PassPM - Glossary of PM Terms

Parallel Activities: Parallel activities are two or more activities than can be done at the same time. This allows a project to be completed faster than if the activities were arranged serially in a straight line.
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Path: A path is a series of connected activities. Refer to CRITICAL PATH METHOD for information on critical and non-critical paths.
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Path Convergence: Path Convergence is the tendency of parallel paths of approximately equal duration to delay the completion of the milestone where they meet.
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PDM: See Precedence Diagram Method.
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Percent Complete: One measure of completion used to determine the remaining duration of a partially completed activity.
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Performance Measurement Baseline (PMB): The time-phased budget plan against which project performance is measured. It is formed by the budgets assigned to scheduled cost accounts and the applicable indirect budgets. For future effort, not planned to the cost account level, the Performance Measurement Baseline also includes budgets assigned to higher-level CWBS elements. The PMB does not include any management or contingency reserves, which are isolated above the PMB.
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Performance Measurement Techniques (PMT): Performance measurement techniques (PMTs) are the methods used to estimate earned value. Different methods are appropriate to different work packages, either due to the nature of the work or to the planned duration of the work package. Another term for Performance Measurement Techniques is Earned Value Methods.
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Performance Reporting: Collecting project performance information and distributing it to ensure project performance.
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Performing: A team building stage where the emphasis is on the work currently being performed.
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Performing Organization: The organizational unit responsible for the performance and management of resources to accomplish a task.
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Period of Performance: The time interval of contract performance that includes the effort required to achieve all significant contractual schedule milestones.
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Pessimistic Duration: The longest duration in the three duration technique.
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Phase: See Project Phase.
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Physical Percent Complete: The percentage of the work content of an activity that has been achieved.
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Placements: The ability to direct aspects of a network view.
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Plan: A plan is an intended future course of action. It is the basis of the project controls.
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Planned Activity: An activity not yet started.
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Planned Cost: Costs set when the schedule becomes the plan or baseline plan.
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Planning: The process of identifying the means, resources and actions necessary to accomplish an objective.
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Planning Package: A logical aggregation of far-term work within a cost account that can be identified and budgeted but not yet defined into work packages. Planning packages are identified during the initial baseline planning to establish the time phasing of the major activities within a cost account and the quantity of the resources required for their performance. Planning packages are placed into work packages consistent with the rolling wave concept prior to the performance of the work.
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Planning Stage: The stage prior to the implementation stage when product activity, resource and quality plans are produced.
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PMI: See Project Management Institute.
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PMP: See Project Management Professional.
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Pool Resource: A group of resources related by skill, department or function.
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Positive Float: Positive float is defined as the amount of time that an activity's start can be delayed without affecting the project completion date. An activity with positive float is not on the critical path and is called a non-critical activity. Most software packages calculate float time during schedule analysis. The difference between early and late dates (start or finish) determines the amount of float.
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Post Implementation Review: A review between 6-12 months after a system in a project has met its objectives and the system continues to meet user requirements.
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Post Project Appraisal: An evaluation that provides feedback for future use and education.
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Precedence Diagram Method (PDM): One of the two methods of representing project as networks, in which the activities are represented by nodes and the relationships between them by arcs. (The other method, Arrow Diagram Method, is rarely used.)
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Precedence Notation: Precedence notation is a means of describing project work flow. It is sometimes called activity-on-node notation. Graphically, precedence networks are represented by using descriptive boxes and connecting arrows to denote the flow of work.
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Predecessor: An activity that must be completed (or be partially completed) before a specified activity can begin is called a predecessor. The combination of all predecessors and successors (see SUCCESSOR) relationships among the project activities forms a network. This network can be analyzed to determine the critical path and other project scheduling implications.
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Predecessor Activity: In the precedence diagramming method it is the "from activity," or the activity which logically precedes the current activity.
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Presenter: Person with the responsibility of making sure that those at a quality review have information needed to carry out the review.
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Priority Rule: A rule used to determine the order of processing in resource scheduling algorithms.
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Probability: Likelihood of a risk occurring.
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Process: A set of interrelated work activities in which value is added to the inputs to provide specific outputs.
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Procurement Planning: Determining what to procure and when.
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Product Breakdown Structure: This identifies the products which are required and which must be produced. It describes the systems in a hierarchical way.
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Product Description: The description of the purpose form and components of a product. It should always be used as a basis for acceptance of the product by the customer.
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Product Flow Diagram: Represents how the products are produced by identifying their derivation and the dependencies between them.
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Product Realization Team (PRT): A mutli-disciplinary team that is responsible for the definition, development, delivery and support of a product through concurrent engineering methods.
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Program: A broad effort encompassing a number of projects.
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Program Benefits Review: A review to assess if targets have been reached and to measure the performance levels in the resulting business operations.
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Program Benefits Review Report: A report produced at the end of a program that describes the findings, conclusions and recommendations in the program benefit review.
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Program Brief: Produced in the program identification phase, the program brief sums up the program and gives the terms of reference for the work to be carried out and the program director’s terms of reference.
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Program Definition Phase: Program management’s second phase including a feasibility study, full definition and funding approval.
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Program Director: The senior manager with the responsibility for the overall success of the program. The program director is drawn from the management of the target business area.
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Program Directorate: A committee that directs the program when circumstances arise where there is no individual to direct the program.
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Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT): PERT is a project management technique for determining how much time a project needs before it is completed. Each activity is assigned a best, worst, and most probable completion time estimate. These estimates are used to determine the average completion time. The average times are used to figure the critical path and the standard deviation of completion times for the entire project.
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Program Execution Phase: The phase in program management where project portfolio management and transition activities are undertaken.
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Program Executive: A group of individuals that supports the program director.
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Program Identification Phase: Program management’s first phase. Here, all high-level change proposals from available strategies and initiatives are considered and their objectives and directions translated into achievable programs of work.
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Program Management: The effective management of several individual but related projects in order to produce an overall system that works effectively.
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Program Management Office: The office responsible for the business and technical management of a specific contract or program.
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Program Plan: A term that refers to all of the following: benefits management plans, risk management plan, transition plan, project portfolio plan and design management plan.
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Program Status Date: The date up to which all program information is complete.
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Program Support Office: A group that gives administrative support to the program manager and the program executive.
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Progress: The partial completion of a project, or a measure of same. Also, the act of entering progress information for a project.
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Progress Payments: Payments made to a contractor during the life of a fixed-price type contract, on the basis of some agreed-to formula, for example, BCWP or simply costs incurred on most government type contracting.
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Progress Reporting: The act of collecting information on work done and revised estimates, updating the plan and reporting the new revised plan.
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Project: A set of activities directed to an overall goal. Also, the collection of data relating to the achievement of that goal. More specifically, a network of activities, or file(s) containing such a network.
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Project Appraisal: The discipline of calculating the viability of a project.
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Project Assurance Team: A three-member team comprised of the business assurance coordinator, the technical assurance coordinator and the user assurance coordinator whose roles cross stage boundaries and through whom continuity of project development and technical product integrity is maintained.
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Project Board: A project board is the body to which the Project Manager is accountable for achieving the project objectives. The project Board should be viewed to represent the stakeholders. For example, on a small project the sponsor may represent the interests of the ‘executive’, the ‘senior user’, and the ‘technical authority’, where in a large project, the Project Board may be larger than the three or four usual members.
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Project Boundary: The boundary of a project which is defined to indicate how the project interacts both with other projects and non-project activity both in and outside of the organization.
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Project Brief: A statement of reference terms for a project.
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Project Calendar: A calendar that defines global project working and non-working periods.
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Project Champion: A senior manager who is above the project manager who gains support and resources for the project.
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Project Charter: A project charter clearly defines a project definition in order to bring a project team into necessary agreement. A project charter consists of a mission statement, including background, purpose, and benefits, a goal, objectives, scope and assumptions and constraints.
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Project Closure: The formal end of a project. It requires the project board’s approval.
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Project Communications Management: A subset of project management that includes communications planning, information planning, information distribution, performance reporting and administrative closure in an effort to correctly disseminate project information.
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Project Cost Management: A subset of project management that includes resource planning, cost estimating, cost control and cost budgeting in an effort to complete the budget with in its approved proposal.
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Project Culture: The general attitude toward projects within the business.
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Project Data Document (PDD): A summary of the project plan for the business office.
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Project Director: The manager of a very large project that demands senior level responsibility or the person at the board level in an organization who has the overall responsibility for projects management.
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Project Directory: A file containing a record for each project maintained by the system.
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Project Environment: The project environment is the context within which the project is formulated, assessed and realized. This includes all external factors that have an impact on the project.
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Project Evaluation: A documented review of the project’s performance, produced at project closure. It ensures that the experience of the project is recorded for the benefit of others.
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Project File: A file containing the overall plans of a project and any other important documents.
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Project Initiation: The beginning of a project at which point certain management activities are required to ensure that the project is established with clear reference terms and substantial management structure.
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Project Initiation Document: A document approved by the project board at project initiation that defines the terms of reference for the project.
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Project Issue Report: A report that raises either technical or managerial issues in a project.
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Project Lifecycle: The events, from beginning to end, necessary to complete a project.
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Project Logic: The relationships between the various activities in a project.
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Project Logic Drawing: A representation of the logical relationships of a project.
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Project Management: Approach used to manage work with the constraints of time, cost and performance targets.
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Project Management Body of Knowledge: This is an inclusive term that describes the sum of knowledge within the profession of project management. As with other professions such as law and medicine, the body of knowledge rests with the practitioners and academics that apply and advance it.
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Project Management Institute: The American professional body for project managers.
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Project Management Professional (PMP): An individual certified by the Project Management Institute.
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Project Management Software: A computer application designed to help with planning and controlling resources, costs and schedules of a project.
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Project Management Team: Members of the project team who are directly involved in its management.
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Project Manager: The Project Manager is the individual responsible for the day-to-day management of the project.
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Project Matrix: An organization matrix that is project based in which the functional structures are duplicated in each project.
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Project Network Diagram: Drawn from left to right to shown project chronology, a Project Network Diagram displays the logical relationships between project activities.
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Project Organization: A term which refers to the structure, roles and responsibilities of the project team and its interfaces to the outside world.
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Project Phase: A group of related project activities that come together with the completion of a deliverable.
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Project Plan: A document for management purposes that gives the basics of a project in terms of its objectives, justification, and how the objectives are to be achieved. This document is used as a record of decisions and a means of communication among stakeholders.
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Project Plan Development: Project Plan Development is the process of putting the results of other planning processes into a consistent document.
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Project Plan Execution: The act of carrying out activities as stated in the project plan.
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Project Planning: Developing and maintaining a project plan.
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Project Portfolio: The constituent projects within a program.
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Project Portfolio Plan: A plan within the program definition statement that defines a schedule of work that includes the timing, resourcing and control for the programs projects.
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Project Procurement Management: A subset of project management that includes procurement planning, solicitation and solicitation planning, source selection, contract administration and contract close-out in an effort to obtain goods and services from outside organizations.
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Project Quality Management: A subset of project management that includes quality planning, quality assurance and quality control in an effort to satisfy the needs and purpose of the project.
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Project Risk Management: A subset of project management that includes risk identification, risk quantification, risk response development and risk response control in an effort to identify, analyze and respond to project risks.
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Project Schedule: Planned dates for starting and completing activities and milestones.
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Project Scope Management: A subset of project management that includes initiation, scope planning, scope definition, scope verification and scope change control in an effort to ensure that the project has all of the necessary work required to complete it.
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Project Sponsor: A sponsor is a person or group concerned with the definition of project objectives in the context of the sponsoring organization.
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Project Status Report: A report on the status of accomplishments and any variances to spending and schedule plans.
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Project Strategy: A comprehensive definition of how a project will be managed.
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Project Success/Failure Criteria: The criteria by which the success or failure of a project may be based.
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Project Support Office: The central location of planning and project support functions that has the responsibility of managing resources across projects and maintaining planning standards.
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Project Team: Those who report to the project manager.
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Project Technical Plan: A plan produced at the beginning of a project that addresses strategic issues related to quality control and configuration management.
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Project Time Management: A subset of project management that includes activity definition, activity sequencing, activity duration estimating, schedule development and schedule control in order to complete the project on time.
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PROMS-G: The project management special interest group of the British Computer Society.
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Public: Individuals who have an interest in the project outcome, but are not directly involved in it.
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Public Relations: An activity meant to improve the project organization’s environment in order to improve project performance and reception.
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