PMP key terms

A leadership style in which the project manager puts the team's needs first, removes obstacles, shares authority, and focuses on helping members grow so they can perform at their best.

The ability to notice and manage your own emotions and to read and respond to other people's, which supports trust, calm conflict handling, and clear communication under pressure.

A written agreement the team builds together that sets ground rules, communication norms, decision-making methods, and how members will handle disagreements and shared responsibilities.

A five-stage model of team growth: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. It describes how a group moves from polite strangers to a settled, high-performing unit.

The work of spotting and addressing disagreements using approaches such as collaborating, compromising, forcing, avoiding, or accommodating. Collaborating usually produces the most durable outcome because both sides' concerns are met.

A responsibility assignment matrix that labels each person as responsible, accountable, consulted, or informed for each activity or deliverable, making ownership and decision rights clear.

Giving a speaker full attention, confirming what you think you heard, and reflecting it back so misunderstandings surface early and the other person feels genuinely understood.

A structured discussion aimed at an agreement both sides can accept, usually by exploring underlying interests rather than arguing over stated positions, and by separating people issues from the problem.

The internal and external forces that make people engage with their work. Pay and conditions mainly prevent dissatisfaction, while recognition, autonomy, growth, and meaningful goals tend to raise engagement.

A team whose members work from different locations or time zones and depend on technology to communicate. It needs explicit norms, thorough documentation, and deliberate relationship building to function well.

The practice of surfacing anything blocking the team and following the agreed route, often through the project manager to the sponsor or management, so it gets removed quickly.

A short document authorized by the sponsor that formally starts the project, names the project manager, and states high-level objectives, boundaries, and success criteria.

The consolidated, baselined document describing how the project will be executed, monitored, controlled, and closed, integrating all subsidiary plans and performance baselines into one reference.

A hierarchical breakdown of the total scope into manageable deliverables and work packages, used as the foundation for estimating effort and cost, building the schedule, and assigning responsibility.

An iterative planning technique where near-term work is detailed carefully while later work stays at a higher, rougher level until more information becomes available.

The longest sequence of dependent activities through the schedule network, which sets the shortest possible project duration; a delay on any activity along it delays the whole project.

The amount of time an activity can slip without pushing out the project finish date. Activities on the critical path have none, so they must be watched most closely.

Two schedule compression techniques. Fast tracking overlaps activities that were planned in sequence, adding rework risk. Crashing adds resources to shorten duration, usually at extra cost.

Adjusting activity start and finish dates to flatten peaks in demand for people or equipment. It often extends the schedule, unlike smoothing, which works only within available float.

A measurement technique comparing planned value, earned value, and actual cost to show scope, schedule, and cost performance, producing indexes such as cost and schedule performance indexes.

The process of reviewing every change request for impact on scope, schedule, cost, quality, and risk, then approving, rejecting, or deferring it and updating the affected baselines and plans.

A designated group of stakeholders with authority to formally review, evaluate, and decide on change requests according to the project's documented change management procedures.

Uncontrolled expansion of scope without matching adjustments to time, cost, or resources, typically caused by small accepted additions that were never formally approved or baselined.

A table linking each requirement to its source and to the deliverables and tests that satisfy it, helping the team confirm that nothing approved was dropped or added without control.

A living document recording each identified risk with its cause, probability, impact, owner, planned response, and current status, reviewed regularly as the project progresses.

Planned approaches for threats (escalate, avoid, transfer, mitigate, accept) and for opportunities (escalate, exploit, share, enhance, accept), chosen in proportion to the risk's significance.

A record of problems that have already occurred and are affecting the project, each with an owner, priority, and target resolution date so nothing is quietly forgotten.

The total money spent on prevention and appraisal plus the losses from internal and external failures. Investing more in prevention usually lowers the overall cost.

A structured, independent review of quality processes and procedures to confirm they are being followed and are effective, and to surface improvements for the team to act on.

A growing record of what worked and what did not, captured throughout the project rather than only at the end, so later phases and future projects can benefit from it.

Categories of agreement such as fixed-price, cost-reimbursable, and time-and-materials. The choice determines how much cost risk sits with the buyer versus the seller.

The number of possible two-way communication paths among participants, calculated as n times n minus one, divided by two. The count rises fast as people are added, so coordination effort grows too.

Deliberately adapting processes, templates, and the delivery life cycle to a project's size, complexity, and risk, rather than applying a standard method unchanged to every effort.

The justification for the project, documenting the problem or opportunity, options considered, expected benefits, costs, and risks that together support the investment decision and later benefit measurement.

The work of making sure the outcomes promised in the business case actually appear after delivery, by defining benefits, assigning owners, and measuring results against targets.

The framework of authority, policies, decision rights, and reporting that determines how a project is directed, controlled, and held accountable to the organization.

A permanent organizational unit that supplies project standards, templates, coaching, and oversight. It may be supportive, controlling, or directive depending on how much authority the organization grants it.

Structured work to prepare people for the changes a project delivers, building awareness, desire, knowledge, and ability so new ways of working are adopted and stay adopted.

Meeting the laws, regulations, standards, and organizational policies that apply to the project's work and product, including keeping evidence that requirements were satisfied.