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Ricardo: Hello everyone, welcome to the five Minutes podcast. Today I'm starting a very special series of three episodes talking about the PMBOK Guide Seventh Edition and the new standard for project management that PMI just published. First, I just want to start making the disclaimer that I'm talking on behalf of myself here. I don't represent PMI; I don't represent any other particular. So everything you will hear in these three episodes is based on my own opinion; in the way, I saw the guide, I participated in the draft, and now I have the full copy with me here, like most of the members.
And I want just to make some analysis and trying to understand those changes, because of what I am seeing on the internet so many times; I have respectfully disagreed with many of the people. For example, people saying, oh, the process is done; the PMI does not support the process anymore. And I don't agree. And I don't believe in that. So let's go, and let's try to figure it out. So on this podcast, I will talk in general about the guide and a standard.
Next week, my plan is to talk about the 12 principles and on the week after, about the 8 performance domains. So let's start with the basics, since the release of the PMBOK Guide in 1987. Of course, the world changes dramatically, and the project management environment changes that dramatically. I just wanted to share with you my own experience, so when I was becoming a PMP and studying in first red, the PMBOK Guide, it was a 19 9 8, and at that time for me, success In a project environment was delivering on time, on budget, on the scope with quality. This, all of you are know, you know, this is a magic triangle that we always talk about.
But what changed at that time? I was not concerned if the project was something good; let’s suppose that the project was a very bad idea, but if you deliver on time on budget, oh, that's good. That's good, no problem. And today, it's different. And with the efforts that PMI putting the place in different versions or trying to create more of the concept of outcome-based, not output. And there is one of the key changes now on this addition. In this edition, the concept of value is the central piece. It's not just delivering on time on budget; it's delivering by value. It's doing the right things, right. It's not just doing things right. You need to do in the right way, the right things.
And these are the critical piece. So this is one of the main aspects of the guide today; it’s talking about how you deliver outcomes. And you will see that many of the principles and many of the performance domains are directly related to this value proposition, and we didn't see this very clear in the previous version.
Another thing that is very important is that the way that the guide was written, and when I say the guide, I need to address one thing. Many people think, oh, the PMBOK is one thing to note, what was published was to books in one it's, one volume or one PDF or one printed the document, but with two different things that complement each other. So the first one, it's the Standard of Project Management or the ANSI standard for project management that was released by PMI, and this standard is where the concept of the principal and the principal based project management takes place; the second piece is the PMBOK Guide Seventh Edition, it’s the way PMI, the Project Management Institute address the standard, and there is where that eight performance domains are explained, and where this information takes place.
So let me go back and try to understand that. The intention of PMI, as far as I know, with the Seventh Edition, is to make a guide that works as an umbrella for all different methods. PMI tried this on the sixth edition, talking about agile and trying to embed agile in the core of the PMBOK, but honestly, many people still saw the PMBOK Six Edition as a predictive approach to project management, that many call a waterfall approach.
With the seventh edition, the first thing that you need to understand is the process, the inputs, tools, and outputs come to at the end? The answer is no, they have not, they are not printed on the pages of the PMBOK Seventh Edition, but they will be available on the PMI standards and available on the PMBOK 6th Edition.
So what happens now is that the new PMBOK now covers principles and performance domains that could be used with any. Let me repeat, because this is a very important point with any approach you may decide to take in your project management delivery.
Let me give you a couple of examples. You can use the PMBOK Seventh with PRINCE2; you can use the PMBOK Seventh with SAFe, with Discipline Agile. You can use the PMBOK Seventh Edition, which Kanban, you can use the PMBOK Seventh Edition, with the PMBOK Sixth Edition.
So they complement each other; they are not just replacing me. Of course, the name is the same, so it gives us a feeling that we are talking just about the same thing, but it's not. So if you go to PMI standard, you can see all the knowledge areas in everything, and they are the way you implement, the principles, and the performance domains.
So let me wrap up that. What is important for you to understand? In order to address the market changes, the standards are comprised into 12 principles that the project manager and the project team; I don't care about the name here; If is Project Manager, if is Scrum Master, whoever you want to call the team and the people working in the project environment, they need to be mindful on 12 principles, that most of them are human-centric, deliver centric, and try to answer this concept of bringing in value and answer to the complexity we see in their environment.
Then the PMBOK Guide is an answer to these 12 principles. Say, look, you should take care of eight performance domains; many people may think the knowledge areas are becoming the performance domain. No, maybe some of them, they will have some similarities like stakeholder, but not all of them. You will see that on both sides, the principle and the performance domain, we see a lot of value. We see a lot of change management embracing change and not avoiding control but embracing change.
This is a big change, and with the principles and the performance domain, you can decide what will be your approach because the performance domains, they are not, oh, you should take care of stakeholders before of value, no, it doesn't matter, all of them are in a holistic set of things you need to take care of your project. So next week, what is my plan? It is to go with you to the 12 principles, trying to make sense of how they look like and what do they cover mainly. And the following week, I will talk about the eight performance domains. And there is the idea that we'll be overarching, have the PMBOK, but don't think that the PMI just gave up on the process in this note; it's the next level we are talking about.
Now we are talking about something that could be applied with anything you do and any methodology or any delivery approach you may decide to use.
I hope you find this podcast useful, and see you the next week with another Five Minutes Podcast.
