TOPIC: Post Mortem ?

Hi,

I have come across the term "Post Mortem" as related to the Closing process (specifically in several of the Oliver Lehman set of 175 Q92, 124, & 150). I could not find this term in the PMI Glossary and opinion seems to vary whether this specifically refers to a project terminated early vs. the normal closing work of a successful project. Should I expect to see this term on the PMI exam and if so, how should I interpret it?

-Bob

PS When some of my co-workers found out I was interested in PM, they said you must be "certifiable", so I thought I should take the exam to see if they were correct.

Hi Robert,

The term "post mortem" refers to the process/meeting/workshop related to assessing the project's successes, failures etc. Its output should generally result into a lessons learnt document, which makes it part of the project closing phase.

It could be applied to both successful and early terminated projects, and its main focus is to retain what was done well, identify the mistakes and learn from the experience.

I do not think the term will come up in PMP exam, but as long as you know its intention, you should be able to understand where it fits.

Just as an aside, i like to use the post mortem term, and generally run the sessions along an agende of: what should we keep doing, what should we stop doing and what should we should start doing. This generally opens up the floodgates to result in an effective lessons learnt output.

Regards

Hi Andre,

Thanks for the response. I was already familiar this term and also interpreted it to be used for both successful and canceled projects; I was just surprised to see the practice questions use it exclusively for cancelled projects. I hope it does not appear on the exam.

Maybe someone else will chime in if appeared on an exam they took and they can shed some light on how PMI might use it.

-Bob

Hi Bob,

This term did not appear on my PMP exam. However, I vaguely remember seeing it in study materials I used and it was in relation to "lessons learned". I agree with Andre in that it should generally result in a "lessons learned" document and as long as you know that, you should be fine. Best of luck!

I did not come across this term during the test and agree that it would be related to closing on both successful and unsuccessful projects. I think of it as an Agile term (similar to a retrospective) and also related to continuous improvement.