Project Management Basics - Productivity 1 - DS031 #DougShow #Best Education Page #Online Earning

you know if you stick with it you'll get

better at it and that's what happened

with me because I wasn't particularly

good at managing projects in the

beginning hello what's going on this is

the Doug show

I'm Doug Huntington and welcome to the

first episode on productivity so we're

gonna do a four part series with topics

on productivity so today we are gonna

cover project management and that is

kind of my wheelhouse

I am a PMP that's a project management

professional and I got that back in 2008

which is it's been a while so I've gone

through a few cycles of you know keeping

that current and taken courses and

practiced managing projects for many

years so that is what we're gonna cover

today and this is kind of a cool episode

here because I recorded this with my

wife so my wife and I had a podcast for

a short stretch we did about 20 episodes

and that was in 2018 so I was actually I

recently saw that the domain was up for

renewal so it was right around I guess

like the May time frame when we were

kind of coming up with the idea and like

I said we did about 20 episodes we

haven't recorded any new ones for the

last several months since we moved we

got pretty busy and we were kind of on

hiatus anyway the point is it wasn't a

waste cuz you know number one I'm able

to reuse the material and all the

content that we did but at the same time

we also learned the mechanics of or I

learned the mechanics and Elizabeth my

wife learned the mechanics of you know

producing a podcast so there was like

the technical aspect of like the gear

and then there was the website and

hosting the podcast and all that stuff

so even though we sort of stopped doing

it that's sort of we literally stopped

doing it and put it on hiatus for the

time being it

a worthwhile thing and that's kind of

you know as an aside one thing that I

look at for my projects that I work on

now it's like his even if this doesn't

you know work perfectly or I end up not

it just doesn't work how I expected it

to well I learned something is my

network gonna be bigger or better

because I'm trying it out and like I

said this podcast the one we were doing

is called survive the nine-to-five and

it was fine we got to see you have some

discussions and it was a worthwhile

thing and you're gonna be able to listen

to that today people have been enjoying

hearing about the beers and I suppose it

is the people that actually drink beers

so I'm gonna tell you what I'm drinking

right now my wife just got home a few

minutes ago she had a couple uh it was a

case of beer I'll tell you what we got

so there's a case of beer and she picked

up something from a brewery I hadn't

heard of crazy mountain burrowing

company this is not sponsored it just

happens to be what I'm drinking I'm

checking out the crazy mountain amber

ale

they say it's malty hoppy and smooth and

this Brewing Company is out of Edwards

and Denver Colorado the art is pretty

cool there's looks like an owl with

antlers and as I turn the can around

here I see they they call this a shyam

us it's an owl a mule deer and a bobcat

which sounds like a crazy animal very

scary and that is what the picture is

also as I'm looking at the can wow it

looks like it has hands and a talent too

so this is kind of a fierce animal and

as I'm drinking the beer it's pretty

good you know an Amber Ale is fairly

middle-of-the-road and typically I'm

going for something more exciting but

it's a nice it's a nice afternoon beer

here and I'm enjoying it so if you get a

chance check out crazy man we got a

variety pack too so there's a

Pale Ales and some IPAs with my name on

it and that's coming up for me later

like I mentioned before this is part one

of a four-part series so today we're

talking project management part two is

going to be like email tips and email

productivity number three is going to be

deep work and there's a whole a whole

book called deep work by Cal Newport

really enjoyed that book and finally the

fourth part is going to be prioritizing

at the very beginning of the discussion

here you'll hear us talk about two

episodes of survived the 9:00 to 5:00

that we have deleted all right so those

were a couple podcast kind of funny that

we actually did this but we went to a

happy hour and we're like hey we're

having a great conversation why don't we

just hit record here and then it just

got out of control so we published those

for like a very short time and then we

pulled them because I listen to it again

and I was like this is nonsense so

lesson learned it's okay to have a you

know sip a little beer you know have a

little drink whatever enjoy yourself

however there's a limit to you know what

you can do and record and have it

interesting or coherent or anything like

that anyway that is what we're talking

about there that's enough rambling for

now let's go ahead and talk about

project management

[Music]

I'm Doug I'm Elizabeth and we're back

from our two-part episode series Friday

night drunk podcasting this should be I

hope a little bit more coherent and easy

to follow I don't know if you listen to

those but we thought we'd try it out

and that's that's what you got

yeah and if you listen to the podcast

for the first time and those are the

ones that you heard I encourage you to

check out some of the others where we're

sober recording in the morning and in

fact we're recording in the morning here

so it should be a little tighter and we

just had coffee so I think this should

be much better I feel help so today

we're talking about project management

and the other three in the series on

productivity are going to be email

productivity and tips and tricks' deep

work and focusing and then the fourth in

the series will be prioritizing and

figuring out what to work on so today

we'll get into the project management

aspect in I have a PMP I'm a project

management professional and we'll talk

about that a little bit more in depth

and what that really means and the

prerequisites and all that but we're

gonna try and cover project management

from like a perspective of like non

jargon early so I'm going to try to

because I think a lot of times people

get bogged down with the details and

that sort of thing so Elizabeth do you

have much experience in the project

management area I do I'm not a PMP like

you are and I don't think my title has

ever been project manager but

essentially most of the jobs that I've

worked have involved managing projects

to one degree or another and I was

actually a pro I worked in a program

management office which is a little bit

different the principles of project

management still apply but as a program

manager you're managing multiple

projects that make up the program so

yeah

I've I'm not a PMP I'm not trained I

guess are certified in that way like you

are but yeah I think I know how to

manage a project my co-workers might

disagree but yeah sure and I think about

it I mean I sort of found my way into

project management because I you know

worked on different pieces of projects

and a lot of times if you just stick

around long enough and you have at least

some leadership skills and you can

communicate with other people reasonably

well better than your peers a lot of

times you'll end up managing projects

and then if you're you know if you stick

with it you'll get better at it and

that's what happened with me because I

wasn't particularly good at managing

projects in the beginning at all

so can we define like just what a

project is from the project management

like aspect sure do you have the

definition up right there don't read it

but do you have it you know what I don't

have it but this is a good test for know

me too so I think that there is a very

distinct definition of a project I'm

trying to remember what it is I remember

it's like it has to have a start and an

end a project does so it's like a

defined set of tasks with a start and an

end date intended to accomplish

something I don't know that's my guess I

think that's pretty much it yeah so it

has a distinct start and end and then

there's a specific thing that you have

to accomplish that's the project there's

a specific output and project management

is just I mean really it's a set of it's

a body of knowledge

a set of like ideas that help you manage

projects and deliver them like on time

within the budget and you know without

everyone going crazy

essentially in dealing with change that

is a big thing ok can I sure but what's

the official definition ok this is from

the project management institute a

project is temporary and in that it has

a defined beginning and end in time and

therefore defined scope and resources

and a project is unique in that it is

not routine operation but a specific set

of operations

designed to accomplish a singular goal

hey not too bad yeah so pretty close and

it's a pretty big distinction between

like the like ongoing sort of things so

can you think of any examples of what

those might be or I don't know maybe

since I'm in the healthcare field

managing like ongoing billing operations

that's not a project because it's going

to go on forever but a project would be

something else I was trying to think of

a good project around billing operations

a project would be I don't know

a project would be if they were putting

in like a new software system and you

know that is the project in installing

it making sure it works with everything

else and once it's installed it's done

yep and then I was gonna say I did a lot

of work and software and stuff like that

so ongoing stuff ongoing tasks and work

would be keeping the server's running

and upgrading those on a routine basis

and that just kind of goes on and on and

I like just an IT department maybe where

they're like getting laptops out and

upgrading that is just an ongoing thing

if they if the IT department was buying

a whole bunch of new laptops and getting

it out to the users then that would be a

project because it has a start and an

end and the specific thing that's

happening so sounds good all right now

before we get into the PMP and

prerequisites and stuff like that let's

just talk about like managing a project

let's say you're you know you're doing

your job and your boss asks you to

manage the project you're gonna have to

you know figure out what that means

so let's kind of go over the steps of

what that is so I think at the core

there's there's a few things you really

need to do and again I'm greatly

simplifying this from like the the PMI

that's the project management institute

but in general if you could do these few

you'll be in good shape and it was a bit

feel free to jump in is I'm going so you

want to identify like what the hell the

projects are doing right like what's the

output of the project I'm a lot of times

this may be referred to as like a

project charter and it's just what

you're delivering and sort of the scope

of what's happening after that you want

to define like the tasks that need to be

done to make that happen once you have

those tasks listed you'll want to figure

out who's doing them so that's like

resources and that sort of thing after

that you figure out sort of a schedule

and once you list out those tasks it'll

become more apparent what order you need

to do things in you could move things

around and then understand sort of like

the priority and scheduling which is

really important and then further once

you get that word or done sometimes you

need to have certain things finished

before you could do other processes

other tasks further down so those tasks

are dependent on others and if you can

get that like this maybe like four steps

right or at least think about them ahead

of time you should be in pretty good

shape and you'll be way far ahead of

other people who maybe just internalize

the things that need to be done on a

project and then it's harder for them to

communicate it to other people like

management or to other people that need

to do work for them so if you could list

out all the stuff it will be much easier

for communication and tracking the

project in general yep yes and if we can

back up a little bit I think the first

step is the most important that we have

listed in the Doug talked about what is

the output and why and the reason this

is the most important sometimes it's

very clear we're implementing a new

billing system okay you need to install

it and it needs to work that's pretty

clear but sometimes it's not that clear

and how do you know you're going to be

successful how do you know the project's

going to be successful and that doesn't

what do you think makes it a success you

need to identify who the prime

stakeholders are and that's a I guess a

project management eternam stakeholder

but you know who's the boss who's the

boss who cares about the project and

what do they want to happen and so you

have to know what that person considers

a success and what they expect before

you can define all that other stuff

right

I think KPI is gonna try and keep you

know jargon out but key performance

indicators but really like once you

figure out like the goal you'll want to

have some mechanism that you could track

and measure before the project and after

the project so for the example of

implementing and you know installing a

new software system there's probably you

know there's a reason why like is it

gonna save time is it going to make it

easier is it gonna do something faster

and hopefully you could track that so in

the future you'll know hey we we

installed this new software and it

didn't improve things so we should keep

an eye out the next time we think we

want to do that and if it turned out

well then maybe you'll have more

confidence the next time to you know

install the software because everything

got better after you did that so if you

define that early then everyone will

have like a mechanism to track that

otherwise like why are you even working

with the project right mm-hmm cool I

think a lot of times if you're working

on like smaller projects on smaller

teams perhaps that's where you can get

fuzzy where you're thinking hey we

should work on this thing and maybe

there's not a clear reason why did you

should do it and I think that's where

you know people end up working on

something that's maybe a waste of time

and no one realizes that you're kind of

aiming towards some vague goal that's

ill-defined have you been on a team like

that or a project like that I don't

think I've been on a

object like that no I think usually the

goals have been very well defined but I

think the issue I've come up with more

often than that is everyone not being on

board for the project so we know what

we're trying to accomplish and maybe

it's important to some people but it's

not important to other people and so the

work doesn't get done right and to throw

in more jargon but these are all common

like if you understand some of the

vocabulary then you'll be in better

shape in your corporate setting

basically it's like a matrix environment

where there are people working on the

project that don't necessarily report to

you or other people and your you may be

peers there may be different levels but

essentially you as the quote project

manager do not have authority over the

other folks and you can ask them to do

things but they may have other

priorities now this is where actually I

was really good at this because I

understood people have other priorities

other incentives their boss may be

telling them to work on something I may

be telling them to work on something

else and at that point I get it right

they're gonna follow their boss so it's

my job as a project manager to escalate

to the appropriate level to get them to

either work on my project or I can get

the definitive answer that they were you

know the the project members work is

more important than my project and then

I would have hopefully some leeway on my

schedule or something but at some point

someone has to make a decision like hey

what's more important there's only you

know 24 hours a day I can only get you

know a certain amount of work done or a

person can only get a certain amount of

work done so and that's a tricky

situation I've always found especially

you know you might be on a project

working managing a project and there are

people above your level that are

assigned tasks to do so you're you know

whatever your manager and

your project manager but there's

directors or VPS or whoever on your

project and they're not doing their

stuff and you have to escalate to

someone and say hey

Doug's continuously late I don't know I

always found that difficult difficult to

do a little bit tricky relationship wise

how did you handle those types of

situations because you're you're

essentially tattletaling right you know

what I was totally fine with it because

I knew that being entitled tales in my

nature no I knew that the priorities

were different and basically like I

would probably request whatever I needed

and then I would go to my lead or boss

or whoever and then it's their job to go

fight the battle for me so hopefully

they know that I need to maintain a good

working relationship with whoever it is

and it's their job to figure out the

priority so I would go to my boss and

then have them figure it out

and I don't care what the you know

either the person is gonna do it or

they're not but someone needs to do the

work for the project and I don't care

who it is they have to figure it out so

I think I was ok with it and you know I

didn't make it personal and hopefully no

one took it personally I know I think

earlier in my career I definitely got

frustrated when like when someone kept

asking me to do work but I was basically

like not supposed to do it and sort of

what happens at least the places I work

a lot of times there were different

companies different vendors working for

the client and we were kind of enemies

like literally like working on the same

contract and yeah so we weren't

necessarily like playing nice with each

other we would really try to make each

other look bad so I think they were

trying to make like my team looked bad

and then I would try and do the same so

it was funny that that dynamic you know

looking back now it's funny but I was

really frustrated when I was working

with those people

sure another tactic I've tried

and hopefully you mean you should do

this anyway but when you have the steps

down you have the list of people who are

responsible for them you're probably

going to be running regular meetings and

tracking tracking those steps tracking

the progress they'll be due dates so

there'll be some sort of status report

that goes along with your project and if

people aren't getting their work done

you can sort of broadcast it on that

status report that goes you know to

everyone goes to the stakeholders and I

think ideally that is how sort of people

stay in line because they they don't

want to be delayed or they don't want to

be read on the status report and when

you put those steps together

theoretically you have a meeting and

everybody agrees to them right I think a

lot of my job was was that where you

have the schedule you develop the

original project plan it everything

changes by the way like we develop these

plans knowing that it's just going to be

you know the best we can do and then

there's a little wiggle room hopefully

but you know maybe it's a meeting every

every week to check status maybe with

various teams and then maybe it's you

know perhaps every day when it's getting

closer to delivery time you really need

to track it but essentially what you

said where you're going through each

task you have an owner you have a date

you have a maybe percentage complete

that sort of thing and in that way you

can make sure let's say it's a six month

long project you can make sure that

you're actually going to finish it on

time and you'll have an idea you know in

month one in month two are you where you

should be based on like the things you

have to complete and how long it takes

and all that stuff

so that's sort of the magic of like

having this all together and maybe

having like a lot of different people

working on the project so and you know

we didn't mention in the notes but there

are a lot of different project

management tools and

I've used probably 10 different ones

depending on like where I was working

and what was going on however most of

the time I ended up using some

spreadsheet so currently I'm using

Google sheets but even in big corporate

settings most of the time the default

that every project team member had

access to was Excel now what would have

you used a Lizabeth yeah I think for

most most projects an Excel list is just

fine I started out using Microsoft

Project which is a really powerful tool

but it is almost more complicated than

you need for a basic project I always

felt like the the power in Microsoft

Project there were some good

visualization tools and then also

resource tracking so if I don't know if

say if you're in construction and you

know you have 30 trucks and they can

only be in certain places at certain

times and you can assign resources to

tasks very easily and things like that

that could be very powerful to track but

yes for most for most projects a simple

list is fine with the tasks the owner

may be and the due date may be a start

and stop date if it's gonna take a while

right what else would need to be on

there a quick backtrack is on Microsoft

Project one thing that I liked a lot was

dependency tracking oh yeah so that was

nice where you could if you moved the

date it would cascade down Sharon so

that was nice but like I said most of

the time it was easier and more people

had access to Microsoft Excel so in

nowadays there's a lot of free apps out

there and some paid stuff but yeah it

really doesn't matter it's just you know

whatever you want to use is probably

fine so you're right I said a couple

things you listed so the tasks some

dates the owner and then that's

mostly it you can make it a little more

complicated if you wanted with the

dependencies but after that not not a

huge advantage to make it more

complicated

alright I want to talk about the PMP

stuff and what that was like getting

certified sure so I had an opportunity

and around 2008 or so to get my PMP I

was fortunate in that my company had a

program and they were very what word am

I looking for they were very supportive

supportive yes they were very supportive

to help us get our PMP so they had like

on-site training that we were able to

take so we took like a five day bootcamp

and then I think a month after that I

took the test now we'll talk about some

of the prereqs but it's a difficult test

and it takes a few hours and there's a

large amount of material so I think I

think it's pretty hard to get just

overall so let's hit the let's hit the

prerequisites here so there are two sets

of prerequisites if you have a four-year

degree you need to have 4,500 hours

leading and directing projects and then

35 hours of project management education

the 35 hours of project management

education was like the the five day

bootcamp that I described I think you

can actually do that online but you know

in person you actually get a lot more

out of it and it's way more expensive

but at the time my company paid for it

so that was great

the other set of prereqs is if you do

not have a four-year degree so that

would be a secondary degree like a high

school diploma or associate's degree and

in that case you need to have 7500 hours

leading and directing projects and also

the same 35 hours of project management

education so you have to have a lot of

hours on the job

and when they say managing and leading

projects

most of the time you're you're gonna be

okay as long as you were on a project

team managing your portion of the

project and you do have to document all

this so that is as part of the game of

project management is being able to

document things well so I mean you have

to put together all the hours that you

work and you know what you worked on and

have a you know a lead or a manager that

can support you and say yeah you worked

on that project should your application

be audited was your application audited

you know no it wasn't so you know I have

actually I don't know anyone that has

been audited personally but there's some

percentage that they do on it and why

might you get the PMP so this is from

and we'll put a link to this this is on

the PMI org website the PMP can provide

a significant advantage when it comes to

salary and earning potential among

survey respondents 2:00 p.m. eyes

earning power salary survey this with a

PMP certification garner a higher salary

20% higher on average than those without

a PMP and employers benefit as well so

when more than one-third of their

project managers or PMI PMP certified

organizations complete more of their

projects on time on budget and meeting

original goals so so question for you do

you think you're a better project

manager than I am

because you have your PMP not

necessarily know you're talking

personally me versus you yes that me

versus you know so I interviewed for a

job once and the person I was

interviewing with had their PMP on the

wall and I was like oh you have your PMP

and he said that doesn't mean anything

which I thought was interesting

hmm and I definitely I think it

definitely is like a hurdle for

interviews cuz or for jobs because some

will

require a PMP but I don't necessarily

think if you have your PMP that means

you're you're a good project manager I

think a project for project management

to be successful I think the

organization has to embrace the project

management philosophy and if you're the

best project manager in the world but

the organization doesn't hold its people

accountable and doesn't you know buy

into accountability for tasks you're not

gonna get anything done I don't know you

you probably are a better project

manager than I am but I was just curious

curious what you thought because I think

I have all the Education and Skills and

all of those hours leading and directing

projects and and the prerequisites but

I've just never gone through and gotten

my PMP it's expensive isn't it yes I

think it's about 500 bucks or so oh I

thought it was a few thousand no it's

like about 500 bucks but a lot of times

if you're taking it in person boot camp

that may be you know that's gonna start

it 1,200 1,500 dollars probably and then

you may have to travel to go to take it

if you're not able to you know be close

what is the test like multiple choice it

is multiple choice but it's usually it's

usually like five answers like a through

e I guess and many times it's a you know

a B and C answer and then D would be a

both a and B or like neither something

or none of the answers above or correct

or something like that so it's a pretty

hard test for multiple-choice you you

may not believe it but they make the

questions pretty hard so and I remember

I studied really hard for a few weeks

yeah probably about a month leading up

to and I spent a ton of time lots of

flashcards tons of material and back to

your point about managing projects

better or worse with the PMP the cool

thing with the PMP

is it it gives like a common set of

vocabulary and framework that if you see

someone that has a PMP you should assume

that yeah at least you can talk the same

language and understand some of the

jargon that we've cut out like the

critical path and some of the you know

different estimation methods and that

sort of thing

however I've definitely worked with a

lot of PMPs that maybe they weren't

assertive enough and they didn't know

how to work with other people well maybe

they didn't communicate well but they

had their PMP so you're I mean you're

right and I think it just comes down to

like individuals some people may have no

project management background but they

could deliver things on time and on

budget and like really have a good

relationship with their project team and

everyone loves to work with them but

they may not have a PMP or know anything

about project management and then

there's other people that may be poor

communicators and then they have their

PMP tons of experience and then yeah so

when you worked in the corporate setting

as a project manager did you like it

there were there were portions that were

that we're fine I'm trying to think did

I actually like it I think at the very

beginning it was probably a lot more

interesting because whenever you're

learning something new it's interesting

and then after a while the newness goes

away and then it depends on who you're

working with so I think it depends on

who you're working with project

management is fine I think one of the

great things for me is and I mentioned

it earlier I don't think I was very good

at first because I literally was coming

from you know working on projects to

managing like maybe the little piece of

the project for my team and then

managing much bigger projects and

managing other team so I went from being

completely unskilled to very slowly over

time like building up the skills and

understanding it wasn't a lot of times

it was more about the relationships with

the other teams and like negotiating

versus anything else because like I

mentioned before

I was on I don't know I was like in

political environments so there were a

lot of moving pieces and if you could

have an ally on another team then you

could work together and maybe I have her

back this time and she has mine next

time stuff like that

so I think I enjoyed it once I started

figuring out it was more like

relationships and politics because if if

you would try to if you try to apply

like logic and reason to things that

don't use logic and reason then you get

frustrated and so yes yes and I think

that's why maybe I'm not the best

project manager is because I I yeah I

try to apply logic and reason where

sometimes it doesn't apply and also I

just sometimes get frustrated and want

to say just do your job and I don't know

90% of project management is just trying

to get people to do the work that

they've agreed to do I just wanted to

say well just do it why don't you just

do it yeah there's a lot of soft skills

in there yep all right so any other sort

of project management tips you could

think of or any tips so if you're

interested in project management and you

haven't had a lot of experience in it

you can apply it to anything so let's

say you have a vacation that's coming up

big vacation with your family apply it

to this you can write out you know a

list of steps research hotels pick a

hotel research locations pick a location

or whatever and you can go through yeah

you can just write out a list of steps

for your vacation assign it to different

members of your family and treat it like

a little project and you can see how it

can help with something like that right

and we can I mean we get let's throw out

some more stuff so like you said picking

a place figuring out the scheduling what

are you gonna pack how are you gonna get

there what's your budget

yep great and so budgeting and then you

literally you know let's say you have

you know a family of four you can assign

like alright like what are we going to

pack and give it to

you know your your teenager and then

have them figure out like what are they

like what is each member of the family

need to bring where are we going to pack

it how long is it going to take to get

to the places and so on and so forth so

that's fun right you could turn a family

vacation into a piece of work an

assignment no but you can you can apply

it to anything like we said a project is

just a specific goal that you're trying

to accomplish an interrelated set of

tasks with a start and stop date so you

know you can apply it to any anything

and sort of see how that works

what were the other productivity ones we

had email deep work and focusing is

going to be part three and then part

four is prioritizing and figuring out

what you need to work on I would say so

along with project management if you

want to research a little bit more look

at issues and risks and so if you get

into a corporate or a very complicated

project you're probably going to do some

some issues tracking and that's a pretty

that's pretty key part of project

management is keeping track of of your

issues and that was actually how I

really got started in it I was on a

couple big projects reporting directly

to a director and I ended up doing you

know issue and risk management for the

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