The Big Time

Celebrating Project Management International Day 🌍

Today, we honor the profession that turns vision into reality and ideas into actionable plans. Project managers worldwide are the unsung heroes behind every successful project, navigating challenges, inspiring teams, and driving innovation.

As a project management professional, I’ve seen firsthand how effective project management can transform teams and industries. Today, I want to share three key principles that continue to shape my approach:

✅ Clarity of Purpose: Every project starts with understanding the “why.” Aligning teams around a shared goal not only keeps everyone motivated but also creates a roadmap for decision-making and prioritization.

✅ Adaptability: Change is inevitable, but flexibility is a choice. The best project managers embrace change, find solutions in the face of obstacles, and teach their teams to do the same.

✅ People-Centric Leadership: Projects are about people, not just timelines and budgets. Building trust and fostering a collaborative environment can make all the difference in project outcomes.

To all my fellow project managers and those aspiring to make a difference in this field, thank you for your dedication, resilience, and hard work. Let’s continue to build, innovate, and empower each other to reach new heights.

Happy Project Management International Day!
 

Have you heard of Wicked Problem Solving (WPS) ? This is a new course offering by PMI and I have to say, it is one of the best courses I’ve taken. 

Upon completion of the course, you will receive a Practitioner Badge and 18 PDU’s. 

What does this course come with  ?

This course will deep dive into the three most important skills of today as per the World Economic Forum:
 

• Complex Problem Solving 
• Collaboration
• Creativity 

WPS is a confluence of Agile, Lean, Design Thinking and other modern ways of working with the goal of helping you improve how you work with your team by focusing on:
 

• Asking the Right Questions
• Making Ideas Visible
• Engaging with Forward Actions
   

While it is a self-paced course, you will also be using Miro, the digital white-boarding Tool. 

The course is outstanding, very well-structured, and while there is no live interaction, the way the course was designed makes it semi-interactive and you also get to learn how to use the colalborative platform Miro. I highly recommend this course. 

Stay tuned for more to come ! 
 

In my last two blogs related to CD, Citizen Development and CD Foundation Course , I dicussed what Citizen Development is, it's benefits, an overview of key roles in Citizen Development and introduction to the CD Foundation course. This blog will be about the Citizen Development Practitioner course which is the second in four planned courses related to Citizen Development. 

Below is some basic information on the course: 

• 5-Hour Self-Paced course 
• Course Fee is $249. 
• 1-Hour Online, non-proctored course-based exam
• Exam is 40 multiple choice questions 
• Free soft copy of all templates. 
• Upon completion of the course, you earn 5 PDU's 
• Upon successful completion of the exam, you earn a PMI micro-credential and badge (No Expiry)

Feel free to reach out to me for the registration link ! 

This is probably one of the best courses I've taken. It is very well structured and comprehensive supported by case studies which adds a great flavour to the course so I highly advise professionals to take this course as it does add value.

The course will give you the tools and knowledge that you will need to efficiently create effective applications to solve the problems that you and your organization face. It revolves mainly around the "DO" part of the CD Canvas that are related to "Project Delivery" and "Capability Development" which the practitioner is usually heavily involved in. It includes eight modules, as follows: 

1. Introduction 
2. Hyper-Agile SDLC 
3. Ideation 2.0
4. Suitability Assessment 
5. Business Analysis and Design 
6. Project Risks and Enterprise Risk Requirements 
7. Application Design, Development and Deployment 
8. Conclusion and Introduction to Maturity Model

Stay tuned for more courses and professional development opportunites ! 

In my last blog Citizen Development from the Eye of a Non-IT Project Manager , I discussed what Citizen Development is, it's benefits and an overview of key roles in Citizen Development. This blog will be about the Citizen Development Foundation course which is the first in four planned courses related to Citizen Development. 

Below is some basic information on the course: 

• 90-Minute Self-Paced course 
• Course Fee is $79
• Upon completion of the course, you earn a PMI Certification.
• You earn 2 PDU's (1 Technical + 1 Leadership)
• No exam, no expiry date

My passion for CD started after taking this course. I highly recommend everyone to take advantage of this opportunity and take this course.

Feel free to reach out to me for the Reigstration Link. 

The foundation course is mostly about what CD is with an introduction to the CD Canvas. It includes three modules, as follows: 

A) Basics of Citizen Development

B) Citizen Development Canvas

• Project Delivery
• Capability Development
• Operating Model
• Organizational Alignment
• Maturity Model

C) Ideation 2.0 

In the next blog, I will go into the details of the CD Practitioner Course, so stay tuned ! 

Recently, I’ve taken two courses that introduced me to a very interesting and valuable new concept called “Citizen Development”. My passion about this topic started when I took the foundation course after which I participated in the pilot for the CD Practitioner’s course. 
 

Being a new concept to many, I decided to write an introduction blog about Citizen Development before I dive into the details of each course I’ve taken. In this blog, all figures are quoted from PMI Resources. 
 

Citizen Development is a very interesting initiative and concept. In the beginning, I thought that it only applies for professionals with a background in IT but after deep diving into the subject and taking couple of courses, my view completely changed in that Citizen Development can be beneficial for all individuals and organizations.  
 

The Citizen Development Movement

Introduction to Citizen Development

The below slides provides a brief overview of what Citizen Development is, why it is important and what are the benefits of CD: 

Transformative Benefits of Citizen Development

Citizen Development Canvas and Maturity Model

Citizen Development Courses

PMI are working on a series of courses related to Citizen Development: 

• Citizen Developer Foundation - Released 
• Citizen Developer Practitioner (PMI-CDP): End of May 2021
• Citizen Developer Business Architect: Q3 - 2021
• Citizen Developer Strategist: Q4 - 2021 

What is the difference between a Practitioner, Business Architect and Strategist ?  (The below definitions are quoted from PMI Resources) 
 

CD Practitioners: Those who do the work by creating apps and using them in their day-to-day work. They range from students to project professionals to SME's. They could be but not limited to, the following:

• Business Analysts
• Project Managers
• Business Consultants
• Sales Executives
• Marketing Managers
• HR Managers
• Finance Analysts
• Operations Analysts. 

CD Business Architects: Architects manage Citizen Development teams, the governance process and the collaboration between stakeholders in IT and the business. They facilitate access to relevant tools and methods. They can come from IT and may already be enterprise architects or may come from the business as an agile coach or product owner. They could be but not limited to, the following:

• Lines Manager 
• Enterprise and IT Architects
• Demand Managers 
• Portfolio Managers
• Agile and Scrum Specialists 
• IT Managers and Team Leaders 
• Business Transformation Consultants 
• Organizations Design Consultants 
   

CD Strategists: Strategists manage and lead the creation of the operating environment that allows Citizen Development to thrive, instilling the cultural practices and mandates that foster adoption and scaling of Citizen Development and drive organizational transformation by harnessing the power of Citizen Development application platforms. The are members of the senior management team and can include, but not limited to, the following: 

• Chief Executive Officers
• Chief Strategy Officers 
• Chief Information Officers
• Chief Transformation Officers 
• Digital Transformation Directors 
• Organizational Designers 

What are your thoughts on Citizen Development ? 

In the next blogs, I will discussing each of the courses separately in details so stay tuned. Meanwhile, feel free to reach out to me for the courses Registration Links.