PRINCE2 Goes to China by APM Group's Tony Kippenberger
PRINCE2 has been translated into Chinese. In preparation for the first ever Chinese exams, PRINCE2 examination body The APM Group has opened an office in Qingdao, China.
PRINCE2 is a written description of how to manage a project in a logical way and is owned by the UK Office of Government Commerce (OGC). It is considered to be the UK's de facto standard process for all types of projects and is rapidly becoming an international standard, with organisations around the world using it as their preferred approach to managing projects. China Machine Press began publishing the Chinese version of the PRINCE2 manual in November 2004 (the English version is published by TSO). The Chinese manual has to date sold 3,000 copies.
"It is a great achievement by the OGC to have created one of the world's most recognised business standards, which has been embraced by so many countries. Naturally we are delighted that China has decided to join the PRINCE2 community and we hope to have the first candidates for Foundation and Practitioner exams by the end of the year", comments Richard Pharro, Managing Director, APM Group.
One of the reasons for the rapid growth of PRINCE2 is that many organisations have recognised that writing their own customised set of standards can be a time-consuming and costly business. It can take anything from 6 to 12 months, and many thousands of man-hours, to complete. But that is just the initial cost. Organisations then have to launch the process internally and educate everyone involved in projects within the organisation, and that can cost the same amount again. They also have to continue doing this when new staff arrive, as trained people move on.
The savings in using an existing best practice standard, and flexing it to the organisation's needs, are highly attractive. As a result, there are already tens of thousands of people around the world who are fully qualified as PRINCE2 Practitioners. So extensive is PRINCE2's use and applicability that in the last 12 months over 30, 000 people have taken either the PRINCE2 Foundation or Practitioner Examinations. Currently more than 700 people a week take one or other of these exams.
APMG's Assessor, Graham Williams gave a keynote address at the Construction Project Management Conference in Beijing in June 2005. The APMG is also supporting China's leading project management publication with a range of articles written by APMG's Chairman, Alan Harpham (one of Europe's best known project management experts) and Tony Kippenberger - one of the UK's most respected project management writers.
For further information about PRINCE2 exams visit www.apmgroup.co.uk or call +44 (0)1494 542450.
