Episode 159: The International Project Management Day

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This episode is sponsored by http://www.pm-summit.de:

The international project management is happening every year on the first Thursday of November. This means that this year "our" day is on November 4th.

Happy international project management day to you all!

The founder of the international PM day is Frank Saladis. In today's episode you are going to first hear my interview with Frank in which we learn more about the international PM day. And then following the interview you are going to hear Frank sing because he wrote "The Project Manager Blues". It's a good song, it's a lot of fun (at least if you are a PM) and Frank kindly allowed me to play it for you.

Episode Transcript

Below are the first few pages of the transcript. The complete transcript is available to Premium subscribers only.

Podcast Introduction

Cornelius Fichtner: This is The Project Management Podcast™. We bring project management to beginners and experts. Find us on the web at www.pm‑podcast.com or send your emails to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Cornelius Fichtner: Hello and welcome to Episode #159. I am Cornelius Fichtner. This is The Project Management Podcast™, nice to have you with us.

The International Project Management Day is happening every year on the first Thursday of November. This means that this year "our" day is on November 4th. So, happy International Project Management Day to you all. The founder of the international PM day is Frank Saladis.

In today's episode you are first going to hear my interview with Frank in which we learn more about the International Project Management Day. We recorded that at the PMI® Global Congress North America in Washington D.C. And then following the interview, you are going to hear Frank sing because he wrote "The Project Manager Blues". It's a good song, it's a lot of fun, well, at least if you are a project manager and Frank kindly allowed me to play it for you here on the program. In fact, if you have a video player then you should also have received the video of this song that you can play and watch.

Today's episode of The Project Management Podcast™ is sponsored by the Project Management Congress 2010 in Munich, better known as The PM-Summit 2010. It takes place on November 15^th, 2010 and offers 5 presentation tracks with over 35 presentations on topics like Agile versus Classic Project Management, Soft Skills as well as Requirements, Team Leadership and Knowledge Management. The keynote speaker is no other than Peter Taylor. You heard him a few episodes ago. For more information, please go to www.pm-summit.de.

And now, on to the interview with Frank Saladis about the International Project Management Day. Frank is an accomplished leader in project management. He is the author of 7 published books, the editor of the All PM newsletter and the author of over 100 articles. Frank has entertained countless audiences with project management songs as his way of sharing his humor and passion for project management. He owns Project Imaginers and Blue Marble Enterprises and is also a Senior Project Management Instructor with the International Institute of Learning (IIL).

Frank is a PMP; he was PMI's 2006 Person of the Year, a graduate from the PMI® Leadership Institute class, and has been very involved with PMI as the president of the New York City PMI chapter for ten years as well as holding many other leadership positions

And now, put on a t-shirt that says "Kiss me, I'm a project manager" and enjoy the interview.

Podcast Interview

Female voice: The Project Management Podcast’s feature Interview: Today with Frank Saladis, founder of the International Project Management Day.

Cornelius Fichtner: Hello Frank, welcome to The Project Management Podcast™!

Frank Saladis: Hello! It’s my pleasure to be here.

Cornelius Fichtner: Alright! And thank you very much for finding the time here at the busy PMI® Global Congress North America to sit down with me and talk about the International Project Management Day.

Frank Saladis: That’s right! Yeah! It is going to be pretty busy over the next days but it’s nice to be here, great to have a chance to talk to you.

Cornelius Fichtner: First question for you about the International Project Management Day: Why do it at all? Why have a day for project management?

Frank Saladis: Well, the idea came to me back in the end of 2003 and I was thinking about all the work that all project managers do. Then I was thinking about we have Mother’s Day, we have Father’s Day, we have Secretary’s Day, we have Boss’ Day. We have all these days, okay, Grandparents’ Day and everything so I said: “Why don’t we have a Project Management Day?” Okay and the idea behind the day was to give an opportunity for people to recognize project managers for the work that they do so I gave that a lot of thought and I said, a lot of the colleagues that I know that I work with, we also talk about the project management being the unappreciated profession and I decided that’s the time for recognition around the world for the type of work that project managers do so that’s where the concept came from and we started that and it has been growing every year since.

Cornelius Fichtner: Yeah! When was the first international PM day?

Frank Saladis: The first one was actually in November of 2004.

Cornelius Fichtner: 2004, so this year it’s number 6, is that right?

Above are the first few pages of the transcript. The complete PDF transcript is available to Premium subscribers only.