Program Management Suite of Courses
Plan with rigor. Execute with confidence. Deliver on time and budget.
Build the program management capabilities your team needs to move from contract award to successful delivery. Shipley’s program management courses cover the full program and project lifecycle, with practical tools for government contracting and other contract-driven environments.
Choose individual courses from the menu below, combine topics into a tailored workshop, or select the four-day Program Management Boot Camp. Our training coordinator will help you align the content, schedule, and delivery format with your organization’s processes and priorities.
Workshop Description:
This hands-on training helps program managers and their cross-functional partners establish programs, build traceable baselines, manage schedule and cost, control risk and change, oversee subcontractors and suppliers, and transition through production and closeout. Relevant courses incorporate MIL-STD-881F, Integrated Master Plan and Integrated Master Schedule (IMP/IMS), Earned Value Management System (EVMS), and Integrated Baseline Review (IBR/IIBR) practices.
Select the courses that address your team’s needs. Exercises and labs help participants apply the material through kickoff plans, work breakdown structures, schedules, cost baselines, risk registers, review packages, and closeout tools.
For comprehensive training, the four-day Boot Camp follows four themes: Stand Up and Structure; Baselines, Risk and Forecasting; Governance and External Execution; and Production, Change and Closeout. It concludes with a capstone review of a consolidated Program Baseline and Readiness package. Pre-award and negotiation courses are available when tailoring your workshop.
Use the following course menu to plan your workshop with our training coordinator. Course lengths provide a starting point for selecting content and arranging delivery.
1. Contract Pre-Award Activities
Length: ½ day
Turn proposal commitments into executable baselines and prepare for a smooth transition to contract execution.
- The program manager’s role in proposal development and pre-award planning
- Baselines, management reserve, and startup risk
- Pre-award checklists and planning templates
Practical application: Use checklists and templates to prepare for contract startup.
2. Contract Negotiations
Length: 1 day
Plan, conduct, and document federal contract negotiations that support fair and reasonable agreements.
- Negotiation objectives, fact-finding, zone of possible agreement (ZOPA), and best alternative to a negotiated agreement (BATNA)
- Bargaining techniques and responses to aggressive tactics
- Cost and price analysis, profit, and negotiation documentation
Practical application: Apply preparation and bargaining techniques to contract negotiations.
3. Project Setup and Program Kickoff
Length: ½ day
Establish the operating framework for a new contract and lead a kickoff that gives the team clear priorities and ownership.
- Contract and finance setup, transaction controls, charge numbers, and decision authorities
- Kickoff attendees, agenda, artifacts, and action owners
- People, process, and tool readiness; program plans, tailoring, intellectual property review, organization charts, and day-30 deliverables
Practical application: Build a kickoff package and 30-day action plan.
4. WBS Development
Length: ½ day
Build a product-oriented Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) using MIL-STD-881F principles to establish complete, traceable scope.
- Alignment with the statement of work, specifications, and contract line items
- Control accounts, Control Account Manager (CAM) ownership, and measurable work packages
- Connections to the Organizational Breakdown Structure (OBS), IMS, and EVMS
Practical application: Draft a WBS and WBS Dictionary excerpt for a sample scope.
5. Technical Schedule, Opportunity, and Quality Management
Length: ½ day
Build an executable technical schedule that integrates opportunities, quality requirements, and readiness events.
- IMP/IMS milestones, durations, dependencies, resources, and vertical and horizontal traceability
- The 14-Point IMS Health Check and critical and near-critical path analysis
- Acceptance criteria, required data deliverables, verification events, and readiness and quality reviews
Practical application: Create an initial IMS segment with quality gates and acceptance criteria.
6. Cost and Risk Management
Length: 1 day or two ½-day modules
Establish cost and performance baselines, apply Earned Value, and connect risk to credible forecasts and monthly program control.
- Performance Measurement Baseline (PMB), direct and indirect costs, management reserve, and time-phasing by WBS
- Earned Value measures including BCWS, BCWP, ACWP, CPI/SPI, and cost and schedule variances
- Estimate at Completion (EAC), Estimate to Complete (ETC), monthly control cycles, and risk and opportunity handling
Practical application: Time-phase a sample PMB, calculate Earned Value metrics, and connect risk information to the forecast.
The full-day course combines cost and baseline management with risk and opportunity management. When tailoring your workshop, the risk portion can be selected separately through the half-day course below.
7. Risk and Opportunity Management
Length: ½ day
Identify, assess, handle, and monitor risks and opportunities across cost, schedule, and technical performance.
- Likelihood and consequence scoring; avoidance, mitigation, transfer, acceptance, and escalation
- Burn-down plans and handling tasks integrated into the IMS
- Schedule Risk Assessment using three-point estimates and Monte Carlo outputs, including criticality and duration sensitivity
- Level-4/5 risks and opportunities in EAC forecasts and management reserve decisions
Practical application: Build risk and opportunity entries, prepare schedule risk inputs, and link significant items to the EAC.
8. Program Reviews
Length: ½ day
Conduct program reviews that validate performance, support decisions, and drive corrective action.
- Monthly Status Review design, performance metrics, and required artifacts
- IBR/IIBR preparation and CAM interviews
- Critical and near-critical path analysis, EAC validation, findings, and corrective action tracking
Practical application: Conduct a mock IBR CAM interview and build an action log.
9. Subcontractor Management
Length: ½ day
Manage subcontractor scope, schedule, cost, and performance throughout the program lifecycle.
- Requirements flow-down into subcontract statements of work and WBS elements
- Major subcontract visibility in EVMS; deliverables and critical parts integrated into the IMS
- Status and EAC reviews, scorecards, readiness checks, escalation, and corrective action
Practical application: Add a major subcontract to the WBS and IMS and establish review metrics.
10. Supply Chain Management
Length: ½ day
Protect program milestones through material readiness, procurement planning, and supplier performance management.
- Resource-loaded and baselined material tasks in the IMS
- Long-lead and end-of-life critical parts, procurement timing, and critical path impacts
- Supplier scorecards, readiness reviews, manufacturing readiness, and early escalation
Practical application: Build a material plan segment and critical-part trackers tied to IMS logic.
11. Subcontractor and Supply Chain Management (Combined)
Length: ½ to 1 day
Select this combined course for an integrated view of subcontractor oversight and supply chain execution. It brings together supplier and subcontract scope in the WBS and IMS, performance and EAC reviews, quality and risk, purchase order changes, requirements flow-down, and supplier closeout.
Choose the individual courses or the combined course based on the depth and emphasis your team needs.
12. Transition to Production, Change Management, and Closeout
Length: ½ day
Move from development to production, control baseline changes, and complete contract closeout.
- Technology and Manufacturing Readiness Level (TRL/MRL) assessments and Production Readiness Reviews (PRRs)
- Yield, quality, throughput, and supplier manufacturing readiness measures
- Baseline Change Requests (BCRs), Class I and II changes, impact analysis, and configuration control
- Deliverable acceptance, funding and invoice reconciliation, property disposition, subcontract and supplier closure, final documentation, and lessons learned
Practical application: Develop production readiness checklists and metrics, a sample BCR showing PMB and IMS impacts, and a closeout checklist.
In the four-day Boot Camp, participants bring these tools together in a capstone briefing covering kickoff, WBS and IMS, cost baselines and forecasts, risk and opportunity management, supplier and subcontract plans, production readiness, change control, and closeout.
Plan Your Workshop
Contact our training coordinator at training@shipleywins.com to select courses, discuss your team’s priorities, and explore delivery options and pricing. Training is available in person, virtually, or in a hybrid format. Pricing follows Shipley’s standard model and is based on the number of delivery days.
Who Should Attend
- Program and Project Managers
- Control Account Managers and Program Controls Professionals
- Engineering, Technical, and Quality Leads
- Finance, Cost, and Scheduling Professionals
- Contracts and Subcontract Managers
- Supply Chain and Procurement Professionals
- Cross-functional team members supporting program planning and execution
Certification
- Applied toward Shipley Certification elective credits
Workshop Length
Individual courses range from ½ day to 1 day. Combine courses into a tailored workshop, arrange multiple sessions, or select the four-day Program Management Boot Camp. Final length depends on your selected topics and desired depth.
Workshop Materials
Materials support the selected courses and may include slides, planning templates, kickoff agendas, WBS and IMS starters, Earned Value and EAC worksheets, risk and opportunity trackers, review checklists, and closeout tools.
