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In part 1 of this Podcast you heard the voice of Brantlee Underhill, who heads up PMI's Virtual Communities Project. Since this project aims at replacing the current SIG structure with a centralized model and thereby dissolving the SIGs this means that the one voice we definitely want to hear is that of the SIGs.

That is why we got together with Derry Simmel, who is the PMO SIG’s Vice Chair Membership. We met Derry at the PMI® Global Congress in Denver and - as you might suspect - we get to hear a slightly different view of the VCP project than in part one.

If you happen to be a board member of another SIG and you would like your voice heard then please let us know. We’ll be happy to put you on.

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In his fabulous book Determining Project Requirements Hans Jonasson, PMP included a chapter on the Enterprise Analsys. He writes "Enterprise analysis is perhaps the fastest growing area of business analysis. It provides the context and the link between projects and the business. [...] The pre-project activities tend to give the analyst the most organizational visibility through dealings with the upper level of the organization. If the business analyst is successful in this area, it can be a great career enhancer; if unsuccessful, it will be noticed." In today's Overtime, we bring Hans back on the program to discuss the relationship between business and enterprise analysis, how to perform an enterprise analysis and what we expect to find in it.

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Today we continue our discussion with Margaret Meloni on your Professional Brand as a Project Manager. We discuss that actions will speak louder than words when it comes to your professional brand, how to ask feedback from others on your professional brand and we also want to know from Margaret if this whole concept really works and ask her to apply it in an example. As part of this episode you will also receive Margaret's white paper titled "Own Your Reputation. Own Your Brand". In it, Margaret gives you the 11 steps necessary in order to define your professional brand.

And if you listen closely you can hear me say "personal brand" instead of "professional brand" several times during the interview. Margaret says that it's a common mistake. But I make it up to her at the very end of the episode... ;-)

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At the beginning of 2008 we put up a survey and wanted to know from you what you considered to be your Project Management Hot Topics for 2008. Requirements Management received 70 votes and landed in second place. We looked around and are happy to bring to you today an interview with Hans Jonasson (www.jtcunlimited.com). Hans is the author of a fabulous book called Determining Project Requirements and in our interview today we will be looking at how you should be determining your project’s requirements. I promise, you are going to like this one. You will learn not only about the process of properly determining requirements and the tools that are required for it, you will also be able to win a copy of his book.

In this interview Hans Jonasson and I discuss requirements gathering best practices as well as many of the tools of the trade. I would like to know how close your company comes to this ideal state. Please leave a comment below.

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Today we are starting a new series of episodes. My plan is to go back to the basics of project management and revisit books and teachings from the great names in project management. The reason for this is because I feel that we loose ourselves way too much in the detailed nitty-gritty of our methodologies. Agile, Waterfall, RUP, Scrum and Extreme Project Management are all good methodologies, but in order to be able to apply them properly, you have to first understand the underlying fundamentals of our profession. And there is no better way to do this than by going back to the basics. I have a list of great names in project management in mind. And today, we are starting out with the name that ranks at the very top and that is the world-famous singer, songwriter and project manager Mrs. Britney Spears.

How do you feel about the project management abilities of Mrs. Britney Spears? Do you read her books? Do you apply her best practices on your projects? Please leave a comment below.

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Lean Six Sigma is a business improvement methodology which combines tools from both Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. Lean manufacturing focuses on speed and traditional Six Sigma focuses on quality. By combining the two, the result is better quality faster. I recently had the opportunity to attend a one week seminar on the Lean Six Sigma methodology from my employer. In this episode I will give you an overview of what I took away, we will talk about the acronyms DMAIC, DIRFT and SWIM and I will give you my conclusion of what I feel is important about Lean Six Sigma.

And here are the winners who each won a copy of Brian Irwin's book Managing Politics and Conflict in Projects: Alfredo A. Guillen (Premium Podcast Subscriber) Karthik Surya (Free Podcast Listener).

Are you using Lean Six Sigma in your daily work? How is it working for you? Where are its weaknesses and strengths? Please leave a comment below.

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The business environment is changing quite dramatically and also quite rapidly. We project managers are facing new challenges like globalization, more complex projects or shorter project schedules. Often this is a result of a changing global marketplace, which changes our company, which in turn changes the way we run projects. Stefan Hagen is the managing director of Startup Euregio Management GmbH, a full service provider for project and process management, and he has taken the traditional organizational approaches and theories and combined them with business process management and the processes needed to run enterprise wide projects. The result is the IPPM Organization®. We discuss this model and how it supports projects in large companies.

We also announce the winners of the Mind Manager Pro 7 giveaway and remind you of our Leap Year Contest.

Download Stefan Hagen's PDF presentation on the IPPM Organization®...

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In Episode 62 we spoke with Thomas Cutting, PMP about "How to become a Project Manager". In today's interview with Nehme E. Abouzeid we will be looking more at the middle of your career. You are now an established project manager, you have managed a number of projects, you are (hopefully) respected in your company and you are thinking about your future. Where can you go? What is there waiting ahead of you? Nehme makes the case that because you are a project manager, because you meet and have to work with people from various departments and divisions in your company and because you have seen so many different aspects of the company's processes and workflows you are an excellent candidate to become an executive officer in your company.

And here are the names of the winners of our Leap Year Giveaway: They are Patrick O'Neill (from among the subscriber of the Premium Podcast) and Rajeev Kumar Sharma (from among the registered users of our website). Each has won a license of The Project Management PrepCast™, which will help them prepare for the PMP® Exam.

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Project Politics are very likely the "ugly stepchild" of project management. We know that we have them, but we try to ignore them as best as we can. Because of that we can be sure that they will bite us. And instead of blaming ourselves for not managing them properly, we blame the elusive "company politics" for the fact that our project just failed. This is where Brian Irwin, PMP can help. He wrote the book Managing Politics and Conflict in Projects, which will help you not only understand the dynamics of politics in a company but will also help you manage it. In our discussion with Brian we focus on one important part of managing your politics, and that is your stakeholders. They say that the only project where you don't have politics is a project where you have only one person participating. But since all of us usually have more than one stakeholder we have to know how to manage their project related expectations properly.

We are giving away two copies of Brian's book. Listen in to learn how to participate in this giveaway.

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In his book Managing Politics and Conflict in Projects Brian Irwin, PMP introduces us to the DTAB Project Leadership Model. This model is based on four guiding principles. About these Brian says: "I've witnessed leaders who demonstrate those four guiding principles deliver outstanding results in the project environment." In today's Overtime, we bring Brian back on the program to discuss the model, how it should work in theory and how you can apply it in your everyday life as a project manager.

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Would you like to know how to define the value of Project Management? We have an answer for you! Five episodes ago we spoke with Mike Graupner, PMP about Monkey Management. We gave Mike another visit and had a conversation about his current projects. We hear about his involvement in IS governance, how he is dealing with SOX compliance, we follow him as he implements a 1 million dollar computer just for testing and he will also tell you how to define the value of Project Management. As always, we also give you several helpful resources that complement our interview.

But there is more: this week we also have not just one, but two contests and you can win four prizes a total value of $800. You can win one of two licenses of Mind Manager Pro 7 and you can also win one of two licenses to The Project Management PrepCast™. But you will have to act fast, so listen in...

Feb 17 2007 update:  We have drawn the winners of the giveaway for Mind Manager Pro 7. They are: Jun Labao from the Philippines and Scott Stamey. Scott is a subscriber to the Premium Podcast and every subscriber automatically got a chance to win, while Jun is a listener to the Free Podcast and was drawn from among those who wrote an email.

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Nehme E. Abouzeid is the guest in today’s episode of The Project Management Podcast™ and we look at project management in the hotel, casino and hospitality business. Nehme works for the Las Vegas Sands Corporation in Las Vegas, Nevada, the town that 15 of the 20 largest hotels in the world call their home. Thus, the projects that Nehme was involved in were major, business critical projects. We hear about a ticketing system that he helped implement for their entertainment center, next is a convention system for the hotel, then we talk about his process improvement projects and we finally explore a retail system project where the complete retail system for a series of stores had to be replaced. In just one night.

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Today we feature a Project Management Conversation with Ron Holohan, PMP. We talk about his role as a Program Manager who has 5 project managers reporting directly to him. He works for a consumer electronics company in a weak matrix organization, which offers challenges of it’s own. We take a look at his company’s processes, how they came to have their current PM methodology and how a project budget is created. We also introduce you to a new Gizmo. This week we look at the 20 Minute IT Manager, a training and mentoring program that works almost like a podcast.

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On the last day of the year we are not going to worry about project management. Instead we are going to have some fun. Unfortunately for me (but fortunately for you) not every episode and interview that we record is perfect on the first take. Sometimes my tongue or the tongues of my guests and helpers gets twisted and the strangest things come out. And more often than not, they are rather funny. And here they are: All the bleepers and bloopers that got cut out of our normal episodes as a 5 minute potpourri for you.

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One of the projects that our show host Cornelius Fichtner, PMP is managing is showing signs of trouble. It is a small, offshore software development project and the quality of the code returned is not good. Because it is a small project that is in trouble there are one or two things that you need to do differently in order to rescue it than you would do on a large troubled project. In today’s episode Cornelius talks about the three steps that he took in order to begin turning things around.