Prince2 and iMedia Project Management update

Prince2 Project Management training has moved to a new level called Prince2 Professional in January 2012. We've discussed the previous 2 levels, Foundation and Practitioner, before. Just to put things in context though, Prince2 qualifications are often stipulated for any UK government projects and for any contractors that they may employ in the course of a project. Hence the knock-on effects on iMedia project management since the UK government spawns a lot of work for our industry.

In our previous discussions Prince2 - the name arises out of Projects in a Controlled Environment - took the lead for project management training because it organised any project into controllable pieces, it gave a common language and approach for people across disciplines, and it gained credibility through its moderated exam paths. We backed it as giving you an edge in the employability stakes too. Our own project management methodology reinforces and extends Prince’s. iMedia project managers found it useful to apply the Prince2 methods to iMedia projects instead of mythical mainstream business projects.

So, here we are a few years later and over 250,000 project managers have the qualification in the UK. Now people are saying that it doesn’t provide the 'differential' for employability anymore because of its popularity. Enter the new level qualification: Prince2 Professional. It has a new-style exam based on assessment of applying the Prince2 process to a case study. But you have to work on teams/groups, it doesn't involve multiple-choice questions, and you will be assessed against competency criteria by moderators interviewing you as well as assessing your interaction with your team colleagues. See Balance Global, Jackie Hewitt, 6th February 2012.

This qualification takes two and a half days at an assessment centre. Sounds tough and apparently it is. On top of that, the pass rate is projected to be worse than the Practitioner rate of 73%. See Digital Arts 31st January 2012.

I tried to find information for you on the costs of this new Professional Course but failed. The closest I got was through the APMG’s (Association of Project Management) pdf describing the course and saying that assessment centre fees varied! However, seeing as the Foundation and Practitioner courses were, by reputation, expensive ... hold onto your proverbial hats!