International Project Manangement Day

International Project Manangement Day - Washington DC PMI Chapter (www.pmiwdc.org)

The Washington DC Chapter of PMI hosted an International Program Management Day event today, Nov 2, 2006.

The half day seminar included a series of speakers from business and government executives regarding past or present project initiatives and the value project management is bringing to their organizations.

Speakers shared their stories of why they have endorsed the practices, certifications, training, etc. based on real successes and failures which reinforce why the profession is growing so dramatically. While all guest speakers were fantastic, the speakers of particular interest to me were:

Dan Smith, VP Program Management, Verizon Business
Dan shared his views on project managements value in the telecommunications industry and some personal views regarding certification. Amazingly enough, several years ago, admittedly, Dan did not see the value in the PMP Certification. Today Dan's program management office requires it! Dan agrees that their is a significant value in the application of the PMI methodolgy, but he expressed some concern around the manner in which people acquire their PMP Certification. From Dan's perspective, the PMP Prep courses pushing people through 2 and 3 day crash courses diminish the certification. I tend to agree. The value of the PMP Certification is in the application not in simply oroving you can pass the test. To some degree, simply voicing this concern, seems to indicate that PMI should revisit the criteria needed for organizations to become registered education providers. It will be interesting to see over time how PMI chooses to deal with this. From the PMI perspective, there is a great deal of value in the speed which the PMP Certification is gaining acceptance.



The other speaker of interest was David Frame (J. Davidson Frame), University of Management and Technology
Dr. Frame has been a major player in project management education and training since the late 1970s. He has written eight books and more than 30 scholarly articles on the subject. His Managing Projects in Organizations (2003) is a business best seller. His most recent book, Managing Risk in Organizations, was published in 2003. For more on Dr. David Frame, visit www.umtweb.edu

Dr. Frame spoke about China's recent acceptance of project management principles. Interestingly, I learned that China accounts for over 40% of the consumption of all construction materials globally. Further, until recently, China depended mostly on engineering principles. China will become PMI's continued growth story. There are an estimated 500,000 project professionals in China, but only 10,000 with PMP Certification. Leading researchers believe the recent acceptance of the PMI Methodology will boost that number to over 30,000 over the next year or so. It was interesting to see that the United State accounted for over 60% of the PMP base while Asia Pacific was less the 20%.


So the United States is quickly becoming a saturated market for project management professionals? How hard does that make your competition next time you interview for a job? The PMP certification will no longer will the differentiator between you and the next person. Hiring managers and executives will likely focus some of the interview questions on topics such as:

What did you do to earn your PMP Cert?
How long did you study?
How long have you been applying the PMI methodology? and ask for specific examples.

These are just a few things to think about as you consider how to prepare for the PMP Certification.