This episode is sponsored by:
Show Notes: The Fast Track is the fast tracked version of the full length Project Management Podcast. It's my way of delivering a show for you even if I don't really have the time for it. Today, we look at what "Fast Track" means in the PM sense and you can also hear the tip of the week.
This episode is sponsored by:
Show notes: We are continuing to look at all the soft skills that you will need in your career as a project manager. Today, the topic is "Meetings". My interview partner is Steve Kaye, who is a professional meeting facilitator. We look at what a meeting is, why so many meetings don't achieve anything and how to set up a meeting to achieve a real purpose. Steve Kayes's website is at http://www.stevekaye.com/ and you can contact him at
Project Management in the News:
Are you currently studying for the PMP Exam? Then try our PMP Podcast:
You can listen to the show by clicking here.
This episode is sponsored by:
Show notes: Dale Brown is an IT Executive who decided to become a PMP. In our interview we discuss his motivation and schedule as well as what and how he studied in order to take and pass the exam. The following books are mentioned in the interview: Outercore's Achieve PMP Exam Success, Sybex's Sybex's Project Management Professional Study Guide, 3rd Edition and Rita Mulcahy's PMP Exam Prep, Fifth Edition.. You can contact Dale at
Jerry Manas's Podcast on Project Management:
Update: Jerry has in the meantime fixed the issues with publishing his episodes as separate podcasts. Here are the updated subscription links for you. To subscribe to Jerry's podcast, simply click on one of the following links (actually... you have to drag & drop the second one into your podcatcher software): [Update 2019: Unfortunately the podcast by Jerry Manas is no longer available so we removed the link.]
Podcast Episodes About PMP, PMP Lessons Learned
Show notes: Today's focus is on Risk Management, which we call "The Black Sheep of Project Management". Risk management in project management is important, but only a fraction of project managers actively manage risk on their projects. Risk management in agile projects is also a trending skill area. Basically, risk is so important to understand as doing so helps us better manage the project towards a successful outcome, regardless of whether you are using hybrid, predictive or iterative methods.
In this podcast episode we discuss why that is so and present a simple technique that will enable you to manage risk on your projects without spending hundreds of hours on this task.
There are many resources to help you manage project risk including the practice standard for project risk management, which many project managers use as their reference guide. We also have some useful resources on this website in the form of past webinar episodes on risk management critical success factors -- these are definitely worth watching for a detailed look at how risk impacts project success. Enjoy the episode!
Don't forget to stop by at Method123, sign up for their newsletter and get the Risk Management Kit for free. Also in this episode: A Good, Bad & Ugly review about TSI's PMP Lunchtime Lecture Series [Update: The web page is no longer available so we removed the link], and we are continuing the giveaway of two free licenses for VIP Team To do List - listen to the show to hear how to participate - time is running out [Update: This giveaway is now closed].
Show notes: We continue to look at the soft skills in project management and proudly present a wonderful interview with Coach Moty Koppes. Her website is at http://www.coachmoty.com and you can write to her at
Project Management in the News
- Hill Consulting Launches a New Project Management Methodology and a Free Offer
- Hansoft Releases Next-Gen Game Project Management Update
Below are the first few pages of a computer-generated transcript with all its computer-generated quirks.
Music (00:09): [inaudible]
Cornelius Fichtner (00:11):
You are listening to the project management podcast. We bring project management topics to beginners and experts. Find us on the web at pmpodcast.blogspot.com or send your emails to
Cornelius Fichtner (00:28):
Hello, and welcome to show number 19. I am Cornelius Ficthner. Now this is the project management podcast for the 11th of February, 2006. Today I am continuing to go soft on you with my interview guest Moty Koppes, and we'll be talking about coaching being coached and how to improve yourself. But first I am very happy to announce that I have some free software to give about. And this software that we have to give away is VIP team to do lists, and you can find them at, to do lists soft.com. They write about the application VIP team to do list is a professional time and task management software for managing projects, workflow, and resources in small and midsize businesses. It enables team leaders and team members to create, manage, and share to do lists within the team by email. Well, if you want to win one of the two licenses in order to participate in this giveaway, all you have to do is send an email to myself
Cornelius Fichtner (01:52):
That's about it. Your email has to reach me by the 21st of February this year, of course, and the winners will be announced on the show of the February, the 25th. So you've got some time there, but the sooner you do it, the faster you are done, um, some of us live in some of us, some of you who have subscribed to the project from hell podcast. I, uh, gave you a review of that a little while back, you may have noticed that it looks like it's no longer being updated well wrong. Um, the reason for why it might seem this way is because they have two feeds listed in iTunes. And one of those feeds is dead. It looks like they are no longer updating that one, but they're updating the other one. So you have to simply subscribe to the correct RSS feed, um, start iTunes, go to the music store, um, select podcasts, and then their search for project hell the two words, project and hell.
Cornelius Fichtner (02:57):
Uh, you'll get the, the top two are project management project from hell. And the second one is simply project from hell subscribed to the second one. The one that is called project from hell. And then your once again, up to date with the project from hell podcast. Uh, I also wanted to apologize for last week's show. You may have noticed that there were about six minutes of silence at the end of the show. No idea how that happened and sorry about that today. I'm trying to increase that to 25 minutes. No, just kidding. Uh, I'd like to see that I get rid of that this time. I'm finally here in the announcements again, a sponsor. Does your company have a project management tool, project management goal book, or a project management seminar to promote, then why not become a sponsor of this show here? The project management podcast, being a sponsor of the project management podcast will immediately get your message into the ears of thousands of project managers worldwide at a cost, which is much lower than what you would have to pay for an ad in a trade magazine. Simply write to me at pmpodcastatgmail.com and I'll be happy to discuss a sponsorship with you. Well, that's about it for the announcements this week, and now we're moving on to the helpful resources and the project management news.
Cornelius Fichtner (04:39):
Today's helpful. Resources are all about project management methodologies because I have received the following email. Hello from Madrid, Spain. I do enjoy your show. Keep up the good and entertaining work. My question is as follows, I have a client medium-sized multinational and am focusing on organizational issues. I have discovered that project management skills are sorely needed also, and not surprisingly, the company has not adapted any project management methodology. I am now looking for a hint on which methodology would be a good candidate to look at with the following criteria, not overly bureaucratic, reasonably compact, well suited for business projects because engineering and it is not a primary focus. And hopefully the study materials templates are available at a reasonable cost, both in the United States and Europe. And this email came to me from mr. Etienne Downwire manic from well Madrid, Spain. Well, at the end, you will find that I have listed five resources for you today.
Cornelius Fichtner (05:59):
The first one is a link to various white papers and articles on project management methodologies. You may simply want to want to go through those and check them out and see what you can find about project management methodologies. In theory, the second link that I have for you is a link to the 10 step project management methodology. I think I've mentioned 10 step quite a few times here. They are a no nonsense, easy to implement project management methodology. The third link is to method one, two, three, also a project management methodology that you may want to look into. Then the fourth one here is a link to project smart project. Smart is a website where you will also find several project management templates, some of which are free, and you may want to check out the free templates and then see if it's, if it looks like something that you may want to go with.
Cornelius Fichtner (07:06):
And finally, I found some deliverables, project plans and checklists free for download on Gantt had. So that's the fifth link that I have for you in my helpful resources there. Of course, the big problem always is that many of these methodologies are well a collection of templates and the processes is a completely different issue because just introducing the templates in a company is one thing, but introducing the processes, making the company change, ready, making them aware of the fact that, well, we need to change everything that we do and follow certain project management processes. That's really the big work. So whether or not your project management methodology is simple and easy or large and convoluted, doesn't really matter. The issue usually in my experience is the fact that the companies are simply not ready to take that step and make the change. But if your company is ready, the one that you're currently consulting with, then these five links should at least give you a starting point towards these project management methodologies. Well, and that's the resources for you, particularly at TN this week. And now on with the news,
Cornelius Fichtner (08:41):
The first news item is almost a continuation of the resources for Etienne. The title of this one here is Hill consulting launches, a new project management methodology and a free offer. Well, pure coincidence, a this was published on the 10th of February, 2006, and it talks about the fact that Hill, the Hill consulting group, and now announced that they are going to release the, um, their matrix based methodology for project management called project prison. And it consists of, uh, three components, which they say facilitate the methodology implementation and use. And they are a project management process guide, a complete and comprehensive compilation of essential project management processes. Well, the issue that I talked about, that's what you really need. Then the second one is a project management practice guide, a presentation of concepts and models that help users to perform the prescribed processes. And the third one is a project management toolkit, a tool set for performing each process step. So you know, that essential actions are being performed and managed, and they're releasing this and they're doing a few workshops. They are in Chicago, Charlotte and Orlando here in the United States. Well, that's not going to help at yen in Spain a lot, but at these three workshops, they're actually giving away the complete project prism methodology package to the attendees. So if you're in any of these three towns and you're looking for a methodology yourself, well, why not join this workshop and get it for free
Cornelius Fichtner (10:35):
Only two news items today. And the second one here is from February the eighth and it's titled hand soft releases next gen game project management update. Well, this was very interesting for me because I had never expected that project management for gaming software next generation gaming software actually exists that there is a particular market for well project management software for games. Very interesting little read here. They also say that they have various industries that actually use their software telecom. It consulting have discovered the benefits of their software here by hand soft, but they're still focusing on the gaming industry because that's where they have a big foothold. So interesting to see that they're ER, very small niches that companies use to produce project management software.
Above are the first few pages of a computer-generated transcript with all its computer-generated quirks. A human-generated transcript is available to Premium subscribers starting with episode 136.
