Project Management Fundamentals and Governance
The governance frame
Every project sits inside a governance structure that authorizes it, funds it, and holds the project manager accountable. Candidates must be fluent in the distinction between the project charter (authorizes the project and the PM), the project management plan (how the work will be executed, monitored, and controlled), and governance documents such as the business case, benefits management plan, and stage-gate criteria. Know the difference between a project, program, and portfolio: a project produces a unique deliverable; a program groups related projects for coordinated benefits; a portfolio is the collection managed to achieve strategic objectives.
Life cycles and organization
Understand predictive, iterative, incremental, and agile life cycles and when each fits - high uncertainty and evolving scope favor adaptive approaches; stable, well-understood scope favors predictive. Know functional, matrix (weak/balanced/strong), and projectized structures and their effect on the PM's authority and resource availability. A strong matrix gives the PM more authority than a weak matrix; projectized gives the most.
Traps in questions
- Confusing authority (charter) with approval of the plan (governance body/sponsor).
- Treating the PM as the person who approves scope changes - changes are approved through integrated change control, not unilaterally.
- Assuming the sponsor disappears after kickoff; the sponsor champions the project and resolves escalations.
Rule of thumb
If a question asks who authorizes the project or the PM, the answer is the charter, issued by the sponsor or authorizing body. If it asks who approves a change, the answer is the change control process/board - never the PM alone.