Calgary APLN Social
Agile Business Conference 2009

PMBOK v4 and Agile mappings

PMBOK pdf For the attendees of my recent Las Vegas course, below is a link to the PMBOK v4 to Agile mappings we discussed. My previous course material mappings were based on PMBOK v3, and before that the 2000 edition, which are out of date now.

 

Quite a lot changed from the PMBOK v3 to v4; all the processes were renamed into the new verb-noun format. Six of the old processes were merged into four new ones, two processes were deleted, and two new ones added. So it seemed like time to redo the mappings and post them online this time.

 

Cautions

Process guidelines and templates are not an acceptable replacement for common sense, thought, dialog, or collaboration. A fool with a tool is still a fool, but can be especially dangerous since they give the impression that they have a potential solution to tricky problems. Beware of simply following any project guidelines that seem counter to your objectives.

 

So, why would you want to be mapping the PMBOK v4 to Agile techniques anyway?...

Recommendations

 

  • Well, perhaps you are collaborating with a PMO group or stakeholder who is currently tied to a PMBOK based approach? Maybe these mapping are a starting point for a conversation?

  • Perhaps you are comfortable with the PMBOK v4 approach yet would like to see where agile tools may help on a project?

  • Perhaps your organization mandates a PMBOK based approach and you are looking to agile-it-up-a-bit by seeing what you can swap out, but still remain within the general remit of your company’s process?

Whatever your reason, please be aware that my interpretation of the PMBOK processes and agile processes is quite flexible. I have no qualms about bending, augmenting, or changing a process if it makes sense to do so on a project and I have stakeholder agreement. I don’t have a lot of time for the “Process Police” or “Agile Zealots” who say things have to be done “just-so”. As a project manager I am tasked with delivering successful projects as defined by the stakeholders, so far “adherence to standards” has never been suggested as their highest priority. I suspect this is the case for most project managers too, but if you are an auditor or “process purest” you may want to stay out.

 

Otherwise, click here to see the interactive map of PMBOK v4 processes. Then click on any process name in the map to see the mapping notes.

Comments

Scott Duncan

Nice summary...thanks.

Just one editorial correction: there are two 9.3's on the chart. The linked to page for the 2nd shows 9.4, so it's just the diagram that needs adjusting.

Mike Griffiths

Hi Duncan,

Thanks for pointing that out. I plan on re-doing the image to make it slightly larger anyway so I will fix that up.

The Image Mapping is slow to do so this will probably be next week now - but I appreciate you pointing it out.

Cheers
Mike

Mike Griffiths

Hey Scott,

Just so you know, I have now fixed up that typo and created a larger version of the map that can be found on the top right of my blog as the 3rd item in the "Services" section.

or here: http://leadinganswers.typepad.com/leading_answers/pmbok-v4-process-mappings-large-format.html

Regards
Mike

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