Project Management Professional / PRINCE2 Management Products, Roles and Exam Technique Syllabus

Management Products, Roles and Exam Technique syllabus — full chapter and topic list

Expand any chapter to see its topics and sub-topics. This is the whole examinable outline for Management Products, Roles and Exam Technique in Project Management Professional / PRINCE2, not a summary of it.

1. 1

   Management Products

   4 topics

   • Baselines, records and reports
     • Baseline products (e.g. PID, Project Plan, Product Descriptions)
     • Records (registers and logs) versus reports
   • Key baseline management products
     • Project Brief, Business Case and Benefits Management Approach
     • Project Initiation Documentation composition
     • The four management approaches
   • Registers and logs
     • Daily Log, Lessons Log, Issue Register, Risk Register, Quality Register
   • Reports
     • Checkpoint, Highlight, Exception reports
     • End Stage, End Project and Lessons reports
2. 2

   Roles, Responsibilities and Governance

   3 topics

   • Role descriptions and accountabilities
     • Mapping responsibilities across themes and processes
     • Combining and sharing roles when tailoring
   • Decision-making and authorisation flow
     • Who authorises what at each process boundary
     • Escalation paths under manage by exception
   • Governance and alignment with corporate management
     • Interfaces with corporate, programme or customer management
     • Assurance, audit and compliance considerations
3. 3

   Certification and Examination Preparation

   4 topics

   • PRINCE2 Foundation examination
     • Format: 60 multiple-choice questions, 60 minutes, 55% pass mark
     • Closed-book; tests recall of principles, themes and processes
   • PRINCE2 Practitioner examination
     • Format: objective-test, scenario-based, 2.5 hours, 60% pass mark
     • Open-book (official manual only); tests application and tailoring
   • Question styles and exam technique
     • Standard, matching, assertion-reason and sequencing question types
     • Scenario interpretation and additional-information handling
     • Time management and process-of-elimination strategies
   • Re-certification and continuing development
     • Practitioner validity period and PeopleCert membership/CPD options
     • Progression to PRINCE2 Agile and related AXELOS qualifications

Management Products, Roles and Exam Technique flashcards for Project Management Professional / PRINCE2

18 of 51 cards from the Management Products, Roles and Exam Technique deck — real questions with worked answers.

1. In PRINCE2, what is a baseline?

   A reference level against which an entity (such as a plan, product or configuration) is monitored and controlled. Baseline management products are fixed at a point in time and changed only through formal change control.

2. PRINCE2 classifies its management products into three categories. What are they?

   Baselines (defining aspects of the project, fixed and change-controlled), Records (dynamic management products maintaining project information), and Reports (management products providing a snapshot of the status of certain aspects of the project).

3. List the baseline management products in PRINCE2.

   Benefits Management Approach, Business Case, Change Control Approach, Communication Management Approach, Plan (Project/Stage/Team/Exception), Product Description, Project Brief, Project Initiation Documentation (PID), Project Product Description, Quality Management Approach, and Risk Management Approach.

4. What is the difference between a Record and a Report in PRINCE2?

   A Record is a dynamic management product that maintains information regarding project progress (e.g. registers and logs that are continuously updated). A Report is a management product providing a snapshot of the status of certain aspects of the project at a point in time.

5. Name the PRINCE2 records (registers and logs).

   Configuration Item Records, Daily Log, Issue Register, Lessons Log, Quality Register, and Risk Register.

6. Name the PRINCE2 reports.

   Checkpoint Report, End Project Report, End Stage Report, Exception Report, Highlight Report, Lessons Report, and Product Status Account.

7. What is the purpose of the Project Initiation Documentation (PID)?

   It is the baseline collection of management products defining the project (the 'what, why, who, how, when and how much'). It is used to gain authorisation to proceed and as a reference throughout the project to check whether it remains viable and on track.

8. What is the purpose of the Business Case in PRINCE2?

   To document the justification for undertaking the project, based on the estimated costs, benefits, risks and timescales, and to drive decision making to ensure the project remains desirable, viable and achievable throughout.

9. What is the Project Product Description, and when is it created?

   A special type of Product Description that defines the overall project's main product, including the customer's quality expectations, acceptance criteria and acceptance methods. It is created during Starting up a Project as part of the Project Brief.

10. What is the difference between the Risk Management Approach and the Risk Register?

    The Risk Management Approach is a baseline product describing how risk will be managed on the project (procedures, tools, roles, tolerances). The Risk Register is a record capturing the actual identified risks and their details, status and responses.

11. What is the purpose of the Daily Log in PRINCE2?

    To record informal issues, required actions or significant events not caught by other registers. It acts as the project manager's diary and is the first record created (in Starting up a Project).

12. What is the purpose of the Lessons Log versus the Lessons Report?

    The Lessons Log is a record used to capture lessons throughout the project (those that apply to this project and future projects). The Lessons Report is a report that passes useful lessons to other projects or the wider organisation, typically created at end stage or end of project.

13. What does the Issue Register capture, and what three issue types feed it?

    The Issue Register records formally raised issues and tracks their status. The three issue types are: request for change, off-specification, and problem/concern.

14. What is the purpose of the Quality Register?

    A record that summarises all planned and completed quality activities, providing key information for the End Stage and End Project Reports and serving as an audit trail of quality management.

15. What is the purpose of a Highlight Report and who sends it to whom?

    It provides the Project Board (and possibly other stakeholders) with a summary of stage status at intervals defined by them. It is produced by the Project Manager during Controlling a Stage to give the board confidence the stage is progressing to plan.

16. What is the purpose of a Checkpoint Report and who produces it?

    It reports progress of a Work Package at a frequency defined in the Work Package. It is produced by the Team Manager and sent to the Project Manager.

17. When is an Exception Report produced and by whom?

    It is produced by the Project Manager for the Project Board when a stage or project is forecast to exceed its agreed tolerances. It describes the exception, options, recommendation and impact, to allow the board to decide on corrective action.

18. Compare the End Stage Report and the End Project Report.

    The End Stage Report is produced near the end of each management stage to give the board the information to review stage performance and approve the next stage. The End Project Report is produced at the end of the project to review how it performed against the PID and confirm the handover of products.

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