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I am starting a project of going through the 6th Edition of the PMBOK® Guide and blogging about its contents.    The 6th Edition was released on September 22nd by the Project Management Institute, and now that I am done reviewing the first three chapters on projects, the environment in which they are done, and the role of the project manager, I am excited to start the fourth chapter today on the first of the 10 knowledge areas, that of Project Integration Management.

Before going through the 7 processes that are included in this knowledge area, I wanted to state some preliminary ideas presented by PMI in their 6th Edition of the PMBOK® Guide.   In the last post, I discussed the various types of integration that a project manager must master in order to master the profession.   In this post, I talk about some trends and emerging practices in project integration management.

• Automated tools-it is necessary to use a Project Management Information System nowadays (such as Microsoft Project or Primavera) in order to manage the amount of data and information necessary to run a project successfully.   However, they are only useful if you are well versed in the processes which use these data, so that you can understand their context and what they mean for your project and its success.
• Visual management tools–this is an influence from agile, that uses kanban and other visual methods to make process flow more transparent to all members of the team.
• Project knowledge management–this means storing knowledge gained during the project and using it to prevent repeating mistakes.   Lessons learned is not an exercise at the end of a project anymore like it used to be; again as an influence from agile, it is a “continuous improvement” effort during the lifecycle of the project.
• Expanding the project manager’s responsibilities–sometimes project managers are not just tasked with taking an existing project charter written by a sponsor and understanding its key elements, but sometimes they are also asked by a sponsor to create it themselves.   Also, the business case development and a plan for the management of the business value created by the project, traditionally done by business analysts, is sometimes also being asked of project managers.
• Hybrid methodologies–project managers are expected to be fluent not only in traditional waterfall methodologies, the main focus of the PMBOK Guide, but are also needed to be conversant (if not fluent) in agile methodologies, which are the main focus of the Agile Practice Guide that accompanies the 6th edition of the PMBOK Guide.

It is because we live in an increasingly connected world that project managers are expected to carry out additional roles that they weren’t expected to before.   So there is one solution:   EVOLVE!

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