The Critical Path

Welcome to today's Open House - It's BA, All Day! We're excited to open up our community today to all project managers around the world to talk about business analysis and connect members to valuable resources and knowledge. Here's what's on the agenda:

Two Amazing (and Free!) Templates:

• Download this valuable worksheet from expert Richard Larson, President and Founder of Watermark Learning - perfect for project managers who are interested in obtaining the PMI-PBA certification.
• Interested in managing risk requirements more effectively? Then make sure you download this template created by expert Cheryl Lee, Business Analysis & Project Management Consultant & Instructor.

Two Free Webinars (great way to earn PDUs!)

• (RESCHEDULED TBD): Richard Larson presents PMI-PBA: From "What Is It?" to "I Did It!". Join us for an overview on PMI-PBA® certification. Attendees will come away with a clear idea of what the exam covers, and tips for applying for, preparing for, and passing the exam. A special focus is on how the PBA exam maps to the PMP to show candidates how to apply their existing knowledge to the new certification. 
• 5:00 PM ET: Cheryl Lee presents Uncover Gaps in Your Requirements Using Requirements Risk Management Techniques. This interactive session will explore the hand-offs between project and requirements risk and arm attendees with information to begin addressing the #2 reason of why projects fail – inaccurate requirements - immediately within their workplace using requirements risk management techniques.

One (1) PDU will automatically be reported for PMI credential holders who view either the live or recorded version of this webinar. Please allow 10-14 business days for processing. 

Please note: Pre-registration does not guarantee access. Our webinars are on a first come, first serve basis with a maximum room capacity of 1500 attendees. These webinars will be recorded and available On-Demand within 48 hours.

 More Free Resources Unlocked!

Our premium content is reserved for PMI members and ProjectManagement.com premium members.  To celebrate today's Open House, we've unlocked the following resources and webinars for a limited time! Get started on downloading these resources and watching webinars on Business Analysis (free PDU alert!) here:

• Strategic Requirements Template
• Requirements Gathering Guidelines and Checklists
• System Requirements Specification
• Requirements Management Plan
• Effective PM-BA Role Collaboration (webinar)
• Relationship Between the PM and BA (webinar)
• Business Requirements Techniques for Delivering Value While Controlling Scope (webinar)
• What's Hot  and What's Not: Trends in Business Analysis (webinar)
• Forward Thinking for Tomorrow's Projects - Requirements for Business Analytics (webinar)
• Requirements Definition - Project and Outcome Success Drivers, PMI's Road Map (webinar)
• EMEA Congress Highlights - Business Analysis and Requirements Management (webinar)
• Requirements Toolkit: Top Models for Complete Requirements (webinar)
• PMXPO 2015: PMI's Annual Pulse of the Profession: An In-Depth Look at Requirements Management (webinar)

First Ever PMI Business Analysis Virtual Conference 2015

• What: This all-day virtual event is designed for business analysts in all industries—and it’s absolutely free! It’s the only event where you’ll find the world’s expert BA and agile speakers together—with live Q&A. You’ll have the opportunity to engage with industry experts while earning up to six (6) free PDUs.
• When: TOMORROW! 4 November 2015 from 8:30 AM ET to 4:45 PM ET.
• Where: From the comfort of your own home or office! Register now at PMI BA Virtual Conference.

Amazing Giveaways (sorry, open to US residents only)

If you're interested in learning more about business analysis, are preparing to take the exam, or just like to win prizes, make sure you enter our giveaway below by Monday, November 9, 2015, 12:00 AM ET.  To celebrate today's open house, we're giving away the following prizes:

• One (1) PMI-PBA Study Guide by Richard and Elizabeth Larson of Watermark Learning. Covering all five domains of business analysis knowledge in depth, this guide provides the structure and explanation you need to comprehend and absorb that knowledge. Retail value $69.00

• Two winners will receive one (1) 30-day subscriptions to Watermark Learning's PBA Online Study Exam. A 3-in-1 tool that lets you warm-up, drill on each domain, and take unlimited exam simulations. Practice on realistic exam questions to help prepare for the PMI-PBA exam. Retail value $99.00!

• PMI-PBA Study Tables by Watermark Learning. These colorful, robust tables are designed for independent study or for use with study groups or training classes. They also are a valuable aid on the job as a quick-reference resource. Retail value $27.00. 


• Three (3) winners will receive one (1) signed copy of "Project Pain Reliever) by Dave Garrett, founder of ProjectManagement.com. Retail value $49.95.
• Three (3) winners will receive this handy spiral bound notebook that can hold your business cards and a pen. Perfect for taking notes! Retail value $3.00.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

If you missed the open house festivities on 16 March 2015, there’s still time to enter the giveaways, which end on Saturday, March 21, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT. You can also access webinars about team building and collaboration and earn PDU credit!

9 HABITS OF EFFECTIVE TEAM BUILDING WEBINAR

Do you need to improve your team-building skills? Have you had bad experiences in the past with keeping your team on board? This webinar by project professional and frequent ProjectManagement.com contributor Bruce Harpham will show you how to assess your team building strengths and weaknesses while giving you actionable steps to improve your team building skills. One (1) PDU will be automatically reported.

GET YOUR T-SHIRT HERE!

Proud to be a project manager? Enter to win a ProjectManagement.com “Influencer” T-shirt!

ENTER TO WIN AND READ!

Project management can be lonely. A valuable reference for all project managers, Project Pain Reliever was developed primarily for new and accidental project managers who manage projects as part of their role and not their profession. These project managers often lack the training or experience to effectively address many of the problems faced by seasoned project management professionals. Compiled by ProjectManagement.com CEO Dave Garrett,  Project Pain Reliever: A Just-In-Time Handbook for Anyone Managing Projects is uniquely organized in essentially a plug-and-play format designed to help these project managers quickly find specific solutions to the problems that they are desperate to fix right now! Enter to win here!

Plus, one lucky winner will receive a digital version of The Effective Project Manager by project professional  Michael Stratton.The Effective Project Manager explains in easy-to-understand terms what you need to do in order to become the best project manager you can be—an Effective Project Manager (EPM). Turn into a “doer” who can handle any situation by being focused on the right things at the right times. See our review and enter to win a copy here!

FREE EBOOKS!

"Teachable Moments" are formed when you have done something--regardless of the outcome--and learned from the experience. Learning makes us better at what we do and provides a great opportunity to develop others and sharpen skills. We’ve compiled our best Teachable Moments from our community members for you to learn from and share with other project managers. (Also available as epub and mobi downloads!)

R.E.A.L Knowledge at NASA - A Knowledge Services Model for the Modern Project Environment by Dr. Ed Hoffman and Dr. Jon Boyle. Learn about the modern project environment and historical context of knowledge and learning at NASA. Strategic imperatives that guide the design and development of a Knowledge Services (KS) Model for individuals, teams and organizations is discussed.

THE EFFECTIVE PM WEBINAR BY MICHAEL STRATTON
 

This live webinar is now complete and is available on-demand! Thanks to all attendees! Project managers make things happen. The Effective PM webinar focuses on strategic assets such as the ability to manage yourself and manage others. Learn how to improve productivity while producing work that matters. One (1) free PDU will be automatically reported. 

ANYTIME, DAY OR NIGHT!

Like what you see on ProjectManagement.com? Want to find out how you can get involved and contribute content? Check out our Contribute Content page and get started today!

In celebration of our March 16, 2015 Open House Event, we're giving away the farm! No, just kidding. We're just giving away copies of Dave Garrett's book (pictured left).

Three lucky winners will receive an autographed, hard copy of Dave Garrett's (co-founder of ProjectManagement.com) book Project Pain Reliever: A Just-In-Time Handbook for Anyone Managing Projects.

Dave's book is so awesome it's even being used in an MBA class at Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. Of course, Dave also makes all of his team members read the book as a condition of employment.

How to Enter

1. Entering is easy! To enter, log in to the Rafflecopter widget below with either your Facebook account or with your name and email address.
2. You must leave a blog comment to enter and all entries must be received through the Rafflecopter widget.
3. The more entries you complete, the greater your chances for winning become.

Giveaway starts on Monday, March 16th at 12:00 am and ends on Saturday, March 21, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT. Sorry, but it's open to U.S. residents only (it's a legal thing). Please read the legal Terms and Conditions contained in the widget below. Winner(s) have seven (7) days to claim their prize before they will be disqualified and a new winner is chosen. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Whether project manager or not, everyone can appreciate the need to hone our skills to become more effective and productive. Often, we get so used to doing things "our way" we don't realize that there may be a better - or more effective - way. I'm definitley guilty of this. 

I recently had the opportunity to read project professional Michael Stratton's new release, The Effective Project Manager.  Mr. Stratton provided me with a free digital copy for this review.

I must say I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book - I loved the conversational tone and down-to-earth approach. It's a quick read, which is especially nice. I put the book down knowing that I konw have a few more tools in my toolbox to start producing the kind of work that really matters - and in the most efficient, effective way possible.

After reading the book, I had a few burning questions for Michael:

Q:  How did you get involved in project management?

A:  I reported to a gifted and talented manager who was brilliant at keeping her employees engaged with work that interested them. I was working as an IT business analyst and she recognized the potential and opportunity for me to work in a project management role. Why? Because she saw me doing it naturally and without effort. She asked me to begin leading efforts as both an IT business analyst as well as a project manager. Ever since then I have brought an analyst mind to project management and in the right organization it can be a very powerful toolset. Thanks to her, I was able to write about the importance of this specific skill in my book.

Q:  What inspired you to write the book? Why did you write it?

A:  At its core, I wrote The Effective Project Manager to bring awareness to the business world that project management professionals are critical to project success. An effective project manager can not only move the work that needs to be moved but also fill a role of deliverable creator and executive advisor.

Secondarily, I wrote the book after I truly felt sustained inner peace of being both productive and effective both at home and in my professional endeavors. I was finally able to wade through all the extraneous organizational and process “stuff” and come out clean with a strong vision of what project management means to me. After 15 years of following other people’s project processes, I found the perfect little process that works for me and my project teams every time. I am a visual person - and arguably not a typical Gantt head. I find that I can be twice as productive and truly effective through my daily use of mind maps, Evernote and online visualization tools such as Lucidchart. These are not typical project management tools and I want to share these tools to other project management professionals so that the profession as a whole can realize the same benefits I have realized. 

Q:  What is one thing you wished you'd known when you first started out in project management?

A:  I wish I had read Secrets of Power Negotiating by Roger Dawson way before I actually read it. I regularly refer to this book. Project management is bursting with give and take and you need to be able to understand both sides of the negotiating table and recognize your next move at all times. Negotiation is about people and understanding motivations. Project Management is also about people and understanding motivations. These two art forms are a perfect match!  

Q:  It's Friday at 4 pm and your boss just told you that you've been assigned to work on a project - on a different continent! You leave 9 am tomorrow. What are the next five (5) things that you do?

A:  

1. Negotiate a week of vacation or a one-time stipend in return for the utterly late notice on this assignment (thank you Roger!).
2. Request a full project debrief that includes travel itinerary, success criteria of the project, personality profiles of the team I will be working with, research running routes and sushi restaurants in the city where I will be working. Save all of this information in Evernote.
3. Call my mom (it’s the right thing to do).
4. Beg my barber for an emergency haircut.
5. Review the music and books on my iPad to ensure I have plenty of reading material for the trip. Must include: Sonny & The Sunsets, The Dirty Heads, Beirut, Port O’Brien, Blind Pilot, Iron & Wine, Talking Heads, Wilco, Grouplove, The Smashing Pumpkins, The Decemberists, Death Cab for Cutie, Cypress Hill, Cake, Beastie Boys, Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings, Parliament, Bootsy Collins, Ohio Players, The Bar-Kays, and Rage Against The Machine. For reading: My Dad is Fat, Jim Gaffigan, Platform, Michael Hyatt, The E-Myth Revisited, Michael E. Gerber, The Four Hour Workweek, Tim Ferriss

Michaels' book is available for purchase on Amazon.com and on effectivepmbook.com and retails for $9.99.

Or, you can try your luck and enter to win our giveaway! One lucky winner will receive a digital copy of Michael's book, The Effective Project Manager. To enter, please fill out the form in the widget below and read the Terms and Conditions. Sorry, open to U.S. legal residents only (it's a legal thing).

Giveaway starts on Monday, March 16th, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT and ends on  Saturday, March 21st, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT. Winner will be notified by email and announced (by first name, last initial only) in the widget below. Winner has 7 days to claim their prize before a new winner will be selected.  Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Project Manager? Aspiring to be one? Then you need to be wearing this super cool T-Shirt!.

To celebrate our Open House Event, we're doing a series of awesome giveaways (sorry, open to U.S. residents only - it's a legal thing).

This giveaway is for one ProjectManagement.com "Leadership is Influence" / "Success doesn't have to be boring" cotton T-shirt (pictured above) in black or white and size of your choosing (S through 2XL). Our T-Shirt is 100% pre-shrunk cotton and sports a classic cut. With a seamless collar, the stitching is double-needed throughout making it durable. Approximate retail value is $9.99.

We're kicking off this giveaway today, March 10, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT and running it through Saturday, March 21, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT.  Fifty (50) winners will be randomly selected on Monday, March 23, 2015 and notified by email.

We will announce the winners in this blog post on Monday, March 23, 2015. Winners' will also be listed in the widget below but only identified by last name, first initial (e.g. "Sarah B."). Please note winners have seven (7) days to claim their prize before another winner will be selected in their place, so keep an eye out!

How to Enter

1. Entering is easy! To enter,Log in to the Rafflecopter widget below with either your Facebook account or with your name and email address.
2. You must leave a blog comment to enter and all entries must be received through the Rafflecopter widget.
3. The more entries you complete, the greater your chances for winning become.

Remember, ends on Saturday, March 21, 2015 at 12:00 am EDT. Make sure you read the legal Terms and Conditions in the widget below. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway