The five project management

processes
The Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK
Guide) breaks down the overarching process of managing a project into
five stages, or “process groups.” These process groups are typically
defined as:

 Initiating: During this phase, the project is conceptualized, and

feasibility is determined. According to SME Toolkit, some activities
that should be performed during this process include defining the
project goal; defining the project scope; identifying the project
manager and the key stakeholders; identifying potential risks, and
producing an estimated budget and timeline.

 Planning: Next, the project manager will create a blueprint to

guide the entire project from ideation through completion. This
blueprint will map out the project’s scope; resources required to
create the deliverables; estimated time and financial
commitments; communication strategy to ensure stakeholders are
kept up to date and involved; execution plan; and proposal for
ongoing maintenance. If the project has not yet been approved,
this blueprint will serve as a critical part of the pitch.

 Executing: During this phase, the project manager will conduct

the procurement required for the project and staff the team.
Execution of the project objectives requires effective management
of the team members on the ground. PMs are responsible for
 delegating and overseeing the work on the project while
maintaining good relationships with all team members and keeping
the entire project on time and budget. The PM must, therefore, be
highly organized and an exceptional leader. That’s because they’ll
need to address team concerns and issues that arise along the
way, requiring frequent and open communication with all team
members and stakeholders.

 Monitoring and control: During this process group, project

managers will closely measure the project's progress to ensure it is
developing properly. Documentation such as data collection and
verbal and written status reports may be used. “Monitoring and
controlling are closely related to project planning. While planning
determines what is to be done, monitoring and controlling
establish how well it has been done,” explains SME Toolkit.
“Monitoring will detect any necessary corrective action or change
in the project to keep the project on track.”

 Closing: The closing process group occurs once the project

deliverables have been produced and the stakeholders validate
and approve them. During this phase, the project manager will
close contracts with suppliers, external vendors, consultants, and
other third-party providers. All documentation will be archived, and
a final project report will be produced. Further, the final part of the
project plan — the plan for troubleshooting and maintenance — will
kick into place.
 Figure 4. PMBOK-7 Principles

The guide has 12 generally accepted principles used in project

management. A Principle is “A statement, truth or rule that
guides and leads our thoughts and actions“. Principles guide
the actions, but do not detail how to do things, and are not strict.
To ensure the expected results of project delivery, project team
members should follow these principles:

1. (Stewardship) Pay Attention/Care: Be a diligent, respectful,

and caring steward. Carry out activities with integrity, care, and
trustworthiness while maintaining compliance with internal and
external guidelines. They demonstrate a broad commitment to the
financial, social, and environmental impacts of the projects they
support.
2. Team: Create a collaborative project team environment. Project
teams that work collaboratively can accomplish a shared objective
more effectively and efficiently than individuals working on their
own.
3. Stakeholders: Engage stakeholders to understand their interests
and needs.
4. Value: Focus on value. Align the project with the objectives of the
organization. Continually evaluate and adjust project alignment to
business objectives and intended benefits and value
5. System thinking: Recognize, evaluate, and respond to system
interactions, with the aim to respond to the dynamic circumstances
within and surrounding the project in a holistic way to positively
affect project performance.
6. Leadership: Motivate, influence, train and learn. Demonstrate
leadership behaviors in areas of honesty, integrity, and ethical
conduct and adapting leadership style to the situation.
7. Tailoring: Adapt the approach of deliveries according to the
context. Adaptability is the key through the use of an iterative
approach.
8. Quality: Incorporate quality into processes and results. Maintain a
focus on quality that produces deliverables that meet project
objectives and align to the needs, uses, and acceptance
requirements set forth by relevant stakeholders.
9. Complexity: Address complexity using knowledge, experience,
and learning. Continually evaluate and navigate project complexity
so that approaches and plans enable the project team to
successfully navigate the project life cycle.
10. (Risk) Opportunities and threats: Optimize responses to
opportunities and threats. Maximize positive impacts and minimize
negative impacts to the project and its outcomes.
11. Adaptability and resilience: Be adaptable and resilient
depending on the context to help the project accommodate
change, recover from setbacks, and advance the work of the
project.
12. Change management: Enable change to achieve the
expected future state.

The adoption of these principles does not mean that the process-
based approaches (process groups) of the previous version are
no longer relevant or useful, are still valid, and represent a way of
applying the previous principles in practice.
 Figure 5. PMBOK-7 Performance Domains

1. Team: Develop high-performance teams.

2. Stakeholders: Build good relationships with Stakeholders.
3. Life Cycle: Develop appropriate phases and approaches for the
project.
4. Planning: Carry out adequate planning at each precise moment.
5. Navigating between uncertainty and ambiguity: Analyze the
project environment to anticipate risks and seize opportunities.
6. Delivery: Proportionate value.
7. Performance Measure: Track to ensure results are achieved.
8. Project work: Guarantee the activities to facilitate the team the
delivery of results.

The way these domains interact and combine among them, it is

typically different in each project.

An introduction to PMBOK process

groups and knowledge areas
The Project Management Institute (PMI) created the PMBOK (Project
Management Body of Knowledge). It consists of guidelines,
recommended practices, standard principles, and common terminology
for managing projects.

The contents of PMBOK were initially consolidated into a book called “A

Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge” (commonly
known as the PMBOK Guide), back in 1996. The sixth edition of this
guide was released in 2017, and the seventh edition is just got released
in 2023.

The PMBOK guide embraces a process-based

approach to project management. It breaks down project management
into 49 processes, which are then grouped under PMBOK process groups
and knowledge areas.

Think of process groups as what you need to do and the knowledge

areas as what you need to know. These come together in a matrix
format to encompass the 49 individual processes. The processes
intersect with each process group so that each of the 49 processes falls
under one knowledge area and one process group.
What do you need to know to succeed at project management? Everything! While
there’s some truth to that joke, this answer can be narrowed down by looking at
the project management knowledge areas as defined in the Project Management
Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), a book by the Project Management Institute (PMI),
which compiles the fundamental concepts of project management.

What Are the Project Management Knowledge Areas?

The project management knowledge areas can be simply defined as the key
aspects of project management that should be overseen by project managers so
they can plan, schedule, track and deliver projects successfully with the help of the
project team and project stakeholders.
Each of these project management knowledge areas needs to be managed
throughout the five project life cycle phases, which are project initiation, project
planning, project execution, monitoring and controlling, and project closing. These
are the chronological phases that every project goes through, also referred to as
project management process groups in PMI’s PMBOK.

The PMBOK knowledge areas take place during any one of these process groups.
You can think of the process groups as horizontal, while the knowledge areas are
vertical. The knowledge areas are the core technical subject matter, which is
necessary for effective project management.

The 10 Project Management Knowledge Areas

Here’s an overview of each of the 10 knowledge areas of project management,

including a brief description of the key project management documents needed to
control each of them. All of these project documents are part of the project
management plan which includes information about all knowledge areas of project
management.

1. Project Integration Management

Project integration management can be simply defined as the framework that

allows project managers to coordinate tasks, resources, stakeholders, changes
and project variables. Project managers can use different tools to make sure there
are solid project integration management practices in place. For example, the
project management plan is important for project integration because it works as a
roadmap for the project to reach a successful end. Once created, the project plan
is approved by stakeholders and/or sponsors before it’s monitored and tracked by
the project management team.

Project management software, like ProjectManager, is ideal for project integration

management because it’s an online platform that project managers can use to
create a project plan, oversee project management knowledge areas and
collaborate with their teams online. Choose between online Gantt charts, kanban
boards, project calendars and other project management views to plan, schedule
and track your projects. ProjectManager also has project reporting features that
allow project managers to create project reports they can share with project
stakeholders to keep them informed.

The project integration area also includes the directing and managing of the
project work, which is the production of its deliverables. This process is monitored,
analyzed and reported on to identify and control any changes or problems that
might occur.

Also, any change control will be carried out. That might require request forms,
approval from stakeholders and/or sponsors or another admin. This area is also
part of the project closure at the end of the project.

2. Project Scope Management

Project scope management is one of the most important project management

knowledge areas. It consists of managing your project scope, which refers to the
work that needs to be executed in a project. To manage your project scope, you’ll
need to build a project scope management plan, a document where you’ll define
what will be done in your project.

To start building your scope management plan, begin by writing a scope

statement. This statement is anything from a sentence to a bulleted list that’s
comprehensive to reduce major project risks. Another part of this area is a work
breakdown structure (WBS), which is a graphic breakdown of project work.

Validate scope during the project, which means making sure that the deliverables
are being approved regularly by the sponsor or stakeholder. This occurs during the
monitoring and controlling process groups and is about accepting the deliverables,
not the specs laid out during planning.
The scope statement is likely going to change over the course of the project to
control the scope, such as if a project falls behind schedule.

3. Project Time Management

Project time management involves estimating your project duration, creating

a project schedule and tracking the project team’s progress to ensure the project is
completed on time. To do so, the first thing to do is to define your project scope to
identify the tasks that should go into your project schedule.

Those project tasks are then put in an order that makes sense, and
any dependencies between them are noted. These dependencies are then
determined to be either finish-to-start (FS), finish-to-finish (FF), start-to-start (SS)
or start-to-finish (SF). This is mostly for larger projects.

With the tasks now sequenced, the project resources required for each must be
estimated and assigned. The duration of each task is also determined at this point.
All of this leads to a schedule by first determining the critical path and float for
each task. You should use project management tools like Gantt charts, kanban
boards or project calendars to place the tasks on a timeline, and then work on
resource leveling to balance resource usage.

Once the project schedule is made, plans to control the schedule are necessary.
Earned value management is performed regularly to make sure that the actual
plan is proceeding as planned.

4. Project Cost Management

This project management knowledge area involves estimating project costs to

create a project budget. To do so, you’ll need to use cost-estimating tools and
techniques to make sure that the funds cover the project expenses and are being
monitored regularly to keep stakeholders or sponsors informed.
As with other project management knowledge areas, the cost management plan is
the document where you’ll explain the method to establish the budget, which
includes how and if it will change and what procedures will be used to control it.
Each project task will have to be estimated for cost, which means including all
resources such as labor, materials, equipment and anything else needed to
complete the task.

5. Project Quality Management

A project can come in on time and within budget, but if the quality isn’t up to
standard, then the project is a failure. This means that quality management is one
of the most critical project management knowledge areas. Your project
management plan should include a quality management plan section that specifies
the quality control and quality assurance guidelines for your project.

Therefore, to control quality, the deliverables must be inspected to ensure that the
standards outlined in the quality management plan are being met.

6. Project Human Resource Management

The project team is your most important resource, so it’s crucial to assemble the
best team and make sure they’re happy. But also you need to track their
performance to ensure that the project is progressing as planned. A human
resource management plan identifies the roles and requirements for those
positions, as well as how they fit into the overall project structure.

After you’ve determined the project roles, it’s time to fill those positions and
acquire a project team. This can be done in-house by drawing from other
departments in the organization, getting new hires or a combination of both. The
team needs development, possibly training and other things that’ll make them
viable for the project.
Managing the project team is an ongoing responsibility of the project manager.
The team is monitored to make sure they’re working productively and that there
are no internal conflicts, so everyone is satisfied.

ProjectM
anager’s free resource plan template.Download now

7. Project Communications Management

All knowledge areas of project management are important, but communication

management might be paramount as it informs every aspect of the project.
Communications inform the team and stakeholders, therefore the need to plan
communications management is a critical step in any project.

Related: Free Communication Plan Template

It’s at this point that the dissemination of communications is determined, including

how it’s done and with what frequency. Target who needs what and when. Also,
note how communications will occur when issues such as changes arise in the
project.

Manage the communications when the project is executed to make sure it runs as
planned. This also involves controlling communications by reviewing their
effectiveness regularly and adjusting as needed.

8. Project Risk Management

Risk management plans identify how the risks will be itemized, categorized and
prioritized. This involves identifying risks that might occur during the execution of
the project by making a risk register.

Perform qualitative risk analysis after the biggest risks have been identified and
classified by likelihood and impact. Then prioritize them. Then perform quantitative
analysis according to their impact on the project, such as its budget, schedule, etc.

Now you’ll need to plan risk responses. If those risks in fact become issues, then a
response needs to have been written in advance, with an owner who can make
sure the risk is properly identified and handled. Controlling risk involves regularly
reviewing the risk register and crossing off those risks that are no longer going to
impact the project.

ProjectM
anager’s free risk tracking template.Download now

9. Project Procurement Management

This project management knowledge area deals with outside procurement, which
is part of most projects, such as hiring subcontractors. This will impact on the
budget and schedule. Procurement management planning starts by identifying the
outside needs of the project and how those contractors will be involved.

Now conduct those procurements by hiring the contractors, which includes

a statement of work, terms of reference, request for proposals and choosing a
vendor. You’ll want to control the procurement process by managing and
monitoring, and then closing the contracts once the work has been done to
everyone’s satisfaction.

10. Project Stakeholder Management

The stakeholders must be happy, as the project has been created for their needs.
Therefore, they must be actively managed like any other part of the project. To
start, identify the stakeholders through stakeholder analysis and find out what
concerns they have. It’s not always easy, but it’s a crucial part of starting any
project.

Now plan stakeholder management, which means listing each stakeholder and
prioritizing their concerns and how they might impact the project. This will lead to
managing stakeholders’ expectations to make sure their needs are met and that
you’re in communication with them.

Throughout the project, you’ll want to control stakeholder engagement by

determining if the stakeholders’ needs are being addressed. If not, figure out what
changes need to be made to either satisfy those needs or adjust the expectations.
 ProjectM
anager’s free stakeholder map template.