The Project Management Podcast

Play Now: For Project Management Professional (PMP)® renewal from Project Management Institute (PMI)®: This episode is part of our PDU Spotlight series in which we help you learn more about PDU credits for your certification renewal. The discussion is based on the article "Need 60 PDUs for PMP® Renewal? Read the CCR Handbook First!" that was published on The PDU Podcast. Read the article... Cornelius Fichtner Today, we are shining a spotlight on Professional Development Units (PDUs). More precisely, I’m going to give you a relatively short overview of the CCR Handbook, which defines all the policies around PDUs. And if you are a project manager who holds a certification from the Project Management Institute (PMI)® then you know about PDUs, because you need them for your certification renewal every three years. And just to be absolutely clear: you need PDUs only after you have passed your exam. If you are still studying for your certification, then you need what PMI® calls Contact Hours. So our focus right now is on the PDUs that you need after you pass your exam, and, because so many of you are Project Management Professional (PMP)® certificate holders, our examples will be primarily about PMP PDUs.

Play Now: We are reposting this interview because the price for The Career Optimization Package has been reduced to $6.99 What's Included in the Package? Dev Ramcharan, PMP, CSM, CCTC This is the third and final of three interviews in which Dev Ramcharan (LinkedIn Profile) from AROUCA Career Coaching helps you to optimize and boost your career. In this interview we focus on the late career phase and also touch upon consulting. Allow me to repeat my recommendation on listening to this series of interviews one final time: You will get the most out of this series of interviews if you listen to them in sequence, no matter if you are currently in your early career, mid career or late career. This is because each of the three interviews contains many nuggets of wisdom applicable to any career stage. And of course... Dev’s Career Optimization Package can be found on The PM Podcast website. Just go to www.pm-podcast.com/career and download the free version first. In this final interview you learn that the late career is really the peak of your experience, knowledge and wisdom. As well as the money you earn. But at the same time, this is also the moment to think back to the time when you started out in your career, and now you need to help out and mentor an eager young project manager at the start of his or her career. The one unexpected topic that you will also hear about is adversity in the sense of getting laid off or overlooked for a promotion during any of the stages in your career. Dev shows you that you can use adversity as your ally to move your career forward. And finally Dev closes with his suggestions for a structured approach to personal growth.

Play Now: We are reposting this interview because the price for The Career Optimization Package has been reduced to $6.99 What's Included in the Package? Dev Ramcharan, PMP, CSM, CCTC This is the second of three interviews in which Dev Ramcharan (LinkedIn Profile) from AROUCA Career Coaching helps you to optimize and boost your career. In this interview we focus on the mid-career phase, which starts about 2-3 years into your life as a project manager. In this interview you learn that there is an early mid-career and also a late mid-career, and that both require a different optimization approach. We talk about when and how often you should update the Career Optimization Package and how to perform a career risk assessment. As part of this interview, Dev also recommends the following two books: Carol S. Dweck: Mindset - The New Psychology of Success Kegan / Lahey: Immunity to Change My recommendation is still the same: To get the most out of this you should listen to all three interviews in sequence, no matter if you are currently in your early career, mid career or late career. And don’t forget to get Dev’s Career Optimization Package from The PM Podcast website. Just go to www.pm-podcast.com/career and download the free version first.

Play Now: We are reposting this interview because the price for The Career Optimization Package has been reduced to $6.99 What's Included in the Package? Dev Ramcharan, PMP, CSM, CCTC If you are listening to this podcast, then you are most likely either someone who wants to start a career in project management or you are already working in the project management field and you want to advance in your career. Well… you have come to the right place. This is the first of three interviews that will help you optimize and boost your project management career. My guest is Dev Ramcharan (LinkedIn Profile). Dev is not only a PMP certified project manager, but he is also a professional career coach with AROUCA Career Coaching in Canada. That means he not only understands the profession of project management but he also has the coaching background to guide you and me into successful project management careers! And my oh my is he good! We have recorded three interviews and each focuses on one stage of your career. The stages are early career, mid career and late career. My recommendation is that you listen to all three interviews in sequence, irrespective of your current career stage. So no matter if you are an absolute newcomer to project management or if you are a highly respected and senior VP of project management… you should listen to all three interviews starting with this one here. Also, Dev has developed the Career Optimization Package for you. This package is just over 30 pages long and contains templates, workbooks, tools and plans to help you review, optimize, plan and boost your project management career. You can download this package for free in both PDF and Microsoft Office format from The PM Podcast website. Just go to www.pm-podcast.com/career. You’ll see that there is a 32 page long free version (that’s the one we talk about during the interview) and there is also a premium version. And with all that out the way here's an overview of our first interview with Dev Ramcharan: We start out by looking at the benefits that a career in project management gives you, discuss the key factors and skills that will help you make your project management career a success, then we move on to discussing how to optimize your early career and we close the interview by looking at how to use the Career Optimization Package. Note: During the interview I say that the free package is about 50 pages long, but the correct number is 32 pages. I'm sorry! I was looking at the wrong file. My mistake!

Play Now: This is a quick "Good News Announcement" for The Project Management Podcast. In a nutshell, here is what has been happening and what the very near future holds We have updated our website. It is now much more mobile friendly, uses a modern template and is easier to navigate. Come take a look at https://www.project-management-podcast.com/ We reduced price for our Premium Career Optimization package to $6.99. Take a look at the Premium package here and see how it will help you to improve your career as a PM. Lastly, Cornelius is getting ready to record new interviews for you. Six guests are currently lined up. Additionally, you can also look forward to a new PDU mini-series to help you better understand the ins and outs of earning professional development units.

Play Now: We are updating our website and technology. And as part of that it is possible that your podcast app will be downloading the 15 latest episodes twice. Apologies if that happens to you...

Play Now: This episode is being reposted because the book we are talking about just made the Amazon Bestseller list for PM Books. And it's available for just $3.99 right now... Update: The price has gone back up again... Todd Williams When project budgets are dwindling, deadlines passing, and tempers flaring, then the usual response is to browbeat the project team and point fingers of blame - usually toward the project manager. That’s not really all that helpful. For these situations, what is needed is an objective process for accurately assessing what is wrong and a clear plan of action for fixing the problem. Enter Todd Williams, PMP who wrote the book Rescue the Problem Project: A Complete Guide to Identifying, Preventing, and Recovering from Project Failure. Todd and I sat down at the PMI® Global Congress last year and in this interview we discuss approaches to project rescue. Here’s a brief book overview of Todd’s book: Rescue the Problem Project provides project managers, executives, and customers with the answers they require. Turnaround specialist Todd Williams has worked with dozens of companies in multiple industries resuscitating failing projects. In this new book, he reveals an in-depth, start-to-finish process. As always when we have an author discussing his book we are giving away two copies and by now you should know how that works. One copy is reserved for our premium listeners and one for everyone else. If you want a chance of winning the book, please go to www.facebook.com/pmpodcast and look for the book giveaway announcement. All you have to do is leave a comment.

Play Now: We are reposting Episode 205 with Todd C. Williams today. This is because we have just learned that Todd's book Rescue the Problem Project jumped to become the #1 Best Seller in Amazon’s Business Project Management books. Also... it's currently available for just $3.99 on kindle. That's a great deal for a book that has a 4.5 star rating! Get it today before the price goes up.

Play Now: Agata Czopek and Cornelius Fichtner In this interview we welcome Agata Czopek (LinkedIn Profile) and discuss that diversity is a fact and inclusion is a choice. Companies with diverse executive teams are 21% more likely to outperform the companies rated in the bottom quartile of diversity. Have you ever experienced a situation that made you feel uncomfortable? Let’s discover the attributes of an inclusive leader and the steps needed to improve team performance by addressing unconscious bias. This interview was recorded ad the crowded Project Management Institute (PMI)® Global Conference 2018 in Los Angeles, California. We learn to describe attributes of an inclusive leader, identify techniques to improve performance by addressing the unconscious bias, and see that privilege is invisible for those who have it.

Play Now: Good news for all listeners of The Free PM Podcast out there: Your favorite business podcast is now available on Spotify! This means that if you hold a certification from Project Management Institute (PMI)® then you can start earning your PDUs right where you listen to your favorite music. Note: If you have a paid subscription to The Premium PM Podcast then nothing changes for you because Spotify only accepts free podcasts.