Programme module · Kent Business College
PMP module 2: connect scope, schedule, cost, performance and change in an integrated project controls pack across 14 weekly online sessions.
Build a plan you can explain, a baseline you can defend and a performance report that supports action. Project Planning, Scheduling and Integrated Controls is the second module of KBC’s PMP preparation route. It connects scope, time, resources, cost and performance within one coherent model.
Begin with the requirements and decision context developed in the stakeholder module. Construct the work breakdown, schedule and estimate before examining progress, forecasts and change. The emphasis is on understanding the relationships between these elements and the consequences when one changes.
Kent Business College, UK, delivers 14 weekly online sessions of two hours: 28 live teaching hours, supported by reading, calculation practice and applied work. Together, the two PMP modules provide 28 sessions and 56 live teaching hours. The integrated pack also creates a foundation for further study in AI, risk, earned value and project controls.
Explore the focus and practical output of each teaching session. Open individual sessions below, or expand the complete plan.
Read a project brief, requirements or suitable technical source. Identify deliverables, interfaces, exclusions and assumptions, and explain how safety, sustainability and acceptance requirements affect the work to be planned.
Practical output: A bounded scope statement with acceptance criteria and an assumptions record.
Organise the scope into a work breakdown and coding approach that connects responsibility, schedule and cost. Test completeness, avoid double counting and trace how a work item appears across different records.
Practical output: A linked work breakdown, coding structure and responsibility view.
Define activities, durations, milestones and logical relationships. Examine missing links, unjustified lags and imposed dates, and explain the network manually before relying on scheduling software.
Practical output: A logic-linked schedule with a clear explanation of its dependencies.
Find the activities that govern completion and distinguish float from spare capacity. Examine calendars, resource availability and compression choices, explaining their implications for time, cost, quality and risk.
Practical output: A schedule critique and a compared resource or compression scenario.
Compare analogous, parametric and bottom-up approaches for the available information. Make quantities, rates, sources, exclusions and uncertainty explicit, and distinguish an estimate from an authorised budget.
Practical output: A transparent estimate with its basis, assumptions and limitations.
Check scope coverage, quantities, rates and benchmark comparability. Examine how procurement lead times, payment arrangements and contractual responsibilities influence a proposed delivery approach and its estimate.
Practical output: An estimate-assurance review and a commercial consistency check.
Bring scope, schedule, resources and cost into a coherent reference for control. Define approval responsibilities, measurement rules and reporting arrangements, and identify unresolved conditions before recommending baseline acceptance.
Practical output: A defended baseline proposal and proportionate project controls plan.
Select evidence-based rules for measuring work. Distinguish time elapsed, effort spent and achieved outputs, and inspect whether reported percentages reflect observable completion within the agreed scope.
Practical output: A measurement rulebook and a worked progress-evidence example.
Calculate planned value, earned value and actual cost using a consistent scope and reporting date. Explain cost and schedule indicators together and investigate causes before proposing a response.
Practical output: Checked performance calculations with a plain-English variance commentary.
Compare remaining-work estimates with forecasts informed by observed performance. Test when historical productivity remains relevant, and explore the effect of a late interface, resource restriction or changed assumption.
Practical output: A forecast comparison showing methods, assumptions and plausible scenarios.
Trace a proposed change through scope, schedule, resources, cost, commercial commitments and risk. Distinguish a corrective action from a baseline change and identify the decision authority and consequences of delay.
Practical output: An integrated change recommendation with a traceable approval route.
Trace information from source through validation and reporting. Review access, versions, error handling and audit records, then check any AI-assisted narrative or calculation against the source and an independent manual method.
Practical output: A validated reporting workflow with checks, limitations and human responsibilities.
Turn the connected controls evidence into a focused management recommendation. Explain what is known, what remains uncertain and what action is needed, drawing on the audience and decision skills developed in Module 1.
Practical output: A decision-focused controls report supported by an inspectable evidence pack.
Challenge the baseline, progress evidence and forecasting method. Respond to a changed assumption without relying on a prepared script, revise the pack after feedback and identify the next improvement to the controls process.
Practical output: A revised integrated controls pack and a defended improvement recommendation.
Apply the learning
Follow one bounded project or work package from requirements to baseline and then to a performance decision. Develop connected scope, schedule, estimate and control information; introduce a status update and a proposed change; then explain the response you recommend. Keep the model small enough for its assumptions and calculations to be inspected, even where software supports the work.
Use anonymised, public or suitable synthetic material where workplace information is confidential. The issued assessment brief confirms the required evidence.
Teaching and the relevant course certificate are provided through Kent Business College in the UK. A Kent Business College course certificate is distinct from a separate professional-body qualification or examination. Eligibility, the exact award and any examination inclusions are confirmed for the chosen route.
A schedule, estimate and dashboard can each look plausible while describing different versions of the project. Integration begins with shared scope, codes, responsibilities and assumptions. You learn to trace a deliverable through the work breakdown, its activities, resource demand, cost and reporting position.
This makes assurance practical. When a scope item changes, you can identify the affected schedule and cost records. When progress is reported, you can explain which output it represents and the evidence supporting completion. The objective is a model that another professional can follow, question and use.
The curriculum first builds the components of the model, then asks you to coordinate them in a performance decision. This sequence gives meaning to later calculations: a variance is useful only when the baseline, scope and measurement rule are understood.
Each applied stage improves earlier work. An assurance finding about the estimate basis remains relevant when you forecast the outturn. A weak completion rule must be corrected before its earned value result can support a recommendation. The final pack therefore shows development across the module.
Explain the scope, breakdown and initial network, with the assumptions that connect them.
Develop the estimate, baseline and controls plan, identifying approval conditions and limitations.
Use progress evidence to explain the outlook and assess a proposed change.
Integrate the records, respond to challenge and propose a proportionate improvement.
An indicator is a signal to investigate, not a complete explanation. A favourable cost position can coexist with delayed work or incomplete cost information. You examine the data date, measurement basis and underlying conditions before deciding what an index means.
Forecasting then asks what is likely to happen to the remaining work. Compare methods, explain the assumptions and test their sensitivity to a changed interface, resource or productivity condition. A useful recommendation identifies which action could affect the outcome and who has authority to decide.
Predictive, adaptive and hybrid contexts require different levels of detail and different planning rhythms. You compare how controlled milestones, rolling-wave planning and feedback can work together, selecting an arrangement that fits the project rather than treating the most detailed schedule as automatically the most useful.
The module introduces the path from source data through validation and reporting. You examine access, versions, audit records and error handling, then consider where an automated workflow or AI assistant could help.
Any AI-assisted summary or suggestion is checked against the underlying source. Calculations are tested independently, limitations are recorded and consequential decisions retain a clear human owner. The outcome is a validated baseline and data definitions that can support later AI learning, rather than a report whose logic nobody can explain.
The subject connects to KBC’s PMO Module 2, Project Planning, Scheduling and Integrated Controls. Its knowledge essay and professional-practice portfolio each carry 50% within that module. The issued cohort brief determines the precise task, word count and criteria.
The knowledge component evaluates planning and controls across predictive, adaptive and hybrid delivery, considering integration, contracts, governance and assurance. The practice component demonstrates your substantive contribution to an integrated package, including status or performance information, change, decisions and improvement. A first baseline is a foundation for that work, not the whole practice submission.
PMO reflective commentary explains your choices and learning. Where artefacts also support a Project Controls Professional evidence bank, factual accounts and reflection are prepared for their respective assessment purposes. Shared material requires separate mapping and an attributable account of your own contribution.
No. Scheduling is one part of an integrated model that also includes scope, resources, estimates, baselines, progress, forecasts and change. You explain their connections and use them to support a management decision.
The learning focuses on transferable planning and controls principles, with a model small enough to inspect manually. KBC confirms any software, access or templates required for your cohort.
You use practical arithmetic, percentages, network logic and performance calculations. The emphasis is on selecting valid inputs, checking units and dates, and explaining the meaning and limits of the result.
This module introduces earned value within a wider integrated controls model. The separate EVM programme develops specialist performance-measurement and forecasting capability in greater depth.
Discuss your existing knowledge with KBC. The teaching assumes you can explain stakeholder requirements, decision authority and reporting purpose. Equivalent preparation may be considered within an agreed learning plan.
It can develop relevant knowledge and evidence, but completion of a separate qualification depends on its full requirements and assessment. Your tutor or assessor identifies the mapping and any further workplace development needed.
Further reading and programme references · reviewed 18 October 2026
