I have always said that one of the most beneficial actions that I took to further my career and success as a project manager was to become involved with PMI. I started out as an event volunteer and worked my way all the way up to becoming the president of my local PMI Chapter. This volunteering not only helped me to find a job, it also introduced me to colleagues in my field put me on the path of becoming PMP® certified and it was the starting point of this here, The Project Management Podcast where I’ve expanded my volunteering efforts out towards a world audience of project managers.
The good news is that I’m not the only one who has seen such great results from volunteering. Kevin Reilly, PMP has seen very similar results. Every since he started volunteering a little over a year ago doors have opened up for him and an incredible number of opportunities have opened up for him.
Kevin has now gone ahead and he has taken his approach and turned it into a process for you. A step by step process that you can follow towards your professional success as a project manager:
Understand the benefits
Analyze your skills
Determine your goals
Select an organization
Leverage your time
Market your skills
We first review these 6 steps in detail and then Kevin tells his personal story of volunteering and networking to illustrate how powerful a driver this approach was in his career and will help you do the same.
Karin Brünnemann (http://www.4cee.eu) made an excellent case last time describing how all our projects are in some way or another influenced by culture. We did also look at a few tools that she recommeds.
But how do you really become adept at mastering intercultural issues on your project? What are some of the actions you can take? What tools are recommended? And what are some of the qualities of a good intercultural project manager?
Well... listen up, enjoy and learn from Karin's worldwide experience.
What would you say, if I told you that any project you lead is an intercultural project? Even if you have grown up in Paris and all the other project team members and stakeholders are native Parisians... you will still have to deal with culture on your project.
Karin Brünnemann (http://www.4cee.eu) specializes in consulting, project management, and training in intercultural and multi-national contexts on a worldwide basis. She has lived in and lead projects in more countries than I have fingers. So when it comes to projects, culture and how to deal with that, she knows what she is talking about.
In our interview, Karin and I will be:
Answering the question: What is culture?
Discuss some myths and mistakes in regards to culture.
See how the iceberg model applies in this context
Review the two high level challenges that projects face in regards to culture
And we will look at three tools that will help you to thrive in managing culture on your project
This is a Special PM Podcast Episode, in which we introduce you to Gazza's Corner, a new podcast about project management by Gary Nelson, PMP. Here is what Gary has to say about the episode:
You cannot underestimate the importance of the Project Kickoff. It sets the tone for the rest of the project, and it is often the first time all of the key players on the Project will be face to face. In some cases, it may be the only time they all get together - so make it count!
It may also be the first time that you get to review the project objectives as a team, and it is where you will build the collective understanding of what you are trying to achieve - and the first stage in Project Team Development.
But what exactly is a Project Kickoff, and why do we really need it? In this session we will explore what it is - and why it is so important.
Gate meetings often require stacks of administrative paperwork and template after template of fact and figure tracking. Most people would probably rather spend their time creating than justifying.
Matt Priest (www.kalypso.com) says that “Gate meetings can be faster, easier and more effective. Just improve the “what”, “who” and “how” of your meetings to make them less of a drain and more valuable for the organization.”
In this interview we discuss, how with a light and nimble framework in place, gate review meetings are more effective and scalable, will become easier to address and will grow and mature with the organization.
In 2001, seventeen software developers met at a ski resort in Snowbird, Utah. They all faced the same problem: the need for an alternative to the slow moving, waterfall approach to improve their software development projects and the “agile” model for software development was born.
So, how does this innovation apply to new product development in the consumer goods industry? The benefits of the agile software development process - increased speed-to-market, reduced costs, enhanced focus, and minimized wasted time in development - apply to any development organization, whether the end result is a consumer product or software application. These gains are especially important in today’s economic climate where development budgets are constrained, competition is fierce, and expectations from both senior leaders and consumers have greatly increased.
To explore how to best do this I invited Matt Priest (www.kalypso.com) onto the program and give us his insights on the topic. He’ll not only answer all my questions but also introduce us to the three simple Agile principles that we should be using when developing new consumer goods, which are:
engage the consumer early
collaborate iteratively throughout the development process
My family and I had a fantastic time earlier this month at the Walk for Autism Speaks Event!
And thanks to the sponsorship of pmStudent readers like you, we raised $12,211 for Autism research.
In this video I thank you for your sponsorship and tell you a bit about what you did, share some pictures and details from the event, and talk a little about the online self-paced project management training I offer for you online.
I hope all of my 455+ new students get a ton of value out of your courses, and give me some feedback about how the training impacts your career in project management.
Episode 215 Transcript:
Josh Nankivel: Hey, This is Josh from www.pmstudent.com recording this video to say Thank You to everyone who sponsored me for the Autism Speaks walk.
If you don’t know, I did a little thing where I offered to give away free courses at www.learn.pmstudent.com for anybody who wanted to sponsor me and support me in the Walk Now for Autism Speaks for South Dakota which is where I live. And the response was overwhelming. I am very, very happy. I think my initial goal that I set was $1,000 or something like that. I wasn’t really sure what kind of response I was going to get.
But I was extremely pleased not only through my website at PM Student but a lot of you probably found out about the offer through my friend, Cornelius Fichtner, who does The PM Podcast and The PM PrepCast. He was really awesome and sent out notification to his subscribers about the event and the sponsorship.
Again, I just wanted to say Thank You. We end up raising $12,211 which is fantastic. That was actually the highest amount raised by any individual at least for South Dakota. So again, thank you very much. I got props at the walk and everything. They made me stand up and called my name and got a standing ovation and everything. So that was pretty cool. But you know, the most important thing is that we raised a whole bunch of money for really a great cause and so I am just really overjoyed about it and wanted to thank you for that.
And if you didn’t miss out on that…I think I’ll probably do it again. It was so much fun. It was a lot of work getting everybody set up for the courses and stuff because normally, when you pay for a course, that’s an automated process. I might put a lot of work in the backend to make that an automated process. But I have to do all of these individually so there was a lot of spent many hours. I have to hire somebody to do that for me next time I think.
But if you didn’t miss out and you didn’t get in on, go over to www.learn.pmstudent.com. The courses that I have are meant to be different than most project management training that you’re going to see. I don’t do PowerPoint slides. I do go through concepts but I share a lot of stories to illustrate those concepts. And a lot of the courses are actually just me sharing my screen and going through whatever it is I’m teaching you to do, I’m actually doing it.
So in the project management plan course, I start with the blank Word document and I create an outline right in front of you and talk through to it all the different pieces and we actually go through and create a project management plan together in about I think that’s like a 7 or a 6-hour course, I think it is. So over the course of 6 hours, you see me create a project management plan from scratch and go through all of the concepts and thinking behind how do I do a project management plan.
I think it’s really valuable and it’s really inexpensive too. If it’s something that you’re interested in, go to www.learn.pmstudent.com and check it out. And look to maybe, I don’t want to do this too often, but maybe a year from now or something like that, I’ll go ahead and do another sponsorship event like this. I’m also pretty active in things like the Special Olympics. I do a lot of disability advocacy-type work too. It may not be Autism Speaks next time I do this. It maybe some other organization that I normally work with and support that I go ahead and do this for.
Again, thank you everybody. I know I’ve been blabbing and blabbing and blabbing but I’m really excited about the money that we raised for autism research. Again, thank you.
https://www.pducast.com The PDU Podcast is the easiest and most convenient way for certified Project Management Professionals (PMP)® to earn their Professional Development Units (PDU): Download and watch the webinars - Earn PDUs - Repeat.
The PDU Podcast: Earning PDUs Made Easy Transcript:
Cornelius Fichtner: Hello! I am Cornelius Fichtner, PMP and I have a mission: I want to make earning PDUs as easy, simple and straightforward for you as possible. And in order to achieve this mission, I have created The PDU Podcast™.
The PDU Podcast™ is a series of video webinars that you download to your portable player like a smart phone or a tablet PC and then you watch them whenever and wherever you want.
For example, you can watch them in the gym, while you are walking the dog, doing your household chores, or while you are relaxing at the beach. But the best thing about these webinars is that each of them will earn you at least 1 Category‑A PDU which are the PMI pre-approved PDUs.
So when it comes to maintaining your PMP certification, then The PDU Podcast™ is the zen of earning your PDUs. It’s as easy as download and watch the webinars, earn PDUs and repeat.
With The PDU Podcast™, you are on auto-pilot to your PMP or PgMP recertification. So stop by at www.pducast.com. That’s p-d-u-c-a-s-t.com and then simplify the way you earn your PDUs.
Today, we are going to do something that we have never done in the history of The PM Podcast. This episode serves only one single purpose: We want to help you win a free project management course.
To participate in the giveaway, please send an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. before June 09, 2012.
And by doing this we are also sponsoring Josh Nankivel from PM Student in his quest to raise awareness for a good cause.
So... would you like to win a free course and learn something new about Project Management... Yes? Well then... listen to this episode.
In this episode of The PM Podcast we bring you a brand new interview that I did with Kevin Reilly, PMP for our sister podcast The PM PrepCast. Kevin and I discuss how he prepared and studied for the PMP Exam. We learn about his experience of becoming a PMP as well as his study plan and approach. At the end Kevin also shares his inspiring closing remarks with us.
In last week’s interview with Susanne Madsen about her book The Project Management Coaching Workbook: Six Steps to Unleashing Your Potential we discussed very high level principles that you have to consider when setting out on an improvement journey. We didn’t really discuss anything that you could do or give you steps to follow to get you started.
Let’s change that and give you a few ideas on how to start on the journey to becoming even better project managers. So in this interview Susanne takes us through step 2 in the book, which is the self-assessment.
We begin with discussing the importance of knowing what your current capabilities are (strengths and weaknesses) and how the process assists you in assessing this through the extensive self assessments (10 categories - 80 dimensions). This helps the project manager pinpoint where they need to focus their attention in order to succeed. Then we review 3 of the 10 categories that need to be assessed and close with a discussion about the importance of feedback - both in the context of providing effective feedback to team members in order to grow others and create highly motivated team members and receiving feedback from peers and managers in order to progress your own capabilities and career.
Would you like to become the best project manager possible? Yes? Did you know that it takes just six steps to reach your Project Management and leadership goals! All you need is to follow the advice that Susanne Madsen (http://www.susannemadsen.co.uk) outlines in her book The Project Management Coaching Workbook: Six Steps to Unleashing Your Potential.
The advice she gives is based on her experience as a coach and mentor. Susanne Madsen offers a method designed to help you understand and articulate what you want to achieve—and then assists you in achieving those goals, like:
Effectively managing a demanding workload
Leading and motivating a team
Building effective relationships with senior stakeholders
Managing risks, issues, and changes to scope
Delegating effectively
And in our discussion today, we are going to start you off on this journey by looking at four areas to consider: We have to begin with the end in mind (both for your career as well as on any project you manage), we look at the difference between leadership and management (with a strong focus on people rather than tasks), the importance of effective time management and delegation, and how to stay motivated to progress personally and professionally on such a journey by taking action and not procrastinating.
I am once again joined by Jack Ferraro, author of the book “Project Management for Non-Project Managers” - When I originally opened the book my attention was drawn to a section of the book called “Functional Managers’ Impact on Causes of Project Failure”. In this section Jack describes about 20 areas of functional management responsibility that - if addressed properly by the functional manager - will go a long way in avoiding that a project fails.
But as we have learned in the last interview, functional managers may not actually be aware of project management fundamentals, let alone that some of their areas of responsibility will in fact help us to deliver a successful project. So my primary thought was... how do I as a PM approach my functional manager and tell him or her that I need their assistance in areas such as business politics or lack of organizational support?
The projects that you and I manage are crucial to implement change within our organizations. To succeed, we routinely depend on the functional managers - the person who runs the department or division, who resolves day-to-day operational issues, and who is responsible for ensuring that the project team has the resources it needs and keeps its goals aligned with the company’s overall strategy and vision.
Unfortunately, there are only few functional managers who speak our language or even have firm grasp on the most fundamental of project processes. Too often, this knowledge gap leads to poor communications, conflict, schedule delays, cost overruns and lost business opportunity.
And who gets the blame? Yup... we do.
To help bridge this gap we are interviewing Jack Ferraro, PMP (www.myprojectadvisor.com[Update: The web page is no longer available so we removed the link]) who wrote the book “Project Management for Non-Project Managers”. We discuss the many ways in which functional managers can get involved in project success and we also discuss the four key project management skills that any functional manager needs:
Articulating the real customer need and business case
There is one question that I get regularly asked from podcast listeners, and that is “Can you recommend any good project management templates?” Of course I can.
Over the years the following two collection of PM Templates have become my favorite: PM Templates from Method123 at www.method123.com PM Templates from The Template Collective at templatecollective.com/
In this video I show you what they have to offer and we open up a couple of examples from both products.
Whether you are creating a project plan and need a template to get you started, or looking for a template for project reporting, or anything in between, they are sure to have something to help.
Please note that The PM Podcast is a compensated affiliate of both Method123 and The Template Collective. If you click and then buy their templates we will earn a commission, with which I will buy a pizza and that will keep my enthusiasm up to continue producing great podcast episodes for you.
Cornelius Fichtner, PMP, CSM, is the host and the author at The Project Management Podcast. He has welcomed hundreds of guests and project management experts to the podcast and has helped over 60,0000 students prepare for their PMP® Exam. He has authored dozens of articles on projectmanagement.com and PM World 360. He speaks at conferences around the world about project management, agile methodology, PMOs, and Project Business. Follow him on Twitter and connect with him on LinkedIn.
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PM PrepCast, Agile PrepCast, PM Exam Simulator, PDU Podcast, PM Podcast are marks of OSP International LLC.
PMI, PMBOK, PMP, PgMP, PfMP, CAPM, PMI-SP, PMI-RMP, PMI-ACP, and PMI-PBA are registered marks of the Project Management Institute, Inc.
I have always said that one of the most beneficial actions that I took to further my career and success as a project manager was to become involved with PMI. I started out as an event volunteer and worked my way all the way up to becoming the president of my local PMI Chapter. This volunteering not only helped me to find a job, it also introduced me to colleagues in my field put me on the path of becoming PMP® certified and it was the starting point of this here, The Project Management Podcast where I’ve expanded my volunteering efforts out towards a world audience of project managers.
Karin Brünnemann (
Gate meetings often require stacks of administrative paperwork and template after template of fact and figure tracking. Most people would probably rather spend their time creating than justifying.
Today, we are going to do something that we have never done in the history of The PM Podcast. This episode serves only one single purpose: We want to help you win a free project management course.
In last week’s interview with Susanne Madsen about her book 
I am once again joined by Jack Ferraro, author of the book “
