0.14 A glossary of project management terms

Every discipline has its own vocabulary, and project management is no exception. Part of the process of successfully deploying project management in your organization is to standardize the terminology. That way, when one person talks about risks, scope, issues, requirements, and other project management concerns, everyone else knows what he or she is referring to. This glossary contains common terms used in project management and can help start the standardization process.

Assumption

There may be external circumstances or events that must occur for the project to be successful (or that should happen to increase your chances of success). If you believe that the probability of the event occurring is acceptable, you could list it as an assumption. An assumption has a probability between 0 and 100%. That is, it is not impossible that the event will occur (0%) and it is not a fact (100%). It is somewhere in between. Assumptions are important because they set the context in which the entire remainder of the project is defined. If an assumption doesn't come through, the estimate and the rest of the project definition may no longer be valid.

Bac

Budget at completion (BAC) is the sum of all budgets allocated to a project.

Backward pass

Calculation of the latest finish times by working from finish-to-start for the uncompleted portion of a network of activities.

Balanced matrix

An organizational matrix where functions and projects have the same priority.

Bar chart

A view of the project schedule that uses horizontal bars on a time scale to depict activity information; frequently called a Gantt chart.

Baseline

The value or condition against which all future measurements will be compared.

Baseline cost

The amount of money an activity was intended to cost when the baseline plan was established.

Baseline dates

Original planned start and finished dates for an activity. Used to compare with current planned dates to determine any delays. Also used to calculate budgeted cost of work scheduled in earned value analysis.

Baseline plan

The original plan (for a project, a work package, or an activity), plus or minus approved changes. Usually used with a modifier, e.g., cost baseline, schedule baseline, performance measurement baseline, etc.

Best practices

Techniques that agencies may use to help detect problems in the acquisition, management, and administration of service contracts. Best practices are practical techniques gained from experience that have been shown to produce best results.

Beta testing

Pre-release testing in which a sampling of the intended customer base tries out the product.

Bottom-up cost estimate

The approach to making a cost estimate or plan in which detailed estimates are made for every task shown in the work breakdown structure and then summed to provide a total cost estimate or plan for the project.

Brainstorming

The unstructured and dynamic generation of ideas by a group of people where anything and everything is acceptable, particularly useful in generating a list of potential project risks.