Project Management Fundamentals in Healthcare

Explore common project management terms and the project lifecycle from the PMBOK, using a healthcare telehealth program to define stakeholders, scope, milestones, deliverables, and change control.

Explore the five stages of the project lifecycle: initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and control, and closeout—alongside business case, objectives, project charter, roadmap, and lessons learned.

Explore the project lifecycle and initiation phase through a falls prevention story, identifying the business case, project requirements, and the project charter to guide organization-wide implementation.

Develop a formal project charter for a home health falls prevention program, detailing sponsor, project manager, purpose, description, stakeholders, risks, goals, milestones, deliverables, change control, phased rollout, and authority.

Identify stakeholders and secure leadership support to gather milestones and tasks for the project charter. Use brainstorming and affinity diagrams to align teams, identify risks, and plan information flow.

Apply affinity diagram tools to research evidence-based fall programs, identify gaps, compare competitors, and group ideas into milestones for updating policies and staff training.

Plot milestones from the charter, and document the planning phase. Use affinity diagrams, designate owners and due dates, and build a stakeholder register and a communication plan.

Identify all stakeholders and their information needs in the stakeholder register, and implement a formal, cross-regional communication plan with regular updates, town halls, and leadership-led intranet messages.

Identify barriers and cultivate champions through a change management plan, supported by consistent leadership communication. Build the work breakdown structure (WBS) with milestones, tasks, owners, and dependencies across departments.

Execute the execution phase by completing pre-implementation tasks, piloting the Falls program at a site, gathering feedback, and going live with updates to training, policies, and EMR.

Apply user experience insights to the procedures manual, web education, and the electronic medical record by gathering clinicians' needs and feedback to drive adoption.

In health care, apply the communication equation to run purposeful meetings, invite only necessary attendees, prepare clear agendas, capture notes, and assign action items with owners and due dates.

Assess actual performance against the plan, identify new risks, and apply mitigation or contingency plans, using success metrics and user feedback to refine the pilot rollout and training.

Apply PMBOK concepts to ensure a project has a defined end and a solid handoff, using checklists to sustain operations after closeout.

Conduct lessons learned sessions at project close or milestones. Integrate findings into close-out checklists and templates to improve future healthcare projects.

Completed beginner level health care project management coursework builds foundational skills to reduce rollout bumps for clinicians and patients, with future modules deepening project management and change management concepts.

Explore basic health care project management principles, from formal planning to execution, with practical tools and terminology explained through a telerehab program lens.

Create a clinic profile by detailing your facility setting, patient population, budget, timeline, technology, staff, resources, and change-management considerations for a new healthcare program.

Cultivate critical thinking and engagement with healthcare project management by applying course content to your own or telerehab implementation scenarios, as we begin this journey.

Define the five phases of the project life cycle, identify two universal project management practices, and outline three steps to improve meeting management, including scope, stakeholders, and the project plan.

Define project boundaries in the initiation phase to prevent scope creep. Learn from a telerehab example how adding unintended programs like congestive heart failure and diabetic management can derail implementation.

Define the healthcare project problem broadly, compare telerehab delivery models from rural to urban settings, and finalize a clinic profile detailing setting, staffing, and structure to guide future implementations.

Define the problem as the first step in project initiation, clarifying the why behind your healthcare project to prevent scope creep and guide decisions, with telerehab examples like weather cancellations.

Identify stakeholders using the PMBOK framework, listing individuals, groups, or organizations affected by a healthcare project, from leadership to clinicians, patients, call centers, front desk teams, vendors, and legal teams.

Identify goals using smart criteria and align project objectives with stakeholder needs to guide action plan, improving tele rehab access and chronic condition monitoring.

Align stakeholders on mutually agreed objectives and project scope, ensuring clear communication during initiation so the final deliverable meets the intended goals.

Break down the work into milestones and tasks to create the work breakdown structure (WBS). Use affinity diagrams and SMEs to brainstorm and organize activities for a complete project plan.

Create a formal healthcare project charter that outlines the scope, sponsor, project manager, purpose, goals and objectives, description, risks with mitigation plans, and milestones with anticipated completion dates.

Define the project scope and outline the project management plan per PMBOK for healthcare, detailing how the team will execute, monitor, control, and close the project.

Outline the project life cycle from initiation to close-out, identify deliverables (charter, vendor contract, competency sign-off), and document procurement and staff development processes and tools for standardized execution.