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If you are like most project managers out there, then you are likely managing more than one project. You have more than one ball in the air. You are juggling.

That means you will have to divide your attention between multiple projects. Keeping an eye on each of the balls as they are flying through the air. Experience helps. Both with keeping three balls in the air and also with making sure you successfully complete all of the projects you are assigned to.

Well... you have come to the right place because over the last decade, I have published 458 episodes here on The PM Podcast, and most of them qualify for free PMI PDUs.

In this recording of a live stream we are joined by Elizabeth Harrin soon launches a new course on Mastering Multiple Projects. And we are picking her brain today for tips, tricks, and good practices.

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For your smart phone: Project Management Professional (PMP)® Certification Training:

Congress presenters reveal their most important interpersonal skill

Last year at the Project Management Institute (PMI)® Global Congress 2016 in San Diego, California I recorded an all time high of 14 interviews. They have all been published over the past few months and you’ve probably heard some or all of them. But what you don’t know is what happened once each interview was complete.

I pressed the recording button one more time and asked each of my guests the following question: Which is the interpersonal skill that you attribute the most of our success in your career to? In other words, what skill has helped you most on your projects when you interact with others?

And today you are going to get all the answers. In one nice mashup. Here are all the presenters in the order you will hear their answers

• Jay Payette
• Kristy Tan Neckowicz
• Nk Shrivastava
• David Hillson
• Denise McRoberts
• Joy Beatty
• Kristine Hayes Munson
• Andrew Burns
• Kim Wasson
• Wanda Curlee
• Beth Spriggs
• Cyndi Snyder Dionisio
• Connie Inman

Oh, and spoiler alert... the answer that I received most often was "Relationships".

It's not a surprise to me, a this comes up time and time again in the things we see on social media for project managers, and you'll have picked up the trend in my past interview. Whether you are leading a PMO, directing a huge project, taking part in an IT software development initiative, or working in the role of project manager in SAFe agile, or any other project role, relationships are the things that power our success. Project manager coaching and mentoring can only get you so far. Building effective working relationships with your colleagues is what really makes the difference. But I have a feeling you might have already known that!

Enjoy this special episode.

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This episode is sponsored by The Agile PrepCast for the PMI-ACP® Exam:

Margaret Meloni - Project Management Coach

When you think of your project manager skills, then “compassion” is probably not the first word that comes to mind. You would probably first list some other hard project management tools and techniques like your scheduling abilities or completing your projects on scope and on budget.

And only if you keep adding words to this project management skills list will you eventually come to terms like conflict management, team building, empathy and compassion.

Margaret Meloni says that we project managers should value compassion much more than we do.

If we are supposed to use compassion as one of our project management soft skills then we have to first define what it is, how it relates to project management and hear examples of how to use it on our projects. And that’s exactly what you are going to get from Margaret’s interview.

But the most important question that I have asked margaret is this: If compassion is truly so important for me as a project manager, how can I see quantifiable results on my projects?