Weekly online
Each four-month module includes 14 interactive two-hour classes and one reading week, following an optional full-day London masterclass. Read selected material, practise between sessions and bring your questions back to the group.
Professional learning · Project Controls & Management
Project Planning & Control.
Build a plan that survives contact with real delivery.
A credible schedule gives people more than dates: it explains the work, the assumptions behind it and the decisions needed to keep delivery moving. This course develops your ability to connect scope, time, resources and cost in one coherent control approach. You will work from an initial brief towards a practical project plan, then respond to changing information through reporting and controlled updates. The reading combines APM’s official PPC guide with Albert Lester’s supplementary text from KBC’s collection. The emphasis is on reasoning clearly about delivery and communicating an achievable way forward.
Weekly route4 months
Live online2 hours a week
Module startsOctober · February · June
Learning structure1 module
The professional challenge
Make the next decision with more confidence.
The project has a deadline, but everyone is working from a different version of the plan. A late design decision affects procurement, a shared specialist is overallocated, and the monthly report says little about recovery. How can you produce an agreed baseline and a useful conversation about the next decision?
Who will benefit
For project managers, planners, project-control staff and PMO colleagues who prepare, challenge or report delivery plans. It is particularly useful when your role involves joining information from engineering, finance, suppliers and delivery teams, or explaining why an apparently reasonable completion date still depends on unresolved assumptions and resource decisions.
What you take back to work
Practical capability, built through learning.
- Translate a brief into structured scope and accountable work packages.
- Build and challenge logic, estimates and resource assumptions.
- Explain performance against an agreed baseline.
- Recommend controlled recovery actions and preserve a reliable record.
Inside the course
A connected learning journey.
KBC’s proposed four-month module comprises 14 sessions: 1–2 definition; 3–5 estimates and resources; 6–8 scheduling; 9–11 monitoring and recovery; 12–14 change, integration and review. Reading and workplace practice sit between sessions. This is KBC’s teaching sequence, not the guide’s chapter structure or APMG’s prescribed training duration.
01Define the work before promising the date
Reading connection: APM guide chapters 2–6 and 8: business case, scope, requirements, stakeholders and breakdown structures.
Explore the relationship between purpose, scope, requirements and the way work is broken down. In KBC’s proposed exercise, a client asks for a facility upgrade while several requirements remain vague. You will decide what must be clarified, what can be assumed provisionally and who should accept each deliverable before detailed scheduling begins.
Apply it at work: Create a scope summary, work breakdown and acceptance checklist.
02Turn assumptions into defensible estimates
Reading connection: APM guide chapters 7, 11–12 and section 16.3: planning, estimating, budgets and resources.
Examine how estimates, resources, uncertainty and the delivery approach influence one another. You will compare an optimistic estimate with the evidence available, identify missing work and decide how assumptions should be recorded. A team exercise asks you to explain a revised forecast to a sponsor who wants to retain the original date, making the commercial consequences of planning choices visible.
Apply it at work: Build an estimate register with assumptions, resource needs and review points.
03Build and challenge a workable schedule
Reading connection: APM guide chapters 13–18, especially section 18.5: schedule construction and technical checks.
Bring activities together through dependencies, durations and resource availability. KBC’s case contains a schedule with an unavailable specialist and a hidden approval. You will investigate what controls completion and test alternatives. Following the guide’s schedule review, distinguish technical checks from experienced judgement about whether the work is deliverable. Both matter when deciding whether a schedule deserves confidence.
Apply it at work: Produce a network and resource check, then explain the key delivery constraint.
04Use progress information to choose action
Reading connection: APM guide chapters 21–24 and 26: baseline, performance, cost, short-term planning and risk.
Work through a reporting cycle that distinguishes completed work, remaining work and the implications for the forecast. In a simulated review, different teams provide inconsistent progress statements. You will ask for evidence, reconcile the reporting position and identify which exceptions need management attention. Your report should make an action possible, with an owner and a decision date for every significant issue.
Apply it at work: Prepare a concise progress report and a reasoned recovery recommendation.
05Control change and make learning reusable
Reading connection: APM guide chapters 25 and 28–31: change, records, documents, handover and lessons.
Explore how approved changes, forecast updates and historical records serve different purposes. The final scenario introduces a client change after baseline approval. You will assess consequences and preserve the decision record, without using budget transfers to conceal poor performance. The closing task plans acceptance and handover early, then turns delivery experience into checks another team can use.
Apply it at work: Assemble a change record and lessons brief with a clear audit trail.
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.
KBC’s proposed learning checks use a planning case, progress review and change recommendation. For the external PPC qualification, APMG currently specifies a closed-book Foundation paper with 50 questions, 40 minutes and a 50% pass mark. Practitioner is a three-hour scenario paper with 80 marks and a 50% pass mark; only the PPC guide is permitted, with a simple calculator allowed. Confirm the qualification level, entry requirements, exam booking and included materials with KBC before enrolment. Attendance alone does not confer certification.
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.
- Planning, Scheduling, Monitoring and Control: The Practical Project Management of Time, Cost and Risk ↗Association for Project Management · 2015; ISBN 9781903494448
Official PPC supporting guide. Verified chapters 2–6 definition, 7–12 planning, 13–20 scheduling, 21–27 monitoring and control, 28–31 records and learning.
- Project Management, Planning and Control — Albert LesterButterworth-Heinemann / Elsevier · 7th edition, 2017; ISBN 9780081020203
Supplementary original book from KBC collection. Verified chapters 12 (work breakdown), 13 (estimating), 19–24 (networks), 27 (reporting), 30–34 (resources, costs, procurement), 37 (information), 44–45 (closure).
- Project Planning and Control certification ↗APMG International · Current public requirements checked 10 September 2026
Official qualification levels and examination arrangements.
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 a scheduling-software course?
It develops planning and control judgement. Any named software tuition should be confirmed in the delivery specification.
Which book supports the external qualification?
APM’s Planning, Scheduling, Monitoring and Control. Lester’s book provides supplementary context.
Can I use my own project?
A suitably anonymised project can support application; a structured case can be used where workplace material is unavailable.
What would this help you achieve?
Talk to KBC about your experience, your goals and the right learning route for you.