CAPM Practice: Demonstrate an understanding of project management planning

The cost baseline serves as the approved time-phased budget that is used as a reference point to measure, monitor, and control overall cost performance on the project. It allows the project team to compare actual costs against planned costs.

**Why not A:** The cost baseline can be changed through the formal change control process. It is not an immovable document that cannot be adjusted under any circumstances. Describing it as unchangeable misrepresents its purpose as a reference point for measuring performance.

**Why not C:** The cost baseline is not a list of all potential costs that might occur. It is the approved time-phased budget used as a reference for performance measurement. Potential costs and estimates are developed during cost estimation, while the baseline represents the approved, committed budget.

**Why not D:** While the cost baseline contains budget information, its primary purpose is performance measurement, not accounting. Detailed expense breakdowns for accounting purposes are maintained in financial management systems, not in the project's cost baseline.