Information Security Management
Project Management Guides, Templates and Toolkit
I’ve spent decades managing IT projects; software, infrastructure, site setups – the lot. It always felt like I was trying to find a golden formula for a framework that was light but provided enough control around implementing change.
Over the years, I’ve polished and honed my project management toolkit, and now I offer it for busy IT and business teams.
Learn the basics, follow the lifecycle, and use ready-made templates so you don’t have to start from scratch and make the mistakes I did.
To jump to another project phase, please select one below.
My Project Management Guides
Take the Shortcut: The Full Project Management Toolkit
What you get
- 47 ready-to-use templates and 6 phase guides covering the full lifecycle – from idea evaluation to closure.
- Templates to plan and run delivery: project plans, progress reports, RAID and risk logs, resource and budget trackers, work packages, change control, meeting minutes and more.
- A lightweight, easy to follow, and robust framework.
“Toolkit goes beyond what I expected and includes process guidance.” – Verified review
A lightweight process your team can actually follow.
I designed these guides for the situation I was always in as a governance manager: I needed my team to follow a clear, consistent process, but I couldn’t bury them in a 600-page method or turn every small change into a full PRINCE2 / PMBOK project. Frankly, nobody cared or wanted that level of detail. We’re ‘Agile’, they would say. Yet they wanted something to follow and a way to contain the chaos.
The result is a simple project process with demand management plus five core phases – initiation, planning, execution, monitoring & control, and closure – that you can tailor to your organisation. You get the rails to keep projects on track, without the red tape that stops people from using the process at all.
Strong on evaluation, light on bureaucracy.
One of the biggest problem areas in most organisations is project evaluation and approval. Ideas either sneak in through the back door, or they consume weeks of effort trying to produce “fixed” estimates that were never going to be accurate that early on.
The Demand Management guide tackles this head-on. It gives you a fast, structured way to capture requests, run a time-boxed “rapid assessment” workshop, and score projects on effort versus reward so leadership can make decisions quickly, with just enough information. Early estimates are treated as rough order-of-magnitude estimates, not promises set in stone.
Phase guides that scale from small to large projects.
Each phase has its own short guide that walks through the key steps, decisions and documents for that stage – from defining a clear charter and scope in Initiation, through detailed planning of scope, schedule, resources and risk, into Execution, Monitoring & Controlling, and finally Closure with benefits reviews and lessons learned.
For every phase, the guides spell out:
- What to do and in what order – so your team isn’t guessing.
- Which templates to use for small, medium and large projects – so you only apply as much governance as the work really needs.
- Where you can keep things lean – you’re encouraged to use the minimum set of documents that gives you control, not every template in the toolkit. 1. Project_Process_Overview
Put together, the guides give you a practical, adaptable project framework: clear enough that people know how to run a project, light enough that they’ll actually use it.
Free Project Templates
Try out these sample templates.
Lean Canvas
Project Charter
Many more templates are available inside the full Project Management Toolkit, along with guidance notes and examples.
Project Management Articles and How-tos
If you already manage projects and want to sharpen specific skills, these articles go into more depth on planning, risk, governance and reporting.
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Business Case Template: Comprehensive Step-by-Step Guidance
Transform your project ideas into clear, convincing, and well-supported proposals. Introduction to the Business Case Template Our Business Case Template serves as a detailed, systematic tool designed to help you structure, evaluate, and present your project proposals in a compelling, professional manner. Whether you’re seeking internal management approval, approaching external investors, or preparing an options…
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How To Take Over A Project
The following article is going to outline how to take over a project and conduct a robust project handover. The Key Steps To Taking Over a Project A few times in my career, I’ve needed to step into in-flight IT projects, pick them up and run with them. It’s not an easy thing to do.…
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How to Use OKRs in Projects
Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) are a powerful tool for setting team goals. While there are multiple goal-setting methodologies, OKRs stand out for their adaptability, precision, and focus on alignment and accountability. Typically OKRs are used for corporate objective setting and cascading, but here, I will unlock OKRs in projects and explore how they can…
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Succeed with My Post Implementation Report Template
The Post Implementation Report Template Used After a Change To Evaluate Success The journey doesn’t end when a change is implemented. In fact, that’s when the real learning begins. A Post Implementation Report (PIR) offers a structured and detailed review of the outcomes—highlighting successes, identifying shortfalls, uncovering process issues, and ultimately driving continuous service and…
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3-Minute Project Methodology Assessment
What is the Project Methodology Assessment Tool? Choosing the right project approach can make or break your delivery. Take a short 5 question quiz to work out which project methodology is best suited to your project. The Project Methodology Assessment Tool is designed to help you make a confident, evidence-based decision about how to structure…
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Project Complexity Assessment Tool
What is the Project Complexity Assessment Tool? Simply put, it’s a tool to help you measure how complex a given project is. Using a set of criteria, the calculator allows you to assess a project quantitatively, removing the guesswork from the equation. It offers an overall complexity score and categorises the project into levels like…