The Microwave Way to Software Project Management is a free guide to help you get the hang of project management stuff in no-time. The entire course consists of seven chapters that are written especially for those who hate long and boring books.

If you are new to Project Management, please watch this 15 minute video first, and afterwards enjoy this tutorial.

Chapter 1: Mindset of the software project manager
Stakeholders are all the people involved in a project, the customer, the supplier, the boss, the user, you name it. As a project manager you have to deal with them; it's even worse, they will determine if your software project will be a success or a failure. This first chapter will describe the image a software project manager should have engraved in his mind. If you see it, you will surely recognize it. It's simple and short, so much easier to keep in your head then a huge binder with methods.

Chapter 2: Project Intake
Ever got a present where you thought "what is this?" Ever got something from your superiors nicely wrapped in a paper with in neon letters 'project' on it, where you thought "what?" Then this chapter is surely for you. Problems, ideas or just plain stupidity are quickly labeled 'project' and handed over to a project manager. The intake is to clarify what is meant so the project manager is not getting the blame.

Chapter 3: Requirements determination
Whatever you do, what ever you make,you should know what to do or to make. After an intake the global contours of the project are outlined by goals and scope. You should get more specific though. It's this getting more specific that requirements determination is all about

Chapter 4: Requirements validation As a kid I played this little game at school we called 'telephone line'. Twenty kids were hurdled up into a circle. One started by whispering a sentence in the ear of his neighbor, so the other kids couldn't hear what was said. The neighbor would say the same sentence to his neighbor, and so on, until the sentence was 'round circle'. The fun of the game was comparing what the last one had heard with what was originally said. Mostly, they didn't even come close. During the project the requirements stated at requirements determination should be validated. This validation goes two ways: are we meeting the requirements, and are the requirements still valid. This section handles the requirements made to the product part of the project.

Chapter 5: Project Progress
In Holland we have this huge (200km) ice-skating event, the "Elf Steden Tocht" which means "Eleven cities tour". On the course are several check points, which in fact are the eleven cities, where you have to get a stamp. Getting these stamps is very important. Actually, the race is about passing all the checkpoints.In a project it's all about getting the approvals to keep on going. This section handles giving feedback on the requirements made to the process. Are we still within time and budget, and are the project constrains still the same

Chapter 6: Risk Management I cannot tell you what the future will bring. No one can, although some people believe they can. This whole project thing is based upon assumptions and estimations, on guesses and hunches. Sometimes we are wrong. In a project we have to deal with this as a fact of life. Enter "risk management". A risk is the possibility of loss of some kind. It's all about what can be different from what we believe right now. Not just what can go wrong, but possibilities can arise also if the future brings not what you think it will. "Dealing with uncertainty" would be a good subtitle for this section of the guide.

Chapter 7: The Bigger Picture
This final chapter in this project management course will cover two aspects of doing projects in a larger context, your organization. The aspects are how to handle policies issued on what systems you may use, and how it should be constructed, and how you can introduce a "project approach" into an organization in such a way, your own job as a project manager will be more effective.

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