Roadtown, Tortola - The Ministry of Finance’s Project Support Service Unit (PSSU) will conduct a series of training workshops on the Basics of Project Planning and Management beginning on July 22.

The training, to be held at the PSSU conference room located on the third floor of RFG Building at Road Town round-about at 10 a.m., will introduce participants to the basic need-to-know concepts of managing projects.  Participants will be exposed to standard forms and tools developed for use throughout the public service.  The topics to be covered during the training will include an introduction to the PSSU; What is Project Management? and Project Planning and Management.

During the training session participants will also be introduced to the revised British Virgin Islands Government Project Management Guidelines and will be shown how to utilise the document to achieve optimum results when managing projects. 

According to the unit the principal purpose of the guidelines is to support the efforts of ministries or departments to more effectively plan, implement and monitor capital investment projects in a manner consistent with stated objectives, and within the limits of financial and other resource constraints.
Manager of PSSU Ms. Shaina Smith told the Department of Information and Public Relations in a GIS Radio Report interview that project management allows the Ministry of Finance and the Government on a whole to “achieve value for money”.

“By planning projects out we are able to properly assign a cost, as well as a schedule, so that we will know how much time it would take and how much money it will cost and this can help us make informed decisions,” she said.

Ms. Smith added, “In keeping with Government’s desire to achieve a more targeted and results-oriented expenditure programme, the guidelines seek to achieve value for money by more consistently realising project objectives with optimal results.”

She said that the training will benefit participants by showing them how to manage projects with “less stress”.  Ms. Smith encourages finance and planning officers to take advantage of this training opportunity.  “There is a lot of work that is involved in projects even in the simplest of project because there are a lot of risks factors that have to be managed and that tends to be where persons get in trouble,” she added.

When asked why it was necessary to revise the guidelines Project Engineer Mr. Kevi Potter said that project management is something that changes often and rapidly even though the basic concepts remain the same.  “Every day you hear about new techniques or new methods so in revising the guidelines what we did was to go over what was already established and see what had to be removed and we replaced it with a new way of achieving things which may be easier,” he said.

He added, “We find that not many persons within the public service are trained in project management and we often try to find the easiest method to implement.”

Mr. Potter said that the training is aimed at anyone who is willing to learn; “we would like for those persons who find themselves tasked with managing projects to take advantage of the training.”  The training will be offered quarterly and also upon request from interested department or ministries. 

For more information and to register for the upcoming training persons can contact Mr. Potter at 468-3701 ext. 4252 by Friday, July 17.

The PSSU distributed the first set of guidelines to all ministries and department in February 2006.  The unit was established in 2005 to facilitate project management procedures and structure within the Government.