People And Projects Podcast: Project Management Podcast

Check Out the Project Management Certificate Program at UC Irvine This episode is sponsored by University of California Irvine Continuing Education, who has been developing adult learners for over half a century. UC Irvine has a Project Management Certification Program that is available to you anywhere around the world. UC Irvine’s program aligns with standards set out by Project Management Institute and satisfies the education requirements for the Project Management Professional certification. Spring registration is now open! Visit ce.uci.edu/PeopleAndProjects to learn more and reserve your seat. Thanks!   The Power of Character Strengths The idea of strengths-based leadership is not new to you, right? You’ve likely been taught that you should focus on your strengths, and lead that way with your team members. We’ve talked about strengths from multiple angles, but today I want to share yet another. Ruth Pearce is a friend--someone I dearly respect as a colleague. She’s a strong advocate not only for strength

Check Out the 120VC Project Leadership Program (PLP) This episode is sponsored by the 120VC Project Leadership Program, led by my friend J. Scott from 120VC. You may recall my discussion with J back in episode 274 about his book The Irreverent Guide to Project Management. There are so many things I appreciate about J, but one is his passion for the people side of our profession. 120VC has been driving large global transformational Projects successfully for the last 20 years for fortune 500 clients like Trader Joes, Sony Pictures, T-Mobile, & AT&T. J's Project Leadership Program is a practical 14-week virtual & instructor-led learning opportunity. It qualifies for 30 PDUs while teaching you techniques that get proven results. J's next cohort starts up on April 22 and he's offering $200 USD off for listeners of the podcast. Register at 120vc.com/plp and use the coupon code People-0422. I highly recommend it!   Agile: Not Just for Software Projects We often think of agile approaches being used for s

Check Out the 120VC Project Leadership Program (PLP) This episode is sponsored by the 120VC Project Leadership Program, led by my friend J. Scott, founder of 120VC. You may recall my discussion with J back in episode 274 about his book The Irreverent Guide to Project Management. There are so many things I appreciate about J, but one is his passion for the people side of our profession. 120VC has been driving large global transformational Projects successfully for the last 20 years for fortune 500 clients like Trader Joes, Sony Pictures, T-Mobile, & AT&T. J's Project Leadership Program is a practical 14-week virtual & instructor-led learning opportunity. It qualifies for 30 PDUs while teaching you techniques that get proven results. J's next cohort starts up on April 22 and he's offering $200 USD off for listeners of the podcast. Register at 120vc.com/plp and use the coupon code People-0422. I highly recommend it!   Impossible Conversations Globally, we’re at a challenging time with the coronaviru

Check Out the Project Management Certificate Program at UC Irvine This episode is sponsored by University of California Irvine Continuing Education, who has been developing adult learners for over half a century. UC Irvine has a Project Management Certification Program that is available to you, regardless of whether you’re in their neighborhood or around the world. UC Irvine’s program aligns with standards set out by Project Management Institute and satisfies the education requirements for the Project Management Professional certification. Spring registration is now open! Visit ce.uci.edu/PeopleAndProjects to learn more and reserve your seat. Thanks!   Life's Great Question Tom Rath joins us for episode 283 to talk about his newest book entitled Life's Great Question: Discover How You Contribute to the World. At a time filled with great uncertainty, Tom's book is a helpful read, reminding us to look outward--how we can contribute. In this episode, you can earn free PDUs while getting practical insights from

Check Out the Project Management Certificate Program at UC Irvine This episode is sponsored by University of California Irvine Continuing Education, who has been developing adult learners for over half a century. UC Irvine has a Project Management Certification Program that is available to you, regardless of whether you’re in their neighborhood or around the world. UC Irvine’s program aligns with standards set out by Project Management Institute and satisfies the education requirements for the Project Management Professional certification. Spring registration is now open! Visit ce.uci.edu/PeopleAndProjects to learn more and reserve your seat. Thanks!   Leaders Have to Influence An ongoing theme over our now 282 episodes is about influence. How can we influence those around us, especially when we’re doing that without a position of authority? In this episode, you can earn free PDUs while getting evidence-based insights from Jonah Berger. Jonah joins us again, this time to talk about his new book The Catalyst:

I just wrapped up the first day of our 2-day Essentials of Project Management workshop at one of my favorite biotech clients. A topic that came up today is how to deal with team members that suffer from bad morale. Of course there are no easy answers, but in this brief video, I share a story and some research that was reported in Bob Sutton's Wall Street Journal article (subscription may be required to read) years ago. Could it be that just one slacker or jerk could drop team performance by 30-40 percent? Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! What advice do you have for dealing with withholders of effort and violators of interpersonal norms? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leave a message on our Listener Feedback Line (847-550-3747). I look forward to hearing from you! Interested in helping your teams get better at successfully del

I just wrapped up another week of workshops and keynotes. In this 3-minute snippet, I share a thought from our keynote entitled Developing Your Ability to Influence (Even When You Don't Have Authority). Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! How do you personally differentiate influence from manipulation? What are some examples of each that you've seen project managers and other leaders use? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leave a message on our Listener Feedback Line (847-550-3747). I look forward to hearing from you! Interested in helping your leaders develop their ability to influence (and not manipulate!)? Contact me to learn more about our keynotes and workshops! Thanks!) Thank you for joining me for this episode of The People and Projects Podcast! Have a great week! Talent Triangle: Leadership Total Duration 2:58 (audio versio

Getting a shared understanding of what's in (and out) of scope is critical for successfully delivering our projects. In this 2-minute snippet, I share some thoughts from an exam prep class I taught today. Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! How do you help keep expectations about scope aligned between your team and your stakeholders? What advice would you share with a new project manager about managing scope? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leave a message on our Listener Feedback Line (847-550-3747). I look forward to hearing from you! Interested in helping your teams learn how to lead and deliver projects? Contact me to learn more about our keynotes and workshops! Thanks!) Thank you for joining me for this episode of The People and Projects Podcast! Have a great week! Talent Triangle: Technical Project Management Total Duration

How To Master The Most Important Skill For Success What is one thing that, if you did it more often, and encouraged your team to do it more often as well, would make a significant difference in your success, personally and with your projects? Earn more free PDUs? No, you are doing that right now! Dr. Wayne Baker suggests it's this: we need to ask more often. Wayne is the author of the new book All You Have to Do Is Ask: How to Master the Most Important Skill for Success. I consider it a must-read book and look forward to sharing this discussion with you. Learn more about Wayne and his book at https://www.waynebaker.org/. During this episode, I mention some episodes that would be good follow-ups: Kari Mirabal, regarding her book You Already Have the No, in episode 258. Adam Grant, regarding his book Give and Take, in episode 93. Amy Edmondson, regarding her book The Fearless Organization, in episode 236.   Let's Stay In Touch! I hear from listeners almost every day and I love it! How about you and I connect

Total Duration 2:30 Download episode 277 We Often Aren't Clear What the Argument Is About "Though many arguments seem to be about matters of substance, they're often just disagreements about the meanings of words." That's from Peter Boghossian, and I'm prepping for an interview with Peter on Friday about his book How to Have Impossible Conversations. In this brief video, I discuss that quote and a couple of ideas around it. Let's Stay In Touch! I hear from listeners almost every day and I love it! How about you and I connect on LinkedIn? Go to https://PeopleAndProjectsPodcast.com/LinkedIn and send me an invite! Also, if you know of a group at your organization that has an upcoming large group gathering and uses outside speakers, let them know about the podcast! I'd love to work with them to help improve their ability to lead and deliver. Learn more at https://i-leadonline.com/keynotes. Thanks! Thank you for joining me for this episode of The People and Projects Podcast! Talent Triangle: Leadership

Sometimes Christmas Isn't So Merry! I'm publishing this episode at a time of year when there are often family gatherings, and in today's polarized, politically correct culture, there can easily be anxiety about someone--you know, that person--bringing up a controversial subject and things devolving into an argument. Whether it's gatherings with friends and family or difficult stakeholders, we need to get better at having productive disagreements. Our guest today, Buster Benson, suggests it's the most important meta-skill to develop. Buster is the author of the new book Why Are We Yelling? The Art of Productive Disagreement. I consider it a must-read book and look forward to sharing this discussion with you. Learn more about Buster and his book at https://busterbenson.com/.   Let's Stay In Touch! I hear from listeners almost every day and I love it! How about you and I connect on LinkedIn? Go to https://PeopleAndProjectsPodcast.com/LinkedIn and send me an invite! Also, if you know of a group at your organizati

Do Project Managers Need Fans? So what are you a fan of? Hmmm. Maybe a sports team comes to mind. Or a musical artist. For example, I’m going through a Chance the Rapper phase right now—really enjoying his music. I’m a fan. Maybe it’s a local restaurant or a celebrity or, ahem, a podcast host. Ha! But when we think of fandom, we often think of someone famous, or a famous brand. But could it be that leaders of projects could get benefit from learning about how fandom works? That’s the premise of today’s episode. We’re hearing from David Meerman Scott today about his book new Fanocracy. It’s a book that probably wouldn’t have otherwise come up on your radar screen since it would appear it’s directed more towards brand managers and marketers. But how about this? What if you could turn your stakeholders into fans of what your team is creating? Further, what if your team members were walking billboards for your company and your products? The science around fandom might just be more relevant to you than initially a

Sponsor: Earlier this year we started using a time tracking solution called Hubstaff and, I have to tell you, it’s amazing. They now offer a project management app called Hubstaff Tasks. It utilizes the best parts of Agile to help you and your team get work done in a way that removes the hassle and just makes sense. Hubstaff Tasks utilizes Kanban boards like so many other PM tools out there but they’ve added extra features like automated workflows that let you move projects through the workflow and automatically assign tasks to whoever needs to work on them next, all with one click. Hubstaff Tasks also has a Sprints feature that allows you to organize all your tasks into a true agile weekly Sprint. Oh, and here’s a new feature they just added where you can set daily Standups to cover the three golden questions in the agile world: “What did you work on today?”, “What will you work on tomorrow?”, “Have you run into any roadblocks?” Hubstaff Tasks only launched this past June and there are already thousands of

Project managers, you know the importance of organization and transparency when it comes to collaborating on a team. This episode is sponsored by Backlog, which is the perfect project management software to keep your projects organized from start to finish. As you’d expect, you can create tasks and track progress with features like Gantt & burndown charts. But beyond that, you can write, revise, and release code right within tasks. You can document processes alongside your work with wikis. And you can do all this and more with one easy to use tool. Try Backlog for your team free for 30 days using the special URL Backlog.com/projects. Check them out! Thanks!   OK, We're Not Spies, But... I don’t know about you, but I like a good spy movie. Start a Jason Bourne movie and I’ll sit and enjoy it all night long. My guest today is Jason Hanson, a former CIA spy who has written some intriguing books about applying spy skills to those of us who aren’t spies. In this episode, we talk about his most recent book, wh

Two people. Both go through stressful situations. One seems to go through it well. The other crumbles. Why is that? I'm wrapping up a 2-week speaking tour in Europe with UN leaders. In this 3-minute video (plus a quick blooper), I share a lesson about stress and resilience from a discussion with one of these leaders who attributes her stressful job to greater resilience. Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! What's a situation that was stressful but helped develop resilience in you? What advice would you share with someone newer in their career about how to face stressful situations? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leave a message on our Listener Feedback Line (847-550-3747). I look forward to hearing from you! Interested in helping your chapter, association, or leaders learn how to build resilience? Contact me to learn more about

This tour guide was so good I almost wanted to move to Turino. I'm on a two week speaking tour in Europe with the UN. In this brief video, I share a lesson about influence from our tour guide in Turin, Italy. Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! What's an experience where the messenger made it so easy to buy into the message? What did the messenger do to be so effective? What's your take on the balance of facts & emotion? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leave a message on our Listener Feedback Line (847-550-3747). I look forward to hearing from you! Interested in helping your chapter, association, or leaders learn how to improve their influence? Contact me to learn more about our keynotes and workshops! Thanks!) Thank you for joining me for this episode of The People and Projects Podcast! Have a great week! Talent Triangle: Le

It's not a newsflash that most of us need more sleep. The question is "How?" One of our most-requested keynotes is called Help for the Crazy Busy. In this brief video, I share a story and lesson related to the keynote and sleep. Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! How many hours of sleep would you say you get on average? What do you do that helps you get the sleep you need? What advice would you share with someone who feels like they just can't get more sleep? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leave a message on our Listener Feedback Line (847-550-3747). I look forward to hearing from you! Interested in helping your executive leaders learn more about agile and their role in fostering project success? Contact me to learn more about our keynotes and workshops! Thanks!) Thank you for joining me for this episode of The People and Proje

Project managers, you're not just here for the free PDUs, right? You're looking for ways to improve your ability to lead! This episode is sponsored by Backlog, which is the perfect project management software to keep your projects organized from start to finish. As you’d expect, you can create tasks and track progress with features like Gantt & burndown charts. But beyond that, you can write, revise, and release code right within tasks. You can document processes alongside your work with wikis. And you can do all this and more with one easy to use tool. Try Backlog for your team free for 30 days using the special URL Backlog.com/projects. Check them out! Thanks!   Leading in an Age of Distractions We live in an age of distractions. Back in episode 144, we talked with Cal Newport about his book Deep Work. In episode 177 we talked with Adam Alter about his book Irresistible. Both books provide helpful insights into how to stay focused when we’re surrounded by so many distractions. As much as I benefited fr

Project managers, you know the importance of organization and transparency when it comes to collaborating on a team. This episode is sponsored by Backlog, which is the perfect project management software to keep your projects organized from start to finish. As you’d expect, you can create tasks and track progress with features like Gantt & burndown charts. But beyond that, you can write, revise, and release code right within tasks. You can document processes alongside your work with wikis. And you can do all this and more with one easy to use tool. Try Backlog for your team free for 30 days using the special URL Backlog.com/projects. Check them out! Thanks!   We're All Project Managers (And Salespeople) For years I've been on a mission to help people realize we're all project managers. Regardless of title, if you have a job, you have deadlines you have to hit, with multiple steps required to get there. Maybe not by title, but by role, we're all project managers. It's a basic skill set we all need. In thi

Wasted time. Wasted energy. Wasted stress. In our project and organizational environments, we're surrounded by waste. In this < 3-minute video, I share some thoughts from a recent keynote to a group of global leaders regarding agile. When you look at the world through the lens of eliminating waste, there's no shortage of opportunities. Good project management practices seek to eliminate waste, regardless of whether you're using a formal agile approach or not. Let Me Hear From You! I'd love to hear from you! What are some examples of where you've seen waste recently? Whether within your organization or--as I share in the video--somewhere in the general public, such as an airport. Where do you see opportunities to reduce waste? And what are some lessons you've learned about identifying and eliminating waste? Let's connect on LinkedIn and discuss! I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what have you been learning lately? What are you reading? Please e-mail me (show [AT] PeopleAndProjectsPodcast [DOT] com) or leav