ICDL Project Planning (ICDL) common mistakes
ICDL Project Planning · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
When asked where an activity such as developing the project charter or holding a phase-gate review belongs, the candidate sorts it into a life-cycle phase list and a process-group list interchangeably, giving answers that mix the two frameworks.
Both frameworks use overlapping vocabulary (initiation, planning, executing), so candidates memorise one list of terms and reuse it for both questions instead of keeping the two structures separate.
What to do instead
Build a two-column map: life-cycle phases (concept, definition/planning, implementation, handover/closure) on one side, process groups (initiating, planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, closing) on the other. Sort 20 exam-style activities into both grids and note that every phase contains all process groups.
Classifies a set of related projects that share one manager and one budget as a portfolio, or calls an entire organisation-wide investment programme a project, when asked to identify the management level.
The three levels sound hierarchical but the distinguishing test is not size; candidates rely on intuition about scale rather than on the defining relationship between the entities.
What to do instead
Learn one test per level: a project produces a unique product or output; a programme is a group of related projects managed together for shared benefits; a portfolio is the collection of projects, programmes and other work that together deliver strategic objectives. Apply the test to three worked examples before the exam.
Writes deliverables as actions - 'test the finance module', 'train the users', 'migrate the data' - when asked to identify or list project deliverables in a scope question.
People narrate work as verbs because that is how tasks are described in schedules, and the schedule statement feels like a correct answer under time pressure.
What to do instead
Apply the noun test: a deliverable must be a tangible output that can be handed over and accepted, with an acceptance criterion (for example 'approved test report covering 100 per cent of finance use cases'). Rewrite any verb-first item until it names the artefact and the condition for acceptance.
Places a high-power, low-interest stakeholder in the 'manage closely' quadrant, or recommends the same engagement strategy for every quadrant, when asked how to handle a named stakeholder.
Candidates remember that powerful stakeholders matter and assume power alone determines close management, without recalling that the interest axis modifies the approach.
What to do instead
Redraw the power/interest grid from memory, label all four quadrants, and attach one action to each: high power and high interest - manage closely; high power and low interest - keep satisfied; low power and high interest - keep informed; low power and low interest - monitor. Then test the rule on the named stakeholder before answering.
Sums every activity's duration to get the project duration, or states that a task with positive float can never delay the project or that the critical path can be shortened at no cost.
Adding durations is the fast arithmetic option, and float is understood only as a vague margin rather than as a quantity computed by the backward pass.
What to do instead
Practise a full forward and backward pass on a seven-activity network, then state the three rules out loud: the critical path is the longest path through the network, it has zero total float, and its length equals the shortest achievable project duration. Check each answer against those rules before choosing.
Treats resource levelling as a technique that never affects the project end date, or selects crashing when the question describes a situation where the schedule must be compressed without extra cost.
Levelling, smoothing, crashing and fast tracking are four techniques with similar-sounding purposes; candidates match on the word 'resource' or 'schedule' rather than on the mechanism and consequence of each.
What to do instead
Memorise a two-by-two of mechanism and consequence: levelling moves work off over-allocated resources and may extend duration; smoothing absorbs variation inside free float and does not move the end date; crashing adds cost for duration; fast tracking overlaps activities and adds risk. Match the question's constraint (cost, risk, resource cap) to the consequence.
Builds the project budget from estimated activity costs and then reports that figure as the approved budget, omitting contingency or management reserve, or places both reserves inside the cost baseline.
Reserves look like duplications of cost to a candidate who has not learned which risks each reserve covers or who owns the decision to release it.
What to do instead
Fix the definitions: contingency covers identified risks (known unknowns) and sits in the cost baseline under the project manager's control; management reserve covers unidentified risks (unknown unknowns), sits outside the baseline and is released by the sponsor. Total approved budget equals cost baseline plus management reserve - verify the arithmetic in that order.
Chooses 'avoid' for a risk where only the impact would be reduced, or picks 'transfer' for a risk that has merely been insured for part of the loss, instead of reasoning from the chosen risk-response definition.
The response names are learned as a list without the operational test of what changes - likelihood, impact, ownership or downside exposure - so similar-sounding options are hard to separate.
What to do instead
Attach a test to each threat response: avoid removes the cause of the risk; mitigate reduces probability or impact; transfer shifts financial ownership to a third party without removing the risk; accept acknowledges the risk with no action beyond a reserve. Run every option through its test before eliminating distractors.
Computes schedule or cost performance with the wrong divisor - for example cost performance index as earned value divided by planned value - or misreads a negative cost variance as being under budget.
The three earned-value inputs share initials and the formulas are memorised by shape rather than by meaning, so the divisor gets swapped under exam pressure.
What to do instead
Anchor each formula to a sentence: CPI compares what was earned with what was spent (EV divided by AC); SPI compares what was earned with what was planned (EV divided by PV); a negative CV or SV means behind or over, never ahead. Write the sentences in the margin first, then substitute numbers and sanity-check the direction of the result.
Answers a closure question by selecting only contract close-out or final payment, leaving out formal acceptance of deliverables, lessons-learned capture, resource release and handover to the operational owner.
Closure is studied last and compressed into 'sign the paperwork', so candidates recall one administrative action and treat the rest as optional detail.
What to do instead
Memorise closure as a checklist in sequence: verify and obtain formal acceptance, transfer the product to the owner, release team and suppliers, close contracts and financial accounts, capture and archive lessons learned, update organisational assets. When an option covers only one item, check whether the question asks for the next step or the complete closure set.