How to Choose a Project Management Course: Nine Questions to Ask Before You Book
The short answer:
Before you book any project management course, check who actually awards the qualification, whether the exam fees and retakes are included in the price, how much of it is live taught rather than pre-recorded video, whether you’ll finish able to use tools like Microsoft Project as well as describe the method, whether it covers both waterfall and agile, and what you’ll actually have to show an employer afterwards.
Then check the price is published, the finance terms are written down in full, and any job guarantee comes with its conditions spelled out rather than implied.
Changing your career into project management is a big investment of your money and time, and the training market doesn’t make it easy to compare providers against each other. Programmes are bundled differently, prices are often hidden until you speak to someone on the phone, and important information is lost in sales jargon.
The way round that is to ask the same nine questions of every provider you’re considering, and to actually compare the answers rather than the sales pitch. We’ve written them below as we’d want someone to ask us, and under each one, how we’d answer it ourselves. If a provider can’t answer one of them clearly, that tells you something too.
1. What exactly am I certified in at the end, and who awards it?
Not everything called a certification is an independently awarded qualification. Some are internal certificates of completion issued by the training provider itself, which is fine as long as you know that’s what you’re getting.
Ask for the full list of qualifications on the programme and the awarding body behind each one. In UK project management, the names that carry real weight with employers are PeopleCert, who award PRINCE2, along with APM, PMI and Microsoft.
What good looks like: A provider who tells you plainly which parts of the programme are examined qualifications and which are just training modules, without you having to press them on it.
Our answer: Our Project Manager Career Programme leads to four official exam certifications awarded by PeopleCert and Microsoft. We tell you exactly which modules build towards an exam and which are practical training.
2. Are the exams included in the price, and what happens if I don’t pass?
Exam vouchers aren’t cheap. A single exam voucher bought on its own can be hundreds of pounds, so a programme that leaves several exams out of the price is a very different deal from one where they’re all included.
Ask two things: are all the exam fees included in the price you’re quoted, and what’s the retake policy if you don’t pass the first time?
What good looks like: Every exam fee included with no surprises later, and a clear, written answer on retakes rather than a vague reassurance. Bonus points if you get a free resit.
Our answer: All four exam fees are included in our published price, so there’s nothing extra to find once you’ve enrolled. We offer one free exam resit in the unlikely event you don’t pass your first time. With a 96% first-time exam pass rate, we’re confident you’ll succeed straight away.
3. Is any of this actually taught by a person?
This is the question that matters most if you’re new to project management, and it’s the one most likely to get a vague answer.
A lot of online training is pre-recorded content that you work through alone. That’s fine if you already know the subject and just want the qualification. It’s much harder if you’re starting from nothing, because there’s nobody to ask when something doesn’t make sense.
Ask directly: how many modules are taught live by an instructor, on a schedule, where you can ask questions in real time?
What good looks like: A specific number of live taught modules, with class times, and recordings available afterwards so you can catch up around work.
Our answer: Five of our eight modules are taught live by an instructor in scheduled evening classes, and every session is recorded with recordings available for a year.
4. Will I finish able to use the software, or just describe the method?
Certain project management qualifications teach you a method. They don’t teach you the tools you’ll actually be handed on day one. It’s vital to choose a programme that offers practical, hands-on experience, meaning that you’ll be job-ready from your first day.
Have a look at real job adverts for the roles you want and see which software keeps coming up. In UK project manager adverts, Microsoft Project appears more often than people expect. Spreadsheet skills and the ability to put together reporting for senior stakeholders come up constantly too, usually described as budget management or financial tracking.
Then find out whether the programme you’re looking at provides the practical tool training for the software you need.
What good looks like: Practical tool training built into the programme, not sold as a separate add-on.
Our answer: You’ll finish our programme with hands-on skills in Microsoft Project, Excel, and Power BI as standard, alongside the PRINCE2 method itself.
5. Does it cover both waterfall and agile?
UK organisations deliver projects in two broad ways, and more and more, in a blend of the two.
Waterfall moves a project through fixed phases in strict order: define, design, build, test, deliver, with sign-off before each phase starts. It suits work where the requirements are known up front and changing course late is expensive. Construction, government, and regulated industries tend to work this way.
Agile delivers in short, repeated cycles: build something usable, show it to the people who’ll use it, adjust. It suits work where the requirements are genuinely uncertain, which is why software and digital product teams lean this way.
Agile shows up in around a third of UK project manager job adverts, and it’s similar for waterfall. Training in only one of them narrows the roles you can apply for, and most employers are looking for someone who can use both approaches as relevant for different projects.
What good looks like: both approaches covered, and taught in an order that helps them make sense together rather than as two unrelated subjects.
Our answer: Yes. The programme runs PRINCE2 Foundation and Practitioner for structured, waterfall-style delivery, then closes with PRINCE2 Agile Foundation, so you finish able to work in both and to credibly talk about hybrid delivery in an interview.
6. What will I actually have to show an employer?
The hardest thing to overcome when you’re entering project management isn’t a lack of qualifications. It’s the lack of evidence that you can actually do the job.
Certificates prove you passed an exam. They don’t prove you can run anything. What closes that gap is a portfolio: a real project schedule, a business case, a reporting dashboard. Things you can open on a laptop in an interview and talk someone through.
Ask what you’ll have produced by the end of the programme, and whether the practical work builds into something coherent or is just a scattering of unrelated exercises.
What good looks like: Practical work that adds up to something you can actually show and discuss.
Our answer: Across the Project Manager Career Programme, you work with a live business case study and build schedules and dashboards in Microsoft Project, Excel, and Power BI along the way – so you leave with something to actually open and talk through, not just a certificate.
7. What’s the price, and why isn’t it on the website?
A big chunk of the UK training market won’t publish prices. You fill in a form, you get a call, and the price shows up somewhere in that conversation with a salesperson.
There’s no good reason for that from where you’re sitting. You should be able to compare cost as easily as you compare content.
Ask for the total cost including VAT, confirm exactly what’s included, and confirm there are no further charges for exams, materials, resits, or extending your access if you need more time.
What good looks like: A published price, VAT included, with what it covers stated plainly.
Our answer: £3,795 including VAT. That covers all four exams, all course materials, and the practical tool training. No hidden calls needed to find out what it costs.
8. If finance is offered, what are the actual terms?
Spreading the cost is sensible and widely available. The terms behind it vary a lot.
Ask whether the credit is interest free or interest bearing, what the monthly payment works out at, over how many months, what the total repayable comes to, and who the lender actually is. A training provider offering finance is usually acting as a credit broker rather than lending to you directly, and they should tell you that upfront.
What good looks like: The term and the lender, all given to you without hesitation and in writing.
Our answer: We offer finance through Vendigo, with terms from 12–60 months. Rates vary from 0%–14.9%.
9. What happens after the training ends?
This is where programmes differ the most, and where the language gets loosest.
Career support, employer networks, job boards, and job guarantees are four different things. All of them are worth having. Only one of them is actually a guarantee.
If a provider offers a job guarantee, read the conditions before you sign anything. In particular, check:
- What percentage of your fees is refunded, and whether exam costs are included in that refund
- Whether it depends on you passing every exam first time
- How long the provider has to place you, and from what date the clock starts
- What you have to do to stay eligible
- What counts as a suitable role, including salary and location
A guarantee with conditions is still worth having. A guarantee whose conditions you never read is not.
What good looks like: The conditions handed to you upfront and a refund that actually covers what you paid.
Our answer: Once you’ve completed your training, you will be connected with our recruitment team who will help you rework your CV, put you in touch with our employer networks and help you choose what to apply for, and guide you through interview preparation and practice. Our job guarantee refunds 100% of your course fee if you fail to find a project role.
Ready to Choose With Confidence
The right course won’t just teach you a method, it’ll change what your working life looks like. That’s worth getting right.
You’ve now got the nine questions that actually matter. We wrote this guide because we’re comfortable answering all nine questions ourselves.
You’ve got this. Let’s get you there.
Explore our Project Manager career programme in more detail or speak to a course advisor to get started or if there’s any further information you require.
