Thivashnee Sharma
The overarching direction and focus of the course is on enabling organizations to realize mission- and vision-critical goals and objectives by performing project work in a manner that enhances value creation, reduces chaos, raises productivity, and fosters innovation and creativity.
A recap of the key concepts, tools, and techniques in traditional project management is followed by coverage of agile methodologies - Scrum and Kanban in-depth, along with an insightful overview of XP, Lean, Crystal, etc. Soft skills like communication, motivation, culture, emotional intelligence, leadership, etc. are also woven into the overall fabric of the approach, and so are enablers like technology, data science (such as Machine Learning/AI), and high-visualization dashboard/report generation, as well as productive interaction with stakeholders, and well-informed and timely decision making. By the end of this course, students will have a mastery of the essential theory and practice of project management (traditional, agile, and hybrid).
Skills / Knowledge
- Paraphrase basic project management (traditional and agile) terms and concepts using illustrative scenarios, situations, and contexts
- Evaluate a project to determine the most appropriate management approach: traditional, agile, or hybrid and the appropriate methodologies (Scrum, Kanban, etc.)
- Determine the most appropriate combination of project management techniques and constructs to apply to a specific project or work situation/challenge – for example: WBS, product backlog, critical path, budget, risk register, risk burn down, earned value, addressing bottlenecks and constraints, etc.
- Apply an effective balance of hard and soft skills and leadership characteristics to ensure favorable project and work outcomes
- Leverage technology, modeling, and simulation – as well as data science/AI/machine learning - to analyze and resolve work and project challenges and to facilitate and inform decision-making
- Develop a model for assessing organizational project management climate and readiness and leverage it to effect organizational change and transformation