Practising people and the integrated elements

PRINCE2 7 describes the method as five integrated elements: the principles, the people element, the practices, the processes and the project context. Exams test the structure itself, because candidates need to know how the elements fit together, and they test the people element in depth, because PRINCE2 7 gave it a much bigger place than earlier editions. People questions cover leadership, teams, communication, organizational change and culture, and they connect closely to the organizing practice, which defines roles and responsibilities. This lesson revises the points that exams test most often and then works through original practice questions, including a matching question of the kind that costs Practitioner candidates the most marks.

The five integrated elements

The elements are integrated, so questions often cross them. A question about the board's response to a stakeholder complaint involves people (relationships and communication), organizing (who decides), issues (capturing the complaint) and directing a project (the board's process). When a question seems to fit several elements, ask which one the stem is really testing: who should act, what product should hold the information, or which behaviour is appropriate.

The people element: what exams test

The people element recognizes that projects are delivered by people and create change for people. PRINCE2 7 discusses how project managers lead teams, often across organizations, how they communicate with stakeholders, how they handle the organizational change that projects cause, and how culture affects the way the method should be applied. Exam questions in this area tend to test four ideas.

First, projects create change, and change affects people. The project manager is responsible for delivering the project's outputs, but the outcomes and benefits depend on people adopting them. The project therefore needs to understand who is affected, plan how they will be supported and work with the business areas that will own the change after handover.

Second, leadership and teamwork matter at every level. The project manager leads a team that may include staff from different organizations with different cultures and loyalties. Building shared purpose, agreeing ways of working and dealing with conflict early are part of the job, not optional extras.

Third, communication is planned. PRINCE2 7 includes a communication management approach describing how and when the project will communicate with its stakeholders, including the format, frequency and channels. Exams test that stakeholder engagement is identified early, during starting up and initiating, and reviewed as the project changes.

Fourth, culture shapes tailoring. An organization with a formal, hierarchical culture may need more formal reporting; a team used to agile ways of working may need lighter controls and more frequent conversation. Tailoring that ignores culture tends to fail even if it looks correct on paper.

Organizing: roles that decide questions

Many people questions are really organizing questions. The organizing practice sets out four levels: the business layer, which commissions the project and sets project tolerances; directing, by the project board; managing, by the project manager; and delivering, by team managers and teams. The board represents three interests: business (the executive), user (one or more senior users) and supplier (one or more senior suppliers). Project assurance acts for board members, project support helps the project manager, and the board may delegate change authority within limits.

Combining roles is allowed with limits. The executive and project manager roles should not be combined, because directing and managing must stay separate. Project assurance should not be combined with project support or with the project manager, because assurance must be independent of the people it checks. Senior user and executive can be combined on small internal projects, and the project manager can act as team manager when there is no separate team.

Foundation-style practice

Practitioner-style practice: the library accessibility upgrade

Scenario extract. Harbour City Libraries' accessibility upgrade (1.4 million, five stages) renovates entrances, washrooms and service desks at four branches. The executive is the director of library services. The senior user role is shared by the head of branch services and a representative of the library's accessibility advisory committee. The architect's firm and the general contractor each provide a senior supplier. Branch staff are anxious about working in partly closed buildings, and the advisory committee has complained that it learned about design changes from social media.

Accessibility is also a compliance matter: the library's design must meet provincial accessibility standards for public spaces and the building code's barrier-free requirements. In exam terms, those obligations shape quality criteria and stakeholder engagement, and an accessibility advisory committee is a natural source of user representation and assurance.

Tracking people questions

People questions are newer and less familiar to candidates who learned earlier editions, so Ana tracked them separately. The program below estimates how many people-related marks a candidate gains by moving from 55 % to 75 % accuracy on them, given an assumed share of the paper.

total_marks = 70
share_people = 0.15      # assumed share of marks touching people and organizing
people_marks = total_marks * share_people
for acc in (0.55, 0.65, 0.75, 0.85):
    print(f"accuracy {acc:.0%}: about {people_marks * acc:4.1f} of {people_marks:.1f} people marks")
gain = people_marks * (0.75 - 0.55)
print(f"moving from 55 % to 75 % adds about {gain:.1f} marks")

accuracy 55%: about  5.8 of 10.5 people marks
accuracy 65%: about  6.8 of 10.5 people marks
accuracy 75%: about  7.9 of 10.5 people marks
accuracy 85%: about  8.9 of 10.5 people marks
moving from 55 % to 75 % adds about 2.1 marks

If about a seventh of the marks touch people and organizing, improving from 55 % to 75 % on them adds about two marks. Two marks sound small, but many failing candidates miss the pass mark by fewer than five.

Questions about the business layer

The business layer sits outside the project but appears in many questions. It commissions the project through the project mandate, sets project tolerances, appoints the executive, receives escalations when project tolerances are forecast to be exceeded and, after closure, owns the realization of many benefits. Questions often test whether a decision belongs to the board or to the business layer. A decision within project tolerance belongs to the board; a decision that would breach project tolerance, or change the project's purpose or funding beyond what the business layer authorized, belongs to the business layer. In the accessibility upgrade, for example, the city capital programme acts as a funding partner and part of the business layer, so a request to add a fifth branch would go beyond the board's authority.

Remember too that the people element applies to the project management team itself. A board whose members rarely meet, or whose senior users do not have the authority to commit user resources, will struggle to direct the project, and Practitioner questions sometimes ask what the executive should do when a board member is not fulfilling the role.