What does PCB mean in project management?

Question

I was reading an article on project management, and it contained something like the following: "The PM called for an extraordinary PCB meeting..."

What does PCB stands for? Is it some kind of meeting for project stakeholders?

Answer 1

PCB stands for Project Control Board. It's not a meeting but a board comprised of stakeholders that control the change requests of the project.

It is usually called the CCB - the Change Control Board (you can read more about the CCB and its role here: http://www.projectmanagementquestions.com/1716/what-is-the-role-of-the-change-control-board )

In short, the PCB has the following two responsibilities:

- Authorizing change requests after studying their impact on the project.
- Rejecting change requests if these change requests are deemed to be very risky and/or unnecessary. Change requests might also be rejected if they deviate the project from its original course defined in the project charter.

In some companies, the role of the Project Control Board is expanded to evaluating projects (killing them if needed). In this case, the PCB is the same as the Gate Review Board (read more about the role of the gate review board here: http://www.projectmanagementquestions.com/1255/what-is-the-gate-review-board )