Project Management in Emergency Management | A Playbook
As an emergency manager, you already have a lot on your plate—planning initiatives underway, exercises in development, after-action reports to write, and improvement plans to complete. Learning how to manage projects well isn’t about adding another task—it’s about ensuring the work you’re already doing gets done.
When your preparedness projects are managed effectively, your team can respond faster, recover more quickly, and protect your community more effectively when disaster strikes.
Our step-by-step project management playbook is designed specifically for emergency managers, providing the structure and tools to keep preparedness projects on track and drive meaningful progress. With a clear roadmap tailored to your unique challenges, you can move from planning to execution with confidence—ensuring your efforts make the impact your community and organization need.
Take control of your projects. Better projects lead to better preparedness.
This Playbook is available to Academy subscribers.
Table of Contents
Section 1 | Laying the Foundation
Chapter 1 | Let’s Get One Thing Clear (Public Article)
Chapter 2 | Why PM in EM Matters | Part 1
Chapter 3 | Why PM in EM Matters | Part 2
Chapter 4 | The Project Manager | Defined
Chapter 5 | The Project Executive is Not the PM
Chapter 6 | How to Use This Playbook
Bonus Chapter | PM in EM: A Career Accelerator (Public Article)
Bonus Chapter | Should I learn agile or waterfall approaches? Both
Prequel Section | Project Selection
Chapter 1 | Strategic Capabilities and Scenario Planning
Chapter 2 | How a “Project Management Office” Structure Can Improve How You Prepare (Public Article)
Chapter 3 | Five Steps to Assess Your Capabilities and Programs (Public Article)
Chapter 4 | Getting the Exercise Type Right
Chapter 5 | Comprehensive Planning for Active Threat Incidents
Chapter 6 | How the Shape of Your Preparedness Cycle Impacts Your Readiness (Public Article)
Section 2 | Project Kickoff
Chapter 1 | So It Begins | Project Kickoff (Public Article)
Chapter 2 | The Project Management Plan
Chapter 3 | Defining “Done” | Setting Your Project Goals
Chapter 4 | Project Design: Turning Goals Into a Roadmap
Chapter 5 | Stakeholder Identification and Engagement Planning
Chapter 6 | Building the Team That Delivers
Chapter 7 | From Tasks to Costs: Building a Project Budget That Works
Chapter 8 | The Project Kickoff Meeting
Chapter 9 | How Fast Can You Launch?
Bonus Chapter | The Three Questions Every Project Team Should Answer on Day One
This Playbook is a living resource, built from our client work and updated routinely with new lessons. It evolves as we concentrate on the areas most important to advancing emergency management readiness.
Right now, we’re finalizing the “Project Kickoff” articles and adding articles to the sections below as those topics come up on our projects.
Section 3 | Managing the Project
Chapter 1 | Getting The Job Done (Public Article)
Chapter 2 | Learning, Discovery, and Analysis
Part 1: Standing on the Shoulders of Giants | The Document Review
Part 2: From “On Paper” to “In Practice” | Initial Stakeholder Interviews
Chapter 3 | Leading the Project Team
Chapter 4 | Surging Resources to the Project
Chapter 5 | On-Going Project Management
Section 4 | Preparedness Projects
Section 5 | Closing out the Project
Chapter 1 | From a Project to Operations - The Transition
Chapter 2 | What Comes Next: Recommendations and Lessons Learned
Chapter 3 | The Project Closeout Meeting
Section 6 | What Comes Next
Chapter 1 | Repetitions and Experience
Chapter 2 | From Preparedness to Response and Recovery