Diane Dugan PMP, LEED AP, was awarded the prestigious Barbara Ann Fuller Volunteer of the Year award at the Volunteer Recognition Dinner event on February 6, 2015 . Diane is the consummate professional, photographer and volunteer. Diane is so dedicated that she was working during her own celebratory event as PMINJ’s chapter photographer!  Diane attends most, if not all, of the PMINJ events - from monthly Program meetings and mid-size workshops to the large Symposium events. Diane uses her talent to commemorate chapter events. The Symposium events are especially demanding with multiple breakout rooms, hundreds of photos captured and subsequently sorted and edited.  In this way, Diane shares her talents and further demonstrates her commitment to the PMINJ chapter. Diane also leads the Photography Team for the Symposium events - organizing photography activities, assuring coverage of speakers and vendors, and the post-event gathering and finalizing all photos for media and website release. Diane is a joy to work with and the PMINJ chapter is grateful for her continued commitment to our chapter. Thank you, Diane!

Adrienne Walcott joined the Volunteer Recognition team in March, 2014.  In this very short time of volunteering, Adrienne has gone above and beyond the expectation for her role as Volunteer Coordinator.  After training, Adrienne learned the VRMS system and efficiently manages it as coordinator for the PMINJ chapter.  In this role she manages volunteer engagements, tracks volunteer opportunities and application, updates VRMS database and Master Volunteer list, sends communication to new members of Volunteer teams, trains applicants in VRMS database and responds to any email questions received to .
 
She thoroughly enjoys her role as Volunteer Coordinator.  When she made a list of reasons to stay in New Jersey or move to Arizona, this was one of the top reason why she chose to stay in New Jersey.  When she is not volunteering, she takes violin lessons and plays in an orchestra.

Her dedication is unmatched and she is very pleasant to work with.

Tod has been the “bedrock” volunteer for the Corporate Outreach Team. He has been PMINJ's ambassador and a project management evangelist at many of our Outreach events - handing out brochures, giving advice and (when available) candy to the people who stop by our PMINJ information tables.

Tod’s smiling face and easy manner of speaking with people have been key elements in spreading the word about the importance of project management as a profession and about the benefits and opportunities that PMINJ provides to members. As we have continued to reach out to project manager communities in corporations, universities, state and local governments, and other professional organizations, we’ve always been able to count on Tod to volunteer and be present to represent PMINJ.

When Tod is not volunteering for PMINJ events, he is a Business Development Manager for Analysts International Corporation (AIC) in Edison, NJ.

Did you know that Emotional intelligence contributes to over 50 percent of Project Manager’s success and job performance? Or that Project Managers with high EQ (Emotional Quotient – a measure of emotional intelligence) are also top performers and earners?  In a recent PM study, emotional intelligence has been identified as a unique area of individual differences that is likely to underpin sets of behaviors such as teamwork, attentiveness, conflict management, and transformational leadership.  

PMINJ invites you to join us at the 2015 Annual Symposium on May 4, 2015, to explore the tools and latest knowledge in the area of emotional intelligence and enhance your Project Management skills.  We are engaging speakers and building content across the well-received triple track format. Our May event will be held at the Pines Manor in Edison, NJ and include opportunities to network with fellow PMs and vendors.  Check for details.

Snow and ice did not deter TEKsystems and interested Project Managers from attending the initial Open Networking session of 2015 in Garwood, NJ.  Despite threatening weather conditions, three recruiters from the Parsippany office arrived early at the Westwood, unpacked, and immediately began meeting attendees who are embracing career change.  

Amanda Thompson, Margaret Woods and Alana Moses enthusiastically greeted 33 PMs, individually listening to goals, skill sets and target industries, suggesting next steps, and gathering business cards for later in-depth discussions and interviews.

Career Networking LCI team members Ram Vandra, Mary White and Joan Galay registered arrivals, introduced them to each other, and facilitated introductions in turn with the three TEKsystems representatives. The CNL team also offered attendees the opportunity to join a Project Manager job-coaching group, headed by a member of the CNL, conducted by phone for members in need of professional guidance in their job search.

Ram, a recent contractor for TEKsystems, vouches for their status as one of the top 100 companies to work for. The Career Networking LCI team appreciates the support of TEKsystems for the February 17th event, and invites Project Managers to visit their website,  to explore new opportunities.

The Career Networking Local Community of Interest (LCI) meets six times each season, alternating facilitated open-networking sessions with expert speakers on relevant job search topics, such as:

• How to Be a GREAT Job Candidate
• Using LinkedIn to Network Effectively
• Job Search Secrets
• The Next Phase: Life Strategies

The March Chapter meeting hosted Radia Carr and Don Warkentin of Dale Carnegie Training for their presentation, “Networking for Success for Project Managers.”

The CNL team encourages members to scan the open positions posted by former PMINJ President John Bufe, under the “Careers” banner on the PMINJ Website, to enroll in the CNL email list for job posting alerts, and to consider posting a resume on the website to be viewed by interested employers.

Sessions are held at 5:30 PM before the Chapter meeting, and all are welcome.  The group aims to provide opportunities for project managers to meet each other and learn how to effectively grow their professional network of contacts, whether in a career transition or to support their professional activities.

The 2015 Volunteer Recognition Dinner Event was a huge success. We took last year's event feedback and decided to add a theme, party games and music to this annual event and sure enough, it was a blast.  This year's theme was Mardi Gras.  We conducted a Jeopardy Game and danced to kept the festive theme throughout the night. All attendees were greeted with beads and their choice of masks when they came through the door. We had door prizes, winner team prizes and last, but not least, announced the Barbara Ann Fuller Volunteer of the Year award winner for 2014 -- Diane Dugan.  Diane is a very deserving candidate for this award.  (See article above)

       

I would like to thank the volunteers who helped make this event a successful one:

I would like to extend special thanks to our PMINJ leadership, Judy Balaban and the Board members for supporting me and assisting me in planning such a great event. I really enjoyed hosting this event and being able to meet the many dedicated PMINJ volunteers who make PMINJ one of the best PMI chapters.

 

On February 7, 2015, the Workshop Team co-sponsored a Winter Workshop with our own NJ Chapter PMP, Joe LaGanga, who presented “An Introduction to Risk Management, and the Effects on Your Project.” DeVry University hosted our event and continues to remain a very generous and accommodating partner with the PMINJ Chapter.

The feedback from attendees was very positive – owing to the fact that Joe was an excellent and engaging speaker who involved attendees from the moment he began presenting.  Joe provided valuable risk information including tools, techniques, documentation, processes and case studies. Joe's interaction with his audience gave the attendees the benefit to hear other's risk concerns and their personal experiences from many different industries.

This workshop was geared toward the practicing Project / Program Manager who would like a refresher, and those who run projects with a desire to become more efficient at managing project risks.  Workshop attendees came away with more confidence and understanding of project risks, identification methods, and the effects on the life cycle of their projects by these risks. All this was covered in only four hours with an abundant amount of data, material and tools to take back to work. Overall, this workshop was a great success, valuable to our members, and offered at a great price.

About the Instructor:
Joe LaGanga has been developing training courses for the Information Technology and Communications fields for the past eight years and is a certified Instructor with multiple organizations. He is president of his own small business that performs Project Management for the Small / Medium business market focusing on network deployments and telecommunications infrastructure improvements, as well as technical training in various aspects of Project Management and Information Technology.

The PMINJ Chapter is working on selecting valuable eight-hour full-day workshops to satisfy our Members and Non-Members' needs. Stay tuned for more workshops with great topics! If you know of a topic that you feel will bring value to our members, contact .

Editor's Note: Last year the newsletter reported on the formation of the Project Managers in Transition group – formerly the PIT team - which was created to enable volunteers who were in transition to continue to practice project management while between jobs. Since then, the group has changed the name to the PMIT group, and below is an update to the group's activities.

The team began discussing and documenting the process and procedures for the PMIT initiative in September 2014. The Advisory team included Nita Parikh, Elaine Tanimura, Darlaine Scott McCoy, Adrienne Walcott, Mary Beth Kuderna, and Mohammad Hasan.

PMIT process and procedural documents were finalized in November of 2014. In December, Mohammad spearheaded the team activities by requesting the PMINJ Board submit projects in their areas so that opportunities could be posted in VRMS.

Thus far, we have posted around five PMIT opportunities on VRMS and two PMIT volunteers have been matched to projects.

The open PMIT opportunities on VRMS are the following:

1. Speaker Committee Project Manager (Opportunity#4446)
2. Volunteer Recruiter Project Manager (Opportunity#4406)
3. Project Manager for Franklin Township Food Bank (In process of posting)

If you are interested in volunteering for the PMIT group, please see the opportunities listed above, or contact Mohammad with any questions - .

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This month's industry focus for Project Management is Marketing. During our February chapter meeting presentation, Leadership and Management of Complex Projects, Professor Rick Heaslip posed the question of whether the complexity of projects in modern organizations is better managed by “PMBOK-style” project management generalists, or by technical or subject matter experts.  As an extension of this topic, and in order to get a more industry-specific perspective on this topic, I spoke with a marketing professional about the role of project management within the industry. 

Michael Clark, Solutions Marketing – Principal, at Computer Sciences Corporation, provided insight into the role of project management in the structure of the marketing function of an organization. Michael’s perspective is shaped by 15 years of experience across multiple companies, with a focus on business-to-business (B2B) marketing. Michael is not PMP-certified, but took the time to share with me the activities which comprise his experience to date with using project management in almost every aspect of his past and prior positions. Below are the typical marketing team activities that he highlighted:

• Plan for a variety of project types, Events, New Product Launches, Solution [product] Development
• Create strategies, outline team and tactics requirements on a broad scope
• Uncover the “why” of client requests to determine project requirements
• Tie deliverables and outcomes back to business objectives
• Enlist subject matter experts and specialized marketing teams, e.g., solution marketing, industry marketing
• Manage ten to twenty sub-projects with multiple deliverables from each
• Communicate strategy, define deliverables, and give direction to such marketing support teams as, digital marketing, social media, and market research.

In this particular example, the role Michael outlines is an example of Heaslip's outcome sage. The activities listed above point to operational, outcome, stakeholder, and organizational, complexities managed at the program and project levels. The nature of Marketing’s direct impact on business success requires strategic planning tightly aligned with business objectives, the “projectification” of which must deliver both---the event, new product, solution, etc., and the business benefits.

Generally speaking, the Marketing Project Manager, as a role, is found in two areas. In online or digital marketing, the responsibility is stated as that of managing x-number of projects from inception to completion. In this case, deliverables have been predetermined in-line with the desired outcomes defined by a director-level, in congress with C-level management objectives. This position must have the skills to manage operational, organizational, and stakeholder complexities to deliver project outputs within the traditional time, budget, and quality constraints, corresponding to Heaslip’s operational savant. 

The Marketing Director, by comparison, handles the orchestration of projects, and the management of operational, organizational, and outcome complexity in the role of the outcome sage. 

Lastly, the other area where the PM role is defined as such is in the Marketing Agency where a PM is part of the service team; this role may take on characteristics that could lean in either direction, or both, depending on how much of the operational and outcome complexity the agency PM is responsible for.
Marketing management roles that require PM skills but do not necessarily include the words project manager, are the following:

• Business Development Director
• Business Development Manager
• Commercial Lines Manager
• Market Development Manager
• Marketing Coordinator
• Marketing Director
• Marketing Manager

To learn more about the Marketing Manager position, including education, salary, and projected job growth, go to the Bureau of Labor Statistics page.

You can download the Heaslip slides from the archive on PMINJ.