After all INFLUENCE remains

Daire,

The influence scores that you see (on the PM expertise tab) are independent statements of your influence on specific topics; they are not intended to be added together.

I’ve provided some comments on them in this thread. To my understanding, they largely measure the response to content that you have generated on specific topics. So, if you write content (e.g., articles, blogs, webinars, questions, etc.) and it generates activity on the site, then you will see the associated topic-scores elevate in correlation to the degree of response.

Now, I know there is much more to it, but what’s important is that it is still a measure of your influence, just measured differently than the singular influence score that was removed.

Dear George,

Thank you for clarifying the situation for me.

If that is the case then how did the original algorithm for calculating your overall influence score work?

To me it seems that the influence number is a number that is personal to you and should not be benched or compared against that of other contributors in the community as each score is unique and not easily transferable or comparable.

Also if it does pick the top three areas of project management that you are strongest at then what are these numbers out of ? 50/75/100 ? There is no range associated with these numbers.

Also the top influencer score does not seem to make any sense as to how they arrived as such a score.

It seems to me that this approach to maintaining the influence score is some half hearted measure to appease the project management community but how this works is still a mystery to us all.

Personaly for me the top influencer are the persons who actively engage with the project management community with thought provoking, insightful and original content that increases your overall depth of knowledge in project management.

Daire

Hi Daire,

None of us knew the algorithm for the overall influence score. My statements regarding it and the topic-based influence scores are based on what was written by PMI regarding the subject (which understandably wasn’t much) and what I learned by watching score patterns (mine and others) over time. In other words, it’s just my opinion.

Topic-based influence scores:
These scores (the top-3 of which you see on the PM Expertise tab) do not necessarily represent how you would rank your expertise to other members. However, they do represent the response other members have had to the content (e.g., articles, webinars, blog postings, PMC postings, etc.) that you have generated on given topics, among other factors. That said, if you specifically target a “topic” (e.g., career development) through generated content, then you can have a degree of control over those scores. In fact, that is how PMI sold these topic-based scores in their writeup on this subject; that is, they encouraged members to target the topics they are interested in (i.e., being recognized in) and then work on getting their name to the top of the respective rankings.

Overall influence score
I understand that we (the members) didn’t have a very good handle on this score. However, what I surmised over time was that it was a pseudo-aggregate of the topic-based scores, plus a measure of one’s engagement (over time) above and beyond that basis (e.g., comment activity, badges, certifications, contributing at a leadership level in your local chapter, etc.). Again, this is all conjecture on my part.

Closing thoughts
Managing one’s influence only from the topic-based influence scores is a new way forward (although it has always been there) and I understand that not too many folks are familiar with it. However, my take on it is this: The topic-based influence scores opens up a much larger opportunity for membership to engage in “getting on the influence board,” as there are over 40 topics currently available (i.e. over 40 areas where a member can compete to get into the top-10).

So, does this not open up more opportunity for more members to be recognized for their efforts? Maybe not at the moment, due to this feature not be overtly pushed on the site. However, once it becomes readily visible, then “let the games begin.” And who knows, maybe there will be a new type of headliners presentation in the future that will give a nice recap of those topic-based leaders.

Dear George,

Thank you for your response and detailed explanation.

So it this an attempt by PMI to turn PM's into SME by getting PM's to focus on the three areas they are the most strong or interested in and not in the other thirty seven areas that are part of the forty topics included for 'top influencer'?

To me a project manager needs to be an all arounder and to gets to this stage needs years of experience delivering diverse and increasing challenging projects.

I can understand the logic behinds PMI's decision to ask projects manager to only focus in three topic area's but you could getting a lot of project managers pilling into a handful of topics and fighting it out to be top influencer instead of having a more balanced approach were a project manager increases their influence score by an maintaining an balanced scorecard across all the fields of project management.

As I look through the list of most active project managers of the projectmanagement.com homepage I know who are the contributors in many different fields and as such their content will be in tune and logical with the various fields of project mangement.

Daire

Daire,

PMI is NOT asking members to focus on three subject areas, nor are they trying to turn their members into SME’s. The last I checked, I had around 20 or so topics where I was scored. However, at the moment, we only see the top-3 in the “PM Expertise” tab, where before we could see all of them on our profiles influence page (which was recently removed). However, I can go to the specific topics and page through the rankings and see my score in each topic area if I wanted to. In other words, there are some gaps at the moment, which I trust will be resolved in time.

Here’s how I look at this: The site is in transition, and we need to be patient as PMI unfolds their vision. I understand there is confusion regarding the topic-based influence scores, which is why I was trying to address it by commenting on this thread. However, it appears that my opinions and thoughts on the subject are possibly creating more confusion. My apologies to all, if that has been true.

George

Dear George
Thank you for participating in this reflection and for your opinions ...

Nothing like having faith :-)

Dear Mayte
Thank you for participating in this reflection and for your opinion.

Apparently I am also nothing :-) (Of course, from the perspective of ProjectManagement)

Interestingly the impression I have is that you are very talented and competent.

Dear Stéphane
Thank you for participating in this reflection and for your opinion

What is your reading?

I think the PMI Engagement team had the worst offender removed: the overall influence score. It would be fairly straightforward and clean to do this.

Topic influences are on many web pages and will likely be removed in a future iteration.