PMP® Project Management Certification – PM’s Roles, Tasks and Responsibilities

PMP® Project Management Certification – PM’s Roles, Tasks and Responsibilities

By Nereda Haque, PMP

This is the new add-on portion of the PMP® Certification Exam which equates to 60 questions of the 200 that project managers will answer. That’s a lot of questions. However, the good part is, that this area will help project managers understand their roles as the project leader in relationship to the 42 processes they need to manage.

This is a great addition because it emphasizes what a project manager must do in a real life project management situation. The project manager should know what do in any anticipated or non-anticipated situations in a project. (The knowns and unknowns.) Today it is anticipated that you may even serve a supportive role in helping to finalize the business case or even work on it from start to finish. The PM will initiate the project and receive a SOW, contract, assignment or work order. Taking the information from this document, that the PM just received, he/she will conduct a project assessment to be well informed about the project before the meeting with the Sponsor. Then the PM will meet with the Sponsor and find out his/her expectation and share his/her own. And so on. The PM will in fact perform 42 processes within the 5 Process Groups and the 9 Knowledge areas. And he or she will know where iteration is required throughout the project and if this is you, you will do the processes in sequence within each Knowledge Area. You will know how to have a Kick-off meeting in order to meet with and further understand the Stakeholders and determine their influence on the the project and their key importance to the project, form a change control board, get volunteers for the Risk Team, and start the process of collecting requirements. You will find out the quality policy by studying the Organizational Process assests which you will most likely get from meeting with Sponsor, as well as the Enterprise Environment Factors. So you will complete all of the 20 Planning Processes, then Kick-off the Project Execution.

You will now execute and monitor and control what you have planned, and follow the "how to" of those plans. You will measure variances, calculate indexes and forecasts and communicate Work Performance Information and Work Performance Measurements. You will issue change requests, examine approved changes requests and so much more. Throughout you will understand what you will produce by performing the processes and where these outputs will be needed for other process, and what tools and techniques you will use to produce the outputs. If a risk occurs any where you will consult the Risk Register and find out what planned response you will do, what contingency reserve you will use or insurance you will claim etc., etc.

You will use your interpersonal skills from start to finish, and exercise your leadership skills throughout the project from start to close. You will Acquire, Develop and Manage your team, Perform Quality Assurance, Distribute Project Information to the Stakeholders and Monitor and Control the Project Work including Scope, Time, Cost, Quality and Risks. You will from the beginning of the project, document the requirements and produce a requirements traceability matrix so you can finally get the customer to accept the deliverables. You will even Plan, Conduct and Administer, as well as close procurement, update templates, checklists, policies, processes, project documents, lessons learned and make sure no risks are left behind, and finally close the project and hand it over to the customer. This is just some of the roles and tasks you will learn about.

SmartPath LLC’s PMP® class objectives are:

1. Prepare you for real life project management work in understanding the processes that need to be done in order to manage a project and your roles and responsibilities in these processes.

2. Prepare you to pass the PMP® Certification Exam by understanding the Concepts of project management and the Connections between the processes in project management so you can understand the context of the PMP® Exam Questions.

Take our PMP® Certification Training with Exam Prep classes. You’ll be glad you did.