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In addition to overseeing projects, today's project managers are expected to provide creative input and use their leadership to create an environment that can respond rather than react to changing parameters. And then there are also these continuously moving objectives and requirements that need to be managed. According to Jack Ferraro, this new landscape calls for a service based project manager, which he discusses in his book titled The Strategic Project Leader.

In our interview with Jack we explore the attitudes and behaviors that define successful leaders, the importance of a service view in project management and most importantly we discuss and give you tools & tips on how to go from being a certified project manager to the point where you are a strategic leader. In this one of our leadership podcasts you'll pick up some actionable advice on how to grow your leadership skills.

Click here to read Jack Ferraro's white paper titled Self Directed Leadership Development (*.PDF)

Our other features: In our Gizmos section we introduce you to Processes On Demand by BOT International, a tool that will help you set up your Project Management Office (PMO) and improve your organization's project management maturity. We announce the winners of the giveaway of Jerry Manas's book Managing the Gray Areas . And we also start a new book giveaway for Jack Ferraro's book The Strategic Project Leader .

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In this episode Jerry Manas gives us additional insights into the gray areas. Because his book is called Managing the Gray Areas, we are concentrating on the actual management process. The tools that Jerry recommends and which we discuss at length are

• Ideals - Standing for something
• Leading by Questioning
• Systems Thinking
• Empathy and Cultural Awareness

Since these are mostly tools from the softer end of managing the gray areas we then go ahead and also spend time looking at a number of hard tools.

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This is a special Episode of The PM Podcast in which we introduce you to a new project management related podcast called PMPOD, hosted by Sebastian Stücker at www.pmpod.de. Here is what Sebastian writes about this episode:

Today the PMPOD features its first interview, which I am very proud of. Also it is the first english episode. To all german listeners, who might be surprised, I explain everything in Episode 3. The topic for todays interview is Project Blame Management. Payson Hall, a management consultant based in Sacramento, California, proposes this as new knowledge area for the PMPOK Guide.

I had lots of fun doing the interview with Payson and I hope you have the same while you listen to this episode.

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Have you ever managed a project where everything was either black or white, yes or no, approved or not approved? You probably haven’t. If your projects are like mine then most decisions that are made are a compromise. You give a little here, you take a little there. In project management nothing is really ever black and white. So don’t adjust your project plan, for you have entered the gray areas. And “Managing The Gray Areas” is the title of the new book written by Jerry Manas, PMP, who joins us on the podcast today to talk about these gray areas and all the tradeoffs that we project managers have to make every single day.

In our Gizmos section we introduce you to a new project management podcast called PMPOD. You can find it at www.pmpod.de .