How can the Project Manager seize the Web2.0 movement to be a PM2.0

By Kumar Sarma, PMP

Most of us working on various projects have our usual morning ritual of spending hours checking our emails. We need to do this activity to catch up on information and critical announcements regarding the project. It is also a common situation in many projects where only some members of the team are aware of important information regarding the project. This situation creates information imbalance among the team members and can be very detrimental to the project outcome. We are in a knowledge based economy where information is power. It becomes increasingly the responsibility of the Project Manager and Project Leaders in the team to disseminate the right information in an effective and concise manner, which brings all the team members to the same page. For the Project Manager, planning, structuring and controlling the communications that are inherently complex is critical to the success of the project. In this article we look at how Web2.0 wiki can help a Project Manager to complement the existing methods of communication and make his or her life easier.

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Powering Past the Post-PMP® Syndrome

by Michelle LaBrosse, PMP®

Post-PMP® Syndrome (noun) – A group of symptoms commonly found after project managers tirelessly prepare to pass the PMP exam pass it and bring home the gold, and then find themselves asking: What’s next?

Does this sound familiar to you? If so, you or someone you know may be suffering from Post-PMP Syndrome. Here are a few tips to make sure you get the most out of your PMP.

• DON’T KEEP IT A SECRET. Send an e-mail out to team members and managers letting them know about your achievement. Talk to your manager about how you might be able to use your PMP immediately to help the organization. Volunteer to do a “lunch and learn” to help others in your organization learn more about the PMP and prepare for the exam. Update your resume and any online profiles where you professionally network. Put your PR hat on and get the word out.

• WALK THE WALK. The best way to strut your PMP is to show results. Project Management is the art and science of getting things done, and now you can embody that with every project. In our careers, we are often as good as our last hit. You don’t have to be a one-hit wonder. Now, you have the knowledge to keep charting, year after year, with success after success.

• BECOME A STUDENT OF HISTORY. Abe Lincoln has nothing on you. With your freshly-minted PMP credentials, you can show ‘em how it’s done. At the end of every project, capture best practices and lessons learned, creating an invaluable documentation of hits and misses. You’ll quickly become the “go-to” person who is always in the know.

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You Can't Avoid Change

Customers change their minds. Competitors zig instead of zagging. Technology advances. Change is constant, and prohibiting it on projects does not work.

In Flexible Product Development, Preston Smith asks, “Is a frozen specification simply fiction?” Citing thirteen years of data collection by Donald Reinertsen at Cal Tech, Smith concludes, “It is not that specifications seldom remain constant during development; it is that they never do. The concept of frozen requirements is a complete fiction in the real world.” [Smith, p. 13]

You can’t prevent changes to your projects, but allowing rampant uncontrolled change dooms projects. Is there solution to this dilemma?

Make Change Valuable

In The New Project Management, J. Davidson Frame points out that change can be valuable. [Frame, p. 48] Companies that react flexibly and quickly can take advantage of market shifts, new technologies, and changing customer desires, giving them an advantage over their slower, less flexible competitors.

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