities in series
• Activities in parallel
• Generation of logic
• Activities: summing up
• Resource Planning
• Estimating
• Forecasting
• Resource availability
• Use of resources
• Resource overload and underload
• Resource adjustment
• Increasing project resources
• Reducing resources
• Controlling the Project
• Why control projects?
• Scope of control
• Scope management
• Technical backup
• Time management
• Resource and procurement management
• Commercial management
• QHSE
• Gathering information
• Applying project control
• Dealing with people
• Quality Management
• Definitions
• Cost of quality
• Right first time costs
• QA costs
• Internal cost (of failure
• External cost (of failure)
• Quality circles
• Quality auditing
• Conduct of an audit
• Why audit?
• Quality control plans
• Risk Management
• Hierarchy of control
• Controlling risk
• Risk assessment
• Identify the hazard
• Decide who might be harmed
• Evaluate the risks and decide upon precautions
• Record and implement your findings
• Review and update your risk assessments
• Communication
• Assignments

Qualification Information

At the end of this course successful learners will receive a Certificate of Achievement from ABC Awards and a Learner Unit Summary (which lists the details of all the units the learner has completed as part of the course).

The course has been endorsed under the ABC Awards' Quality Licence Scheme. This means that UK Distance Learning & Publishing has undergone an external quality check to ensure that the organisation and the courses it offers, meet certain quality criteria. The completion of this course alone does not lead to an Ofqual regulated qualification but may be used as evidence of knowledge and skills towards regulated qualifications in the future. The unit summary can be used as evidence towards Recognition of Prior Learning if you wish to progress your studies in this sector. To this end the learning outcomes of the course have been benchmarked at Level 3 against level descriptors published by Ofqual, to indicate the depth of study and level of demand/complexity involved in successful completion by the learner.

The course itself has been designed by UK Distance Learning & Publishing to meet specific learners' and/or employers' requirements which cannot be satisfied through current regulated qualifications. ABC Awards' endorsement involves robust and rigorous quality audits by external auditors to ensure quality is continually met. A review of courses is carried out as part of the endorsement process.

ABC Awards is a leading national Awarding Organisation, regulated by Ofqual, and the Welsh Government[1]. It has a long-established reputation for developing and awarding high quality vocational qualifications across a wide range of industries. As a registered charity, ABC Awards combines 180 years of expertise but also implements a responsive, flexible and innovative approach to the needs of our customers.

Renowned for excellent customer service, and quality standards, ABC Awards also offers Ofqual regulated qualifications for all ages and abilities post-14; all are developed with the support of relevant stakeholders to ensure that they meet the needs and standards of employers across the UK.

[1] Regulators for exams and assessments in England and Wales

Method of Study

Online Version

Our online A-Level courses are fully digitised versions of the paper-courses, so you can study on any PC or smart device when connected to the internet.

As with the paper course, your online learning programme is completely flexible, so you can study at a pace that suits you.

All of our online course content is broken down into bite size chunks to make your learning more manageable and effective.

Method of Assessment

The course contains a number of assignments which your tutor will mark and give you valuable feedback on. We call these Tutor Marked Assignments (TMAs). You need only send the TMAs to your tutor for comment, not the self-assessment exercises which are also part of the course to help you gauge your progress.

Tutor Support

You will have access to a tutor via email who will mark your work, guide you through the course and assist you with any problems you may have. In addition you will be supplied with a comprehensive Study Guide which will help you through the study and assessment process.

Currently there are no Q&As for this course. Be the first to ask a question.