L&D project management guide for budding professionals
Do you want to know more about project management and develop these skills? Do you plan to take the next step in your career? If you are ready to take this stage in L&D project management, certain roles, as well as the L&D project manager, include:
- Apprenticeship
- Senior Learning Developer
- Main educational designer
- Senior learning technologist
- Main learning content developer
- Main coach / facilitator
- Learn a trading partner
- Learning project manager
- Multimedia designer, etc.
How can you start?
Always read items of learning and development project management or dedicated PM books, follow learning trends and become visible on social networks by sharing or writing L&D articles. Start looking for descriptions of positions of learning project manager to identify the main roles and responsibilities of your future and desired work. This will help you have an idea of what companies are looking for, required tools, necessary certifications and much more.
If you have still not done so, start looking for a certification in the field of PMs (ideal if you can find something linked to L&D project management – it would be great), and learn from other professionals / PM L&D by shade, networking and participation in specific events and groups. Update your CV, improve your wallet and check the internal roles in the company for which you are currently working. In addition, request external roles outside the company to be hired.
Let us dive deeper into the L&D aspect of project management.
An overview of the L&D project management life cycle
1. Analysis of project needs
Engage the stakeholders with critical questions to identify the requirements and objectives of the project.
2. Kick -off meeting
Make a first meeting to align objectives, clarify roles and establish a shared understanding of the project.
3. Development of the chronology of the project
Describe the project phases – analyze, design, develop, implement, assess – detect tasks, responsibilities and deadlines.
4. Task planning
Define specific tasks, attribute the property and establish clear priorities.
5. Monitoring and updates
Regularly examine progress, provide updates and keep project meetings to quickly guarantee alignment and solve problems.
6. Project closure report
A document from the whole life cycle of the project, in particular:
- Initial project needs.
- Minutes of the meeting of what was discussed during meetings / calls.
- Control tasks and lists completed according to the activities requested.
- Deliverable (the final documentation developed, the equipment, the course links, etc.).
- The lessons learned (including what was going well during the project, including people, tasks, organization, surveillance, challenges, aspects that did not go well, and aspects and opportunities for improvement during the next learning projects).
- Recognition of team efforts and project celebration!
Key methodologies
Pedagogical design methodologies are frameworks or approaches used to systematically create effective, engaging and centered educational experiences. The use of structured frames, such as Addie, Sam or Bloom taxonomy, will effectively guide the project process.
L&D project management tools
Now it's time to identify the tools that a learning project manager can use. For the analysis of the project needs (key questions for your stakeholders), there are preliminary questions that can be used to identify the needs of the project, and I will provide some examples below:
- Goal and objectives
What do we want to achieve thanks to this project? Are there clear and measurable goals? What is the desired result? - Time and deadline
What is the deadline to complete the project? Are there milestones or deliverables along the way? How often should we point out progress? - Allocation of resources and responsibilities
What are the key people involved and what roles have they each? What resources do we have at our disposal (time, budget, equipment)? Who makes the final decisions and who is the main point of contact? - Risks and challenges
What are the risks provided for this project? What preventive measures can we take to manage potential obstacles? How do we manage the last-minute delays or changes? - Tools
What communication channels will we use for updates and questions? Are there dedicated platforms where we can follow progress? How often will we organize exam meetings?
As each project must start with a kick -off meeting, you can use various communication tools. A learning project manager should also develop a project chronology And keep a trace of all project activities. The next step would be to plan all tasks, using project management planning tools with a good design and a lot of features.
The surveillance part includes verification, the supply of project updates and project meetings if necessary or with regularity, and communication tools or e-mails can easily help you. Which can also depend on the type of project. The project closing report can be created in any application for notes, shared by e-mail or presented as a PDF document with a well-organized structure, clear visualization and professional formatting.
Conclusion
We all have different types of work, planning and organization, but this overview serves as a starting point when planning to start a new L&D project management career. It is also useful when you start a new project and you feel uncertain about how to start, organize and manage your projects, or if you are looking for a new inspiration by exploring other project structures.
Originally published on January 11, 2025
