CAPM cheat sheet

A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result; operations are ongoing and repetitive.

The PMBOK Guide 7th edition has 12 principles and 8 performance domains: stakeholders, team, development approach and life cycle, planning, project work, delivery, measurement, and uncertainty.

Distinguish three terms: project life cycle (phases from initiation to closure), development approach (predictive, hybrid, adaptive), and product life cycle (spans the product's whole life, often beyond the project).

Project manager authority increases along this continuum: functional organization < weak matrix < balanced matrix < strong matrix < project-oriented.

PMO types and control level: supportive (consulting and templates, low control), controlling (compliance with frameworks, moderate control), directive (PMs report to the PMO, high control).

The project charter formally authorizes the project and the project manager; the sponsor issues it before planning starts and it contains high-level scope, objectives, budget, and risks.

Tuckman team development stages: forming, storming, norming, performing, adjourning; a team can regress when membership changes.

Conflict approaches: collaborate/problem-solve is win-win and best for long-term resolution; compromise is partial; force, avoid, and accommodate produce a winner and a loser.

Scope creep is uncontrolled addition of work without change control; gold plating is adding unrequested extras that add no value.

Predictive (waterfall) life cycle: scope, schedule, and cost are baselined early, and changes flow through Perform Integrated Change Control and the change control board.

WBS rules: deliverable-oriented decomposition; the 100 percent rule means child elements fully represent the parent; the lowest level is a work package; the 8-80 rule keeps work packages between 8 and 80 hours.

The critical path is the longest duration path through the network and has zero total float; it determines the shortest possible project duration, so any delay on it delays the finish date.

Float formulas: total float = LS - ES = LF - EF; free float = early start of successor - early finish of the activity.

Precedence Diagramming Method relationships: finish-to-start, start-to-start, finish-to-finish, start-to-finish; a lead overlaps activities, a lag inserts waiting time.

Three-point estimating: triangular = (O + M + P)/3; PERT beta = (O + 4M + P)/6; standard deviation = (P - O)/6.

Earned value: CV = EV - AC; SV = EV - PV; CPI = EV/AC; SPI = EV/PV; EAC = BAC/CPI when performance persists; ETC = EAC - AC; VAC = BAC - EAC; TCPI = (BAC - EV)/(BAC - AC).

Contingency reserve covers identified risks (known unknowns) and is controlled by the project manager; management reserve covers unknown unknowns and generally requires sponsor approval.

Risk response strategies: threats - escalate, avoid, transfer, mitigate, accept; opportunities - escalate, exploit, share, enhance, accept; EMV = probability x impact.

Agile Manifesto (2001) four values: individuals and interactions over processes and tools, working software over comprehensive documentation, customer collaboration over contract negotiation, responding to change over following a plan; items on the right still have value.

Agile principles include satisfying the customer through early and continuous delivery, welcoming changing requirements, delivering working software frequently, daily business-developer collaboration, self-organizing teams, sustainable pace, and simplicity.

Scrum roles: product owner (maximizes value and orders the backlog), scrum master (servant leader who removes impediments and coaches process), developers (build the increment).

Scrum events: sprint (1-4 weeks), sprint planning, daily scrum (15 minutes), sprint review, retrospective; artifacts: product backlog, sprint backlog, increment.

The sprint goal gives the sprint its focus; scope may be clarified with the product owner but is not changed arbitrarily once the sprint starts.

Kanban core practices: visualize the workflow, limit work in progress, manage flow, make policies explicit, implement feedback loops, improve collaboratively; it is pull-based and requires no fixed iterations.

Extreme Programming practices include pair programming, test-driven development, continuous integration, refactoring, small releases, simple design, and collective code ownership.

Lean targets waste: overproduction, waiting, transport, overprocessing, inventory, motion, and defects; tools include value stream mapping and kaizen (continuous improvement).

Metrics and scaling: velocity forecasts team capacity, burndown shows remaining work, burnup shows completed scope; scaling frameworks include SAFe, LeSS, Scrum@Scale, DSDM, FDD, and Crystal.

BABOK Guide knowledge areas (6): business analysis planning and monitoring, elicitation and collaboration, requirements life cycle management, strategy analysis, requirements analysis and design definition, and solution evaluation.

BACCM core concepts (6): change, need, solution, stakeholder, value, and context; every business analysis task is performed in relation to all six.

Requirement types: business requirements (why the change), stakeholder requirements (what stakeholders need), solution requirements (functional and non-functional), and transition requirements (temporary, for implementation only).

Elicitation techniques: interviews, workshops, focus groups, observation/job shadowing, surveys, document analysis, prototyping, brainstorming, and interface analysis.

A requirements traceability matrix links each requirement to its source, business need, design components, and test cases, enabling impact analysis and coverage verification.

Prioritization approaches: MoSCoW (Must, Should, Could, Won't this time), Kano (must-be, performance, delighter, indifferent, reverse), time-boxing, and voting.

User story format: 'As a , I want , so that '; INVEST criteria are Independent, Negotiable, Valuable, Estimable, Small, and Testable.

Process and scope models: SIPOC (Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, Customers), BPMN diagrams, use case diagrams, and context diagrams; compare as-is versus to-be states.

Solution evaluation measures delivered value against desired outcomes, assesses solution and enterprise limitations, and recommends actions; cost-benefit analysis and ROI support the business case.