Planning Courses

Advanced Time Management and Organizational Skills
(2-Day)

Time and information management have become increasingly challenging in our ongoing attempts to stay organized and make effective use of our time and energy resources. A significant amount of time is wasted daily looking for information because of inefficient workflow systems. More importantly, chaos, loss of control and inefficient use of time leads to missing critical deadlines or compromising the quality of the job. This workshop presents a practical approach to organizing and accessing information in a systematic and effective way that promotes a sense of control, lowers stress and leads to an efficient use of time. This Advanced Time Management Workshop has three modules: Time Management, Organizing Your E-mail Inbox using Outlook and Organizational Skills Focus.

Learning Objectives:

  • Align your time usage and organizational systems with the corporate vision, mission, your roles and goals for each role.
  • Apply the Paredo Principle to focus your efforts on the most important items.
  • Learn strategies that maximize effectiveness and efficiency.
  • Organize in the context of the week, implement daily.
  • Review a tried and proven system for planning and prioritizing.
  • Identify and analyze your information collection systems.
  • Examine risk and contingency management as applied to time management.
  • Message management: an efficient method to track, categorize and file messages.
  • Manage your time spent using email more effectively.
  • Organize your e-mail and computer files.
  • Organize your paper and physical workspace.
  • Identify and analyze your information collection systems.
  • Create balance between home and work.
  • Develop an Action Plan to extend the learning experience.

Applied Project Management Workshop
(2-Day)

This course is designed over two consecutive days to provide hands-on instruction in the fundamentals of project management. Participants will learn the five project management processes and nine knowledge areas in alignment with Project Management Institute (PMI) Standards. In small groups, participants will construct their own project scope and plan to help develop an understanding of planning, tracking, and communication issues necessary for successful project management. This combination of fundamentals and project development training is designed to maximize knowledge, understanding, and skill transfer to the worksite.

Learning Objectives:

  • Demonstrate an understanding of the five project management processes and the project life cycle as it applies to a sample project.
  • State clearly (written) a sample project scope, including the three project constraints, three objectives, and three deliverables.
  • Diagram a sample project Work Breakdown Structure, Network Diagram, and identify the Critical Path.
  • Demonstrate an understanding of time and cost estimation (PERT technique) and Earned Value by performing appropriate calculations.
  • Calculate forward and backward passes to determine project floats and the critical path.
  • Identify four sources of risk and respond in the written project plan.
  • Demonstrate an understanding of resource leveling in response to changes that occur during the project.
  • Construct a Standard Activity Bar Chart for a sample project to demonstrate an understanding of the relationships between tasks and durations.
  • Crash a project schedule to get a project behind schedule back on track.
  • Identify the appropriate steps in problem solving and decision-making.
  • Examine and practice effective communication skills for overall project success
  • Construct a project termination checklist to successfully close-out a project.
  • Develop an Action Plan to extend the learning experience.

Fundamentals of Project Management

This workshop is designed to benefit both the novice and more experienced project manager. The novice will understand project management fundamentals and apply basic techniques to manage a sample project. The more experienced participants will gain additional insights for better organization, planning, and communication. This interactive program provides tried and proven structure to organize any project, orchestrate the people, resources, and tasks to bring the project in on time, within budget, without sacrificing quality measures.

Learning Objectives:

  • Understand the project life cycle as it applies to all projects.
  • Develop a list of defining questions for your project.
  • State clearly project objectives and deliverables.
  • Recognize and understand the triple constraints of your project.
  • Apply task analysis to help control risk.
  • Provide an “educated guess” to estimate durations of high uncertainty.
  • Understand work packages using a Work Breakdown Structure.
  • Demonstrate usage of PERT/CPM methods for project control.
  • Construct a Gantt Chart and know five reasons it simplifies project management.
  • Understand and identify critical path and float.
  • Analyze a project that is behind schedule and determine how to get back on track.
  • Develop a plan for managing multiple projects.
  • Translate the principle of contingency planning to your project.
  • Incorporate and mange risk in the project plan.
  • Apply managed conflict for improved team trust and communication.
  • Recite the key steps to project management success.
  • Develop an action plan to extend the learning experience.

Managing Your Time and Multiple Priorities

Two of the major obstacles of personal and professional effectiveness involve the ways we manage our time and our priorities. This dynamic and interactive presentation provides solutions for these problems. Participants will identify and focus on the modifiable circumstances that produce the fruit of overload and lack of control. A personal action plan will be developed that addresses the root of the problem and helps bridge the gap between knowledge gained in the seminar and applying the actions immediately. Participants are encouraged to bring their calendars or planning systems to the class.

Learning Objectives:

  • Learn strategies that maximize effectiveness and efficiency
  • Identify your prime work times and how to make effective use of time logs
  • Understand and apply “interruption management”
  • Apply the Paredo Principle to focus your efforts on the most important items
  • Set priorities that drive your actions
  • Practice a tried and proven system for planning and prioritizing
  • Learn how to delegate effectively
  • Overcome procrastination
  • Allow the systems to serve you; not you serve the systems; e-mail, telephone, etc.
  • Recognize how to build margin into an overloaded schedule
  • Discover 25 ways to maximize your time and effectiveness
  • Create balance between home and work
  • Develop an action plan to extend the learning experience

Planning and Decision-Making

This course consists of three training modules; Planning, Decision-Making and Action Planning. The Planning module is designed for individuals or teams who desire more structure in their planning efforts. A deductive process is used to look at planning, long-range planning and strategic planning starting with organizational or personal vision and progressing through identification of mission, roles, and goals. The Decision-Making module identifies decision-making styles and boundaries; consensus decision-making, and examines a ten-step process for problem solving and decision-making. The third module allows participants a structured way to apply the learning gained at the workshop back at the worksite.

Learning Objectives:

  • Identify the differences among planning, long-term planning, and strategic planning.
  • Describe a simplified planning process.
  • Develop an integrated vision and mission statement.
  • Develop SMART goals and objectives.
  • Organize and discover new ways to get things done.
  • Describe four decision-making styles.
  • Determine decision-making boundaries.
  • Utilize consensus-building techniques to maximize effectiveness of team decisions.
  • Apply a 10-step procedure for problem solving and decision-making.
  • Develop an action plan to extend the learning experience.
  • Synthesize goals, objectives, and action plans to create a 90 Day Roll-Out Plan.