Weekly online
Join interactive online teaching, with guided reading, practical activities and assessment work around the live sessions. Your written course plan confirms the timetable, learning hours and masterclass arrangements for this module.
Professional learning · Project Controls & Management
Planning, Controlling & Leading a Project.
Build a workable plan—and the commitment to deliver it.
Planning, control and leadership need to work together. A technically sound plan can still fail if ownership is weak, information arrives late or the team cannot resolve competing demands. This applied course connects the foundations of project definition, work breakdown, estimating and scheduling with progress control, communication and leadership. It draws on Albert Lester’s Project Management, Planning and Control and contemporary PMI guidance, using a developing case to make the relationships practical. You learn to explain what should happen, establish how progress will be judged and lead the conversations needed when reality differs from the plan.
Weekly routeAgree your timetable
Live online2 hours a week
Module startsOctober · February · June
Learning structure1 module
The professional challenge
Make the next decision with more confidence.
The plan contains dates and tasks, but dependencies are unclear and the team has different views of what ‘complete’ means. When progress slips, the discussion becomes a negotiation over numbers. The course helps establish shared expectations, credible control information and a constructive way to decide the next action.
Who will benefit
For project managers, team leaders, engineers, coordinators and professionals taking greater responsibility for delivering a project or workstream. It is useful where a role combines planning and reporting with stakeholder communication, team coordination and day-to-day decisions about priorities and change.
What you take back to work
Practical capability, built through learning.
- Define a project’s purpose, scope, success criteria and responsibilities clearly.
- Develop a reasoned work breakdown, estimates and schedule with visible assumptions and dependencies.
- Use progress, cost and change information to support practical control decisions.
- Lead team and stakeholder conversations that create ownership, resolve disagreement and support delivery.
Inside the course
A connected learning journey.
A 14-session teaching model can move from definition and planning into control, leadership and a final integrated case. The proposed learning blocks combine verified book topics into a practical sequence. The timetable for this course remains to be confirmed; this mapping should not be turned into an invented course duration or external syllabus.
01Purpose, scope and a shared definition of success
Examine the relationship between the business need, project objectives, requirements and success criteria. Clarify what is included, what is excluded and who has authority to agree the work. Compare different project contexts and life cycles, recognising how uncertainty affects the planning approach. Use a concise project brief to create a common reference for later commitments and decisions.
Apply it at work: Develop a project brief with scope boundaries, success measures, assumptions and approval responsibilities.
02Work breakdown, estimates and responsibilities
Translate the project’s scope into manageable work and assign clear responsibility for outputs. Explore estimating approaches and the information needed to support them, making assumptions and uncertainty visible. Connect the work breakdown with the project management plan, resource needs and acceptance expectations. Challenge whether the level of detail is sufficient for coordination without becoming difficult to maintain.
Apply it at work: Create a work breakdown and responsibility matrix with a documented basis for key estimates.
03Schedule logic and achievable commitments
Build a schedule from the way work depends on other work, rather than imposing dates without explanation. Explore milestones, network logic, duration, float and resource loading. Consider the effect of interfaces, calendars and constraints on commitments. Compare feasible alternatives and explain the consequences of acceleration, so the plan can support a realistic discussion with the team and sponsor.
Apply it at work: Develop a simple network and milestone plan, then test a resource constraint or changed dependency.
04Progress control and informed intervention
Establish a baseline, progress measures and a regular review cycle. Connect actual achievement, remaining work and cost information with the forecast, using control reports to identify decisions rather than merely record history. Consider change and configuration so that the team understands which commitments remain approved. Evaluate corrective options and record the reasons for the selected action.
Apply it at work: Prepare a progress review and change recommendation with clear evidence, options and an accountable owner.
05Leadership, communication and difficult conversations
Explore team formation, motivation, leadership, negotiation and conflict through project situations. Consider how roles, expectations and communication influence cooperation, particularly across functional boundaries. Practise listening and explaining trade-offs when priorities differ. Connect the human discussion to the project evidence so that an agreed action is both understood and capable of being followed through.
Apply it at work: Rehearse a progress conversation, a negotiation over resources and a response to disagreement within the team.
06Risk, handover and learning
Bring risk, quality and stakeholder expectations into the final delivery and handover conversation. Confirm what acceptance requires, who will use the output and what information or capability must transfer. Examine closure and review as opportunities to understand how decisions affected results. Use the integrated case to reflect on the balance between a workable plan, effective controls and leadership.
Apply it at work: Produce a handover and closure checklist with a short lessons review and a personal improvement action.
Learn around your working life
Time to understand. Space to apply.
Online or in a city near you
Face-to-face delivery can be arranged in London, Maidstone, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds and Liverpool. Your course offer confirms the venue and teaching dates.
A London masterclass to start your module
Meet your tutors and fellow professionals at an optional full-day London event. KBC covers the event, agreed transportation, refreshments and an open buffet dinner. Confirm arrangements with the team before booking travel.
Support between sessions
Return to class recordings and learning resources, bring questions to your tutor and use free one-to-one tutoring and coaching support. Your course plan sets out the guided reading and practice needed alongside live teaching.
Your route to recognition
Know what the assessment involves.
Practical exercises can demonstrate learning through a project brief, work breakdown, schedule, progress review and leadership reflection. The final course brief should confirm the required KBC submissions and completion standard. No separate awarding-body examination has been verified for this named course. It should therefore be presented as applied professional development, with any external certification named only if it is explicitly included in the learner’s confirmed offer.
Your written offer records the award or course completion requirements, any examination fees included, and the relevant eligibility checks.
The professional knowledge behind the course
Explore the books and standards.
The learning themes above bring together the relevant guide, syllabus and workplace practice. KBC’s teaching sequence connects these ideas through discussion and application.
- Project Management, Planning and Control: Managing Engineering, Construction and Manufacturing Projects to PMI, APM and BSI Standards ↗Albert Lester / Butterworth-Heinemann, Elsevier · Seventh Edition,2017
Verified chapters on project definition, business case, stakeholders, WBS, estimating, planning, networks, progress, resources, cost, communication, team building, leadership, negotiation, conflict, governance and closeout.
- PMBOK Guide and The Standard for Project Management ↗Project Management Institute · Eighth Edition,2025
Contemporary value, life-cycle, tailoring, leadership and integrated performance-domain context.
- KBC professional course catalogue ↗Kent Business College · Existing professional offer reviewed 10 September 2026
Published course identity: Planning, Controlling & Leading a Project.
Your investment
Get a course offer that fits your route.
Request the standalone fee for your chosen format, including the teaching, reading materials, assessment and membership arrangements relevant to this course.
Exploring the full PCP apprenticeship?
£27,000 apprenticeship funding + £7,000 additional IPC support. The IPC package covers professional examinations, memberships, graduation, Benenden Health membership, London masterclasses and agreed transport.
These figures relate to the complete Project Controls Professional apprenticeship. Standalone course fees are separate. The team confirms eligibility, any employer contribution and the contents of your written offer.
Explore the PCP pathway →Your questions, answered.
Is this suitable for someone newly leading projects?
Yes, particularly where you already coordinate work and want a more structured approach. The course connects planning fundamentals with the practical leadership responsibilities that often arrive before a formal project-manager title.
Will I need specialist scheduling software?
The central skills can be explored through a manageable case and accessible planning tools. Any software requirements should be confirmed before enrolment; the aim is to understand the plan and its logic.
Does this award PMP or an APM qualification?
No external award has been verified for this course title. It develops applied capability. PMP and other professional qualifications have their own specified preparation, eligibility and assessment routes.
What would this help you achieve?
Talk to KBC about your experience, your goals and the right learning route for you.