Introducing Return to Mars: Leading a Complex Project

Credits: 14 PDUs

Engaging. Entertaining. Challenging.

In an on-demand world, this highly interactive web-based skills training courseware delivers immediate results.

Pricing Schedule

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Program Details

Content: Case-based asynchronous learning that brings relevance to the user experience. Build competency. Practice skills in a virtual environment.

Learn from the experts. These groundbreaking, interactive, media-rich learning experiences recreate many of NASA's innovative projects, including the Pathfinder Mission to Mars (PMI's Project of Year) and two case studies based on the NEAR and IMAGE missions.

Learning Design: Return to Mars blends over 40 movies, 350 screens, state-of-the-art sound, animation, interface facility - and even Leonard Nimoy - into 14 powerful, 45-minute modules. NEAR and IMAGE are modeled on the Harvard Business Case Study Method.

Overview: The course uses an advanced project to create a dramatic context for a learner to build skills and practice project management techniques within a subsystem of the Pathfinder mission/project and puts you in the hot-seat of a bold attempt to land a spacecraft on Mars. The budget is tight: $150 million, though the last mission to Mars cost over $1 billion. The schedule is rigid: do it in 3.5 years, or you'll miss the launch window. Since participants get to simulate a real project, they come away with skills and information they can immediately apply to their own projects.

Performance Focus
The courseware gives participants a clear understanding of the dynamics and challenges of project management, and provides the tools and techniques to manage the entire life cycle of a project. The course develops essential soft skills by immersing the participant in a simulation of Pathfinder's unique project environment, stressing performance and creativity, as well as innovation under tight budget and schedule restraints. Alongside its critical insights into the value of such skills as leadership, teamwork, and communication, Return to Mars provides practical tools such as work breakdown structures, lessons learned, and a 60-day scheduling software.