Explore every episode of the podcast Project Management Happy Hour

What if the reason your project management job search is stalling has nothing to do with your skills? On average, about 300 people apply to a single opening, and the odds of being the one who gets the offer are slim. In that market, strong project leadership isn't enough. Landing a six-figure project management role takes the same things that make projects succeed: clear decision making, a targeted strategy, and the ability to read how an organization really works.

In this episode of Project Management Happy Hour, Kate and Kim talk with Mukhtar Kadiri, PMP, a project management career coach and recruiter with more than 15 years on both sides of the hiring table. Mukhtar helps project managers land roles in the $100,000 to $300,000 range and shares his insights with a LinkedIn community of more than 70,000 project professionals. His hard-won business lesson sets the tone. Early in his consulting career, he was called into an office and given a verbal beating by a stakeholder who sat nowhere near the top of the org chart. She turned out to be one of the most powerful people on the project. Once he won her over, she became his biggest champion, a mentor, and a lifelong friend, and he has looked past the official org chart ever since. As Kim puts it: "There's the one on paper and there's the one that really gets things done."

From there, the conversation turns to bias in hiring and then to the heart of the episode: the first two steps of Mukhtar's job search framework, clarity and positioning.

Grab a drink and join us.

Quotes from the Episode

"The purpose of the resume is to sell you to the gatekeeper so that you can get through the door, right?" — Mukhtar Kadiri

"And it's not that you as a project manager aren't good enough. It's that job hunting is a different skill than doing the job and getting another certificate that proves you know how to do the job is not going to help you get a job." — Kate Anderson

"And not just what is the problem they're trying to solve, but how are you the best person to try to solve this?" — Kim Essendrup

"So don't wait for the perfect match because sometimes people don't exactly know what they want or they're not good at documenting it." — Kim Essendrup

"Because I know the fear is that I don't want to miss out on opportunities, but when you actually do target and when you focus, you actually get more opportunity because your branding, so to speak, is more potent." — Mukhtar Kadiri

Practical Takeaways

1. The shadow org chart. Influence often sits with people who have no formal authority, so map the real power structure, not only the official hierarchy.

2. The five-step job search framework. The steps are clarity, positioning, the hidden job market, interviewing, and negotiation.

3. The 75% match rule. Job descriptions are wish lists, so target roles where you meet roughly 75% or more of the criteria. Below that is a poor use of time; near 100% can read as overqualified.

4. Pain-point mapping. Distill a role into its top 3–5 pain points, map one skill to each, and back each skill with quantified evidence.

5. The four-person outreach strategy. Email the recruiter, the hiring manager, a peer, and a leader. Follow up twice, since most responses arrive after the second follow-up.

Closing Reflection

The episode closes with Mukhtar's toast to finding what you want in your career, whether that's a new job, the next level, or peace and sanity in your current role. It's a reminder that a job search is a project in its own right, and it deserves the same strategy you'd bring to any other.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• Mukhtar Kadiri on Substack: https://substack.com/@mukhtarkay

• Mukhtar Kadiri on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/m-kadiri/

• Email-finding tools mentioned:

• Lusha

• Hunter

• Apollo.io

• LinkedIn Sales Navigator

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership

• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page

Why "over-communicating" isn't about saying more — it's about knowing exactly what your stakeholders need to hear, and when.

What happens when a project manager goes silent? According to this episode of Project Management Happy Hour, nothing good. Left in an information vacuum, stakeholders don't assume the best — they assume the worst. That single insight sits at the center of a conversation about project leadership, stakeholder communication, and the quiet skill that separates good project managers from great ones: knowing exactly what to say, to whom, and when. If you've ever been accused of "running dark" on a project, or been told to simply "communicate more" without any idea what that actually means, this episode is for you.

Kate and Kim open up about their own early missteps as project managers — Kim recalling a boss who relentlessly demanded he "over communicate" without explaining what that looked like in practice, and Kate admitting that while she never struggled to talk to her own team, she took years to learn how to communicate effectively up and out to executives and sponsors. Their honest, back-and-forth storytelling style — equal parts practical and funny — turns what could be a dry topic into a genuinely useful conversation about project delivery and leadership communication.

Grab a drink and join us.

Quotes from the Episode

"The human brain is not nice. It takes lots of therapy and or meditation to tell yourself nice stories... if you're in an information vacuum, because our brain wants to protect us from bad things happening." — Kate Anderson

"Data is meaningless without context and contrast." — Tim Creasy (as quoted by Kim)

"It's not that it's meaningless. It's that it's vulnerable to misinterpretation without context and contrast." — Kate 

Practical Takeaways

1. The information vacuum effect — In the absence of updates, stakeholders default to negative assumptions rather than neutral or positive ones.
2. Communication baseline calibration — New project managers often start with a communication baseline that is far lower than stakeholders actually need.
3. Bottom-line-up-front (BLUF) messaging — Lead with the specific action or decision needed, then follow with supporting context.
4. Self-service reporting channels — Creating an always-available update source (chat channel, dashboard, bulletin) reduces stakeholder anxiety and unplanned interruptions.
5. Narrative ownership in project leadership — Framing project updates as a story you control, rather than a list of data points, shapes how stakeholders perceive project health.

Closing Reflection

The episode's real throughline is ownership: the best project managers don't just report facts, they own the narrative of their work. As Kate puts it, data without context and contrast is vulnerable to misinterpretation — and if you don't tell the story of your project, someone else's imagination will tell it for you.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership

• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page

• Get the Audience Persona Worksheet at: pmhappyhour.com/resources

• PMHH Episode 091: The Perfect Status Report

• PMHH Epsiode 131: Listen to Don't Be the PM Everybody Hates with Rachel Losser

• Got your communication conundrum? 📧 Email us at social@pmhappyhour.com — you might just hear it (and the answer) on a future episode.

Projects rarely fail from a lack of templates — they fail because of people. Author Dawn Mahan reveals the animal avatars that help you spot the cheerleader, the finicky fan, and the saboteur before one of them bites you in the ankle.

Why do projects really fail? Not, as guest Dawn Mahan argues, from a shortage of templates or Gantt charts — but from the people around them. In this episode, Kim and Kate dig into the human side of project delivery: the stakeholders who love your project, the ones who quietly want it dead, and the "style under stress" that surfaces when the pressure cooker of Projectland heats up. If you've ever been blindsided by a saboteur or tripped up by an over-eager cheerleader, this conversation on stakeholder management, risk, and project leadership is for you.

Kim and Kate welcome Dawn Mahan, author of the bestselling Meet the Players in Project Land and co-editor of Project Land Goes to the Movies: 22 Blockbuster Strategies for Project Success. Dawn's premise is refreshingly human: projects rarely fail because the paperwork is wrong — they fail because the people involved aren't set up for success. Using animal avatars to make stakeholder behavior easier, and safer, to talk about, she gives project managers and leaders a practical vocabulary for the messy, political, feelings-driven reality of getting work done inside real organizations.

Grab a drink and join us.

 

Quotes from the Episode

"If you're skipping through the meadow of project land toward your goal, one might just jump up and bite you in the ankle when you least expect it…" — Dawn Mahan "You've got a style under stress." — Kate Anderson "Instead of being a cheerleader, she accidentally became a saboteur." — Dawn Mahan "I believe PMs are in the pain prevention business." — Dawn Mahan "Any of us can sabotage our own lives, relationships, projects, even." — Dawn Mahan Practical Takeaways

1. The three stakeholder archetypes — the cheerleader (happy dog), the finicky fan (flamingo), and the saboteur (snake), and how each one engages with or endangers a project.
2. "Style under stress" — how both stakeholder and team behavior shifts under pressure, and why leaders should plan for those reactions in advance.
3. Stakeholder analysis as a scheduled activity — running it privately with the sponsor, casting a wide net, documenting decisions, and coding the stakeholder register discreetly.
4. The "Feel" question — asking "How do you feel about this?" instead of "What do you think?" to surface fear and identify project risk early.
5. Managing cheerleaders with soundbites — the Stakeholder Gabby lesson on why enthusiastic champions can accidentally become saboteurs, and how to channel their energy constructively.

Closing Reflection

Perhaps the most human insight of the episode is Dawn's reminder that any of us can sabotage our own projects. Sabotage isn't always evil; more often it's fear, miscommunication, or a stakeholder who simply doesn't understand how Projectland works. The leadership question worth sitting with: who on your project is operating from fear right now — and what could you do to change that?

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership
• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page

Your worst project management habit might also be your superpower — the trick is knowing which one you're wielding, and when.

What actually separates a great project manager from the one everyone dreads seeing on their calendar? It's rarely a certification or a prettier Gantt chart — it's behavior. This episode of Project Management Happy Hour digs into project leadership, accountability, team dynamics, and the everyday habits that quietly undermine project delivery. The uncomfortable truth running through the whole conversation: our worst project management habits are usually just our genuine strengths turned all the way up, with no dial to turn them back down.

Kate and Kim are joined by Rachel Losser, founder and managing partner of Losser Consulting Solutions, a delivery-focused firm known for its get-stuff-done philosophy. Together they walk through five "bad PM personas" — the versions of ourselves that colleagues quietly avoid — and, crucially, the more skilled counterpart each one can grow into. Rachel sets the tone early with a bit of grace: we're talking about these "with love and reverence," because everybody starts somewhere and most of us have been every one of them at some point.

The practical throughline is nuance. Every strength becomes a liability when it's your only mode. Great PMs read the moment: when to slow down and build consensus, and when to say "we're going this way." They tell hard truths early, manage handoffs rather than just dates, and treat relationships and communication as the real currency of the job. As Kate puts it, the only way out of a struggling project is through it — not around the color of the status.

Which persona are you under stress? That self-awareness, the hosts suggest, is where better project leadership actually begins.

Grab a drink and join us.

Quotes from the Episode

"The PM has to be the brutal truth-sayer. Because if the PM doesn't say it, who's going to say it?" — Kim Essendrup "The only way out is through." — Kate Anderson "We had to live it to be able to write it." — Rachel Losser "You have no idea what people are motivated by until you implement something like that." — Rachel Losser Practical Takeaways

1. Every PM strength has a shadow. Each of the five personas is a positive skill (documenting, reporting, follow-through, decisiveness, convening) overused into a liability.
2. Report status honestly, then own the path back to green. Transparent "highlighter green" reporting builds credibility; greenwashing destroys it.
3. Accountability beats date-moving. A Task Master probes why a deadline slipped and what will change, instead of silently updating the due date.
4. Directive leadership works only in moderation. The Hammer is effective in a crisis precisely because they aren't operating at full intensity all the time.
5. Every meeting needs a goal and buy-in. Confirming the objective at the top of a call is how you avoid becoming the Meeting Vampire.

Closing Reflection

Rachel's toast says it best: this is often a thankless job of late nights and "adult babysitting." But the difference between a PM everyone avoids and one everyone wants on their project usually isn't talent — it's the self-awareness to know which persona you default to under stress, and the discipline to reach for its better half instead. Which of the five is your worst habit — and what would its superpower version look like?

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership
• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page
• Losser Consulting Solutions — Rachel Losser's firm
• Big Project Energy with Rachel Losser
• Rachel Losser on LinkedIn
• Losser Consulting Solutions on LinkedIn
• Rachel Losser on Instagram: @losserconsultingsolutions
• Rachel Losser on TikTok: @losserconsultingsolutions

A $6.9 million estimate. A $1.25 billion catastrophe. How fake deadlines, a rigged bid, and a steering committee allergic to bad news turned a routine payroll migration into one of the biggest project disasters in Australian history.

What happens when project leadership treats risk management as optional, decision making gets diffused across committees, and a hard deadline turns out to be completely negotiable? You get one of the most instructive project failure case studies in project management history — and in this episode, Kim and Kate pour it out one painful lesson at a time.

The subject is Queensland Health, the public healthcare provider for the Australian state of Queensland, employing roughly 85,000 people across about 300 sites. In 2005, their legacy payroll vendor gave them three years' notice: support ends June 30, 2008. Sounds like plenty of runway — until the organization waited two of those three years to act. By the time a consultant named Terry Burns (remember that name) ran the procurement and IBM signed a contract in December 2007, the original $6.9 million estimate had ballooned to a $98 million contract with just six months to deliver a system covering more than 24,000 unique payroll combinations.

Why does this matter for project managers and leaders? Because almost nothing that went wrong here is exotic. Late project intake. Governance where a transition team, a steering committee, and an IT department all had partial authority but no single decision-making structure. Two weeks — total — for requirements gathering on a nine-figure program. A "lift and shift" strategy that preserved every broken process and demanded 2,500 custom software configurations to replicate them. As Kim and Kate walk through it, the episode becomes a masterclass in how ordinary project management failures compound into organizational catastrophe.

The discussion highlights are equal parts horrifying and hilarious. There's the program's actual internal slogan, taken straight from the project materials: "Plan A or Die" — no continuity plan, no risk mitigation, no fallback. There's the June 2008 deadline that came and went with a simple change request and some extended support from the legacy vendor, prompting Kate's sharp observation that the date was fake and not fake at once: end-of-life risk is real even when the cliff turns out to be movable. There's the UAT phase in June 2009 that surfaced 2,422 severe defects — after which the steering committee simply reclassified high-severity defects as lower severity so the dashboards would show enough green to proceed. Watermelon project, indeed. And when frontline payroll staff kept failing the system in testing, leadership's answer was to remove the requirement for business sign-off entirely.

The go-live in March 2010 delivered the reckoning: 35,000 payroll anomalies, roughly $400 million in accidental overpayments, zero-dollar paychecks for healthcare workers, and government debt collectors hounding nurses for money they never asked to receive. Queensland ultimately hired a thousand staff to manually prop up the new system — a 40 percent increase in labor over the old one — with a projected five-year cost to taxpayers of $1.25 billion. The commission of inquiry that followed, led by the Right Honourable Richard Noel Chesterman, revealed the final twist: Terry Burns, a former IBMer, had leaked a competitor's bid specs to IBM and browbeaten the selection panel into rescoring until IBM won. And when the state sued? A release buried in the fine print of a change order had signed away its right to litigate.

Grab a drink and join us.
Quotes from the Episode "Everyone's in charge, so no one's in charge." — Kate "If you've got a deadline, question the deadline." — Kim "I've heard the term watermelon project where they're green on the outside and red on the inside." — Kim "And you are paying that company that you're hiring to learn." — Kate "But ultimately, if your project options are plan A or die. Maybe sometimes the best option is die." — Kim Practical Takeaways

1. Governance and decision rights — When multiple bodies share authority without a single decision-making structure, accountability evaporates ("everyone's in charge, so no one's in charge").
2. Deadline validation — Interrogate whether a project deadline is a true constraint or a negotiable date, and what options (like extended vendor support) exist beyond it.
3. The watermelon project pattern — Recognizing status distortion, including reclassifying defect severity and removing sign-off requirements to force green dashboards.
4. Parallel run as cutover risk mitigation — Why replacing a legacy business-critical system requires side-by-side operation and validation before go-live.
5. Procurement integrity and vendor selection — The risks of conflicts of interest in vendor selection, of choosing a vendor with no prior experience delivering the solution, and of unreviewed contract fine print.

Closing Reflection Nobody ever really "accepts" a risk on paper. When risks are realized, someone always pays—taxpayers, frontline workers, or the organization itself. Sometimes the bravest act of project leadership is admitting that Plan A deserves to die. 🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership

• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page

Why do perfectly logical, well-researched project plans still fail to win people over? It's one of the most frustrating forms of project failure—not a broken schedule or a blown budget, but a smart solution that nobody trusts. Kim and Kate dig into that exact problem, exploring decision-making, risk management, and team performance through the lens of one hard-earned leadership lesson: being right is not enough. If you've ever done everything "to the T" and still hit resistance, this conversation is for you.

In this episode, Kim and Kate welcome Noel Nicole Ransom—VP of Implementation, PMP, Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, educator, speaker, and founder of Sigma Certify—for a wide-ranging conversation about project leadership and career advancement. Noel has led complex enterprise implementations, organizational change efforts, and strategic transformation initiatives, and now coaches professionals on bridging the gap between certification and real influence. The topic matters because so many capable project managers get stuck being seen as schedule-checkers rather than leaders, and that perception ceiling caps both their impact and their careers.

This episode explores the throughline that credibility, not correctness, is what actually moves projects forward. Noel explains that organizations run on trust rather than logic, which means a technically perfect plan can still stall if people don't feel included in how it was built. From there, the conversation moves into what Noel calls the shift from "note takers" to "progress makers" — PMs who stop documenting problems and start solving them. She offers a simple framework for unresolved roadblocks: everyone needs an owner, an action, and a date, or it can't actually be managed. The discussion also covers how to work with resistant stakeholders by treating pushback as concern rather than defiance and how leadership conversations require starting with understanding before persuasion, since executives are rarely trying to win an argument—they're trying to get to clarity.

Grab a drink and join us.

Quotes from the Episode "Being right is not enough." — Noel "Organizations move mostly at a speed of trust and not necessarily logic."  — Noel "You are not a glorified executive assistant."  — Noel "Teams don't need more status updates. They need fewer barriers."  — Noel "Leadership conversations really should begin with understanding before persuasion."  — Noel Practical Takeaways

1. Treat every unresolved roadblock as incomplete until it has an owner, an action, and a date—vague status updates don't count as progress.
   
   
2. When a stakeholder resists, get curious about the underlying concern instead of pushing harder on your rationale; questions like, "What concerns do you have?" or, "What are you seeing that we're not?" tend to open doors that arguments close.
   
   
3. When bringing ideas to leadership, come with a rough draft or "prototype" rather than an open-ended question—it invites collaboration instead of putting the entire burden of thinking on the other person.
   
   
4. Resist the instinct to arrive with every answer buttoned up; asking thoughtful questions early, framed the right way, builds far more trust than appearing to have it all figured out.

Closing Reflection

The project managers who build lasting influence aren't the ones with the most airtight plans—they're the ones who build trust one honest conversation at a time. Curiosity over certainty, progress over perfection, and quiet obstacle-removal over box-checking.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership
• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page
• Noel Nicole Ransom's website: noelnicole.com
• Noel on LinkedIn
• Sigma Certify
• Book: Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss and Tahl Raz

Ever worked on a project that felt like a complete disaster... only for leadership to call it a huge success?

In Part 2 of our Mr. Beast series, Kim and Kate dig into the reported chaos behind Beast Games—from weather disasters and safety concerns to unhappy contestants, lawsuits, and production challenges. But here's the twist: despite all the problems, does the sponsor spin it as a win? If they did - would they be 'right?'

This episode explores project sponsors, stakeholder management, risk management, and one uncomfortable truth many project managers eventually learn: success is often defined by the people funding the project—not the people doing the work.

Kim and Kate unpack what happens when ambitious goals collide with reality, why sponsors often see projects differently than project managers, and why writing your own project post-mortem may be one of the most important leadership skills you can develop.

Grab a drink and join us.

Quotes from the Episode

"Imagine that guy pouring down rain. He's in ankle deep water holding a 240 volt line over his head thinking, well, at least I'm getting paid for this." — Kate

"Watch out for fixes that move the problem instead of solving it." — Kim

Practical Takeaways

1. When project scope or scale increases dramatically, bring in people who have experience operating at that level.

2. Challenge proposed solutions by asking whether they solve the root cause or simply move the problem elsewhere.

3. Escalate business-level risks back to leadership when leadership made the decision to accept those risks.

4. Build post-mortems that document both successes and failures—not just one side of the story.

5. Tailor project communication to sponsor priorities while still surfacing risks clearly and consistently.

Closing Reflection

A project can be operationally messy and still be considered a success by its sponsors. The question isn't just whether a project succeeded—but whose definition of success ultimately mattered.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• PM Happy Hour Membership: pmhappyhour.com/membership

• PM Happy Hour Facebook Page

• Folding Ideas — Why Was I Invited to Beast Studios?

• Rolling Stone article by Stephen Essarch: A Fyre Fest Feeling Inside the Chaos of Mr. Beast's New Reality Show

• KSNV article by Minx and Lau: Las Vegas Staff Say Mr. Beast Should Be Blacklisted, Cite OSHA, Medics Set for Failure

 

Ever worked with a stakeholder who changes direction faster than your project plan can keep up? Then this episode may feel a little too familiar.

Kim and Kate dive into the rise of Mr. Beast and the making of Beast Games through a project management lens—not to critique content creation, but to examine what happens when vision outpaces execution. From sponsor behavior and scaling challenges to agile gone sideways, they unpack the risks of massive ambition without the systems to support it.

If you've ever managed shifting priorities, difficult stakeholders, or a project that seemed to grow by the hour, this conversation will hit home. Grab a drink and join us for a fascinating look at project sponsors, leadership, and what real-world project management can learn from internet-scale production.

🎙️ Spicy Quotes from the Episode

"Those poor people. Those poor people. I feel so bad." — Kate

"This has to be a textbook case of the absolute worst project sponsor I have ever seen." — Kim

Key Concepts & Takeaways

The Sponsor Shapes the Project
Kate frames Mr. Beast not as a creator but as a project sponsor. Great sponsors create alignment; difficult ones can unintentionally create chaos, rework, and burnout.

Scale Changes Everything
What works at small scale may not work as it scales up - in this case, scaling from Youtube videos to a massive $100m production involving thousands of participants and multiple organizations. Scaling requires stronger processes, decision making, and management support - not just bigger budgets.

Empathy Matters in Project Management
Kate repeatedly returns to the human side of projects: behind every schedule slip or scope change are real people doing the work.

Practical Takeaways

• Evaluate sponsor behavior early, not just project requirements.

• Reassess processes when projects scale dramatically.

• Governance doesn't slow decisions - it can help speed them and ensure your project can effectively absorb changing priorities.

• Consider the human impact of ambitious timelines and scope changes.

• Distinguish between innovation and avoidable chaos.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• Folding Ideas video: "Why Was I Invited to Beast Studios?" (https://youtu.be/0dwagg5wYY4?si=wNMmjhncv06AqUul)

• Project Management Happy Hour Website 

• PM Happy Hour Membership

 

You know the moment.

Your project plan is solid. The scope is defined. The team is ready. Then an executive walks by and casually asks:

"Can we just make this AI?"

Suddenly you're no longer managing a project. You're managing expectations, buzzwords, corporate excitement, and whatever article someone just read on the flight home from a conference.

In this episode, Kim and Kate tackle the question nearly every project manager is hearing right now: What's your AI strategy?

They discuss why this isn't the first technology hype cycle we've lived through, how to respond when leaders want AI without knowing what they actually want AI to do, and why saying "yes" doesn't mean committing to anything.

Along the way, they unpack executive AI buzzwords, governance concerns, AI productivity myths, vibe coding, project management tools, and where AI genuinely helps versus where it's mostly creating noise.

Most importantly, they share practical ways to stay credible, keep your projects grounded, and avoid getting swept up in the latest technology frenzy.

So grab a drink, pull up your RAID log, and let's talk about surviving the AI gold rush without losing your mind.

🎙️ Spicy Quotes from the Episode

"My eyes actually fell all the way out of my head and are rolling down the street. I actually can't see anything anymore." — Kate

"Your project cannot be more mature than the organization." — Kim

"AI is not like magic pixie dust you sprinkle on your project and suddenly magical things happen, right?" — Kim

"AI is not better than you at project management. And it probably never will be." — Kate

Key Concepts & Takeaways

AI Hype Cycles Are Not New

The technology changes, but the executive behavior doesn't.

Before AI there was cloud. Before that there was blockchain. Every generation gets its must-have technology that promises massive transformation. Project managers shouldn't panic when AI becomes the topic of every conversation. The important skill isn't becoming an AI expert overnight. It's understanding enough to have an informed conversation.

Other key concepts covered: 

• Learn the Language Without Drinking the Kool-Aid

• Don't Let Projects Outrun Governance

• Ask "How?" Before You Ask "Why Not?"

• AI Is Only As Good As Your Data

• AI Helps More With Starting Than Finishing

Closing Reflection

The next time someone asks, "What's our AI strategy?" maybe the better question is:

"What problem are we actually trying to solve?"

Because the organizations that benefit most from AI probably won't be the ones chasing every new buzzword—they'll be the ones that stay focused on outcomes while everyone else is getting distracted by the hype.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• Project Management Happy Hour Website 

• PM Happy Hour Membership

 

AI is changing work fast enough to give every project manager emotional whiplash. New tools, new workflows, new expectations… and somehow you're still expected to hit deadlines, manage stakeholders, and explain for the fifth time why the project scope changed after leadership changed the entire business strategy.

In this episode, Kim and Kate sit down with Kelly Heuer from Project Management Institute to talk about the skills that actually survive industry shifts, changing technology, and whatever shiny new buzzword LinkedIn is obsessed with this week.

They unpack why "soft skills" are actually the hardest skills in project management, how business acumen separates strategic PMs from task trackers, and why learning to navigate ambiguity matters more now than memorizing formulas from the PMP exam.

The conversation also dives into the uncomfortable reality that project success is rarely about perfectly following the original plan. Sometimes the real job is realizing the plan should change in the first place.

Along the way, they cover durable vs. perishable skills, why varied career experience is secretly a superpower, how PMs can become more effective strategic partners, and why "say the thing" might be the most important career advice you'll hear all year.

Grab a drink, question your project charter, and let's get into it.

Guest Bio

As Vice President of Learning at the Project Management Institute (PMI), Dr. Kelly Heuer brings over two decades of experience in higher education to lead PMI's Learning division. She oversees a global portfolio including professional standards, publications, live and enterprise training, and digital learning products that equip project professionals worldwide to drive project success.

Kelly holds multiple degrees in philosophy, including an AB from Harvard and an MA and PhD from Georgetown University. She began her career at Georgetown, helping launch the university's first Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) in bioethics and co-founding its ethics and social innovation lab. She most recently served as Vice President of Learning Experience at edX, driving learning strategies and digital innovation across the company's portfolio.

As the first in her family to pursue higher education, Kelly is passionate about mentoring first-generation students, coaching formerly incarcerated individuals, and supporting colleagues exploring alternative career paths. She lives in Brooklyn with her partner, Arjun, and their two children, chess enthusiast Kiran and aspiring explorer Ryan.

🎙️ Quotes from the Episode

"If you're thinking the thing, if you're wondering the thing, if you're confused about the thing, say the thing." — Kelly

"Human skills are more important than artificial intelligence skills." — Kate

"Soft skills are the hardest part of project management." — Kate

"Comfort with ambiguity. It's acknowledging change as a constant, not as something you're going to design around or manage your way away from." — Kelly

📌 Key Concepts & Takeaways

Durable Skills vs. Perishable Skills

Technical skills expire faster than most PMs want to admit. Tools change. Platforms die. Entire workflows disappear. But communication, business acumen, stakeholder management, adaptability, and decision-making under uncertainty keep paying dividends across every phase of a career.

"Say the Thing"

One of the biggest career mistakes is staying quiet because you don't want to sound inexperienced, difficult, or slow the room down. Asking the uncomfortable question early often prevents much bigger problems later.

Business Acumen Is the Real Career Multiplier

Technical project management skills are still important—but they're table stakes now. The PMs who move into larger, more strategic work understand value, organizational priorities, market shifts, and executive decision-making.

Varied Experience Builds Better PMs

Working across industries, teams, and business problems creates stronger long-term judgment. Diverse experience teaches pattern recognition, adaptability, and strategic thinking in ways repetitive specialization sometimes doesn't.

Learning Happens in the Field

Courses, books, and certifications matter—but they're only part of the equation. Real growth happens when people practice skills, make mistakes, reflect, adapt, and try again in live environments.

Discussion Highlights

One of the strongest threads throughout the conversation was the idea that project managers are being forced to rethink what makes them valuable. Kelly talked about how rapidly technical skills are expiring, referencing research showing that the "half-life" of professional skills has dropped dramatically over time. The implication wasn't that technical knowledge no longer matters—it absolutely does—but that technical expertise alone is no longer enough to sustain a long career.

Kate pushed hard on the idea that so-called "soft skills" have always been the hardest part of the job. Not the formulas. Not the software. The real challenge is learning how to navigate people, power dynamics, ambiguity, and shifting business priorities without becoming either invisible or terrifying.

The conversation also got surprisingly honest about career growth. Kate talked about how asking "dumb questions" early in a career feels different than asking them after twenty years of experience. Early on, vulnerability makes you non-threatening. Later, the exact same question can suddenly feel like a high-level strategic critique because people assume expertise from seniority alone.

Kim brought up another tension a lot of PMs quietly experience: organizations wanting project managers who have done the exact same project fifteen times already. That led into a larger conversation about how difficult it can be for experienced PMs with varied backgrounds to communicate the value of transferable skills during hiring processes.

And naturally, because this is PM Happy Hour, the conversation eventually circled back to the reality that no amount of theory replaces getting kicked by the metaphorical horse yourself.

Sometimes literally.

Practical Takeaways

• Stop treating stakeholder communication as a "soft" secondary skill. It's one of the highest leverage parts of the job.

• When joining a new project or industry, focus first on understanding how the business creates value—not just how the process works.

• Ask questions earlier, especially when something feels unclear or inconsistent. Waiting usually makes problems more expensive.

• Revisit project success criteria regularly during long initiatives. The business environment may have shifted even if the project plan hasn't.

• If your background is varied, learn how to frame it as strategic adaptability rather than lack of specialization.

• Build learning habits that fit into real work. Continuous learning matters more now because many technical skills become outdated quickly.

• Don't confuse sticking to the original plan with leadership. Sometimes leadership means recognizing the plan itself needs to evolve.

Closing Reflection

Project management used to reward the people who could control complexity.

Now it increasingly rewards the people who can navigate uncertainty without freezing, adapt without losing direction, and keep delivering value even while the ground underneath the project keeps moving.

That's a very different skill set.

And honestly? Probably a much more human one.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• Project Management Institute (PMI)

• PMI Learning Resources

• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

• Death by Meeting

• PM Happy Hour Membership

• PM Happy Hour Website

• Kelly Heuer on LinkedIn

 

If your to-do list is 47 items long, your Slack won't shut up, and you ended the day thinking, "Cool… but what did I actually accomplish?"—welcome. You're among friends.

In this episode, Kim and Kate take on the very real, very unsexy side of project management: figuring out how to manage your own work when everything (and everyone) is demanding your attention.

This isn't about finding the perfect tool or building a prettier dashboard. It's about surviving—and actually functioning—in an interrupt-driven world where emails breed overnight, notifications multiply, and every task somehow feels urgent.

They get into what actually works: setting a North Star for your week (yes, only a few priorities), getting tasks out of your brain before they haunt you at 10 PM, and why some tasks are secretly just traps that create even more work (looking at you, boomerang tasks).

Also: a gentle reality check—you're not supposed to do everything.

Grab a drink, ignore your inbox for a bit, and let's figure out how to organize the chaos without losing your mind.

 

🎙️ Spicy Quotes from the Episode

On chaos: "If you have no North Star point, the rest of your week is going to feel like chaos." — Kate

On overwhelm: "The human brain can't really process all of that. We can process having three priorities." — Kate

On modern work life: "Notifications trying to notify you about notifications." — Kim

On control: "Manage your tasks—don't let your tasks manage you." — Kim

On reality: "There has to be things you can stop doing." — Kate

📌 Key Concepts & Takeaways

The North Star Rule (a.k.a. calm down, it's not 47 priorities):
Pick 2–3 things that actually matter this week. Everything else? It either supports those—or it waits.

Get It Out of Your Head (your brain is not a storage system):
If you're trying to remember everything, you've already lost. Write it down somewhere reliable so your brain can stop yelling at you.

Boomerang Tasks (aka "this will take 5 minutes" lies):
Some tasks look small but come with hidden side quests. Know the difference before you commit.

Interrupt-Driven Work Is the Default—Act Accordingly:
You're not bad at focusing. Your environment is designed to destroy it. Filter, batch, and control when you engage.

Physical Lists Still Work (and no, it's not just nostalgia):
Sometimes the best productivity hack is using something that doesn't ping, buzz, or open 12 tabs.

Reflection Beats Hustling Harder:
End your day or week by asking: what actually mattered? Not what felt urgent—what mattered.

Not Doing Things Is a Skill:
You don't need a better system. You probably need fewer things on your list.

 

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

PM Happy Hour Website: https://www.pmhappyhour.com
Scripts & Resources: https://www.pmhappyhour.com/scripts

Books Mentioned:

• Essentialism by Greg McKeown

• Getting Things Done by David Allen

• Conquer the Chaos by Clate Mask

Tools Referenced: Notion, Evernote, OneNote, Smartsheet, Jira, Monday

 

If your weekly calendar looks like the loser in a state fair quilt competition - just solid blocks of mismatched colors with no room to breathe - this episode is for you. Today, we're joined by facilitation expert Evan Unger to talk about a topic that Kate and Kim geek out over: meetings. Specifically, why most of them are terrible, how they drain organizational productivity, and exactly what you can do to fix yours.

We also tackle one of the most delicate situations in project management: how to handle the HIPPO (Highest Paid Person's Opinion) when they barge into your meeting and try to completely take over the flight controls. Grab a drink, settle in, and let's get into it.

🎙️ Spicy Quotes from the Episode

• On owning your time: "If you don't own your calendar, you don't own your life." – Kim

• On the true cost of bad meetings: "If you're spending 50% of your time in meetings [that are less than 50% effective], you're literally going to spend a year's worth of your life and hours in meetings in under a decade. How organizations tolerate this, I have no idea." – Evan

• On visibility: "Every meeting is a leadership moment." – Evan

• On career survival: "We don't want to make hippos wrong because there's career limiting interventions. I mean, let's be honest, they have power and authority over us." – Evan

• On meeting math: "Nine things on an agenda in a 40-minute meeting is 4.44 minutes per agenda item. That's just not possible. It is better to end early than to run over." – Kate

📌 Key Concepts & Takeaways

• The Meeting Metaphor (Flying the Plane): Every meeting needs three phases. Takeoff (getting aligned), the Flight (the process/agenda), and Landing (saving 5-10 minutes at the end to secure next steps and accountability). Do not run out of fuel and crash. Leave time to land the plane.

• The POPRA Model for Meeting Prep: Don't accept or run meetings without knowing these five things:

• Purpose: Why are we here?

• Objectives: What are the specific deliverables or decisions needed?

• Process: What is the agenda?

• Roles: Who is the ultimate decision-maker? Who is the SME?

• Agreements: How will we interact and handle disagreements?

• The AREA Model for Taming the HIPPO: When a senior leader tries to bulldoze the process:

• Acknowledge: Validate their right to a point of view without necessarily agreeing.

• Reframe: Tie the conversation back to the project's purpose or objectives.

• Engage: Ask neutral questions to open the floor ("Would you be willing to listen to other perspectives on this?")

• Align: Bring the group's feedback back to the leader to help them make a better, more informed decision.

• The Power of Simultaneous Chat: To break the dominance of the loudest voices (and the HIPPO), ask a question and have everyone type their answer in the chat without hitting enter. On the count of three, everyone submits at once. This holds space for introverts, junior staff, and non-native English speakers to contribute without getting run over.

• Process is Your Shield: If a leader has a strong opinion, use process structure to ensure all sides are heard. Force the group to list "Pros" before "Cons," or use a timer to keep long-winded talkers (even the boss) in check.

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned

• Connect with Evan Unger: Find Evan on LinkedIn (look for the blue/black check shirt and the impish grin, not the doctor!). Note: Evan is generously offering $2,000 off a seat in his training program for PM Happy Hour listeners!

• Books Mentioned: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team and Death by Meeting by Patrick Lencioni.

• Join the Conversation: Want to geek out about project management with us? Check out the PM Happy Hour membership site at https://www.pmhappyhour.com/membership.

• Say Hello: Hit us up on Facebook at PM Happy Hour or find our contact info on the website under "About Your Hosts."

 

Boss fights and boardrooms. Kate puts Kim through meeting hell in this tabletop roleplay episode.

Kate: "Help me torture Kim."

That was the prompt.

What followed was a meeting dungeon built from listener-submitted horror stories, tabletop chaos, and the exact kinds of project meetings that make smart people question their career choices.

In this April Fool's episode of Project Management Happy Hour, Kate becomes game master and throws Kim into a gauntlet of cursed kickoffs, bloated status meetings, executive dodging, and stakeholder nonsense. It's funny because it's absurd. It lands because it's true.

"My dice are green like all of my status reports."

The setup is playful. The meeting pain is not.

Kim tries to survive a kickoff with distracted leaders, a giant update meeting nobody needed, a build-versus-buy conversation where nobody wants to own the decision, and a phase gate where "close enough" suddenly becomes everyone else's problem. As the dungeon gets worse, you hear what experienced project managers actually do under pressure: reset the room, cut through noise, force clarity, and keep momentum when everyone else is drifting.

"This is how Kim would operate in a meeting."

That's what makes this episode so fun - and insightful. The dice are a toy. The project management is real.

If you've ever had a sponsor with a hard stop in ten minutes, a technical lead who gets defensive the second testing reveals a problem, or a leadership team that turns every decision into one more meeting, this episode will feel painfully familiar.

"We survived that near miss. It's okay. Next time we'll be okay."

A lot of bad meeting habits stick around because teams get used to surviving them. This episode turns that reality into entertainment—and into a sharp reminder that surviving dysfunction is not the same as managing well.

And because it's PM Happy Hour, the whole thing is loaded with lines that hit for PMs immediately.

"We can't food bribe our way out of every meeting disaster."

"I need you to do a speed run of a project."

"It is 2 hours long."

That last one might be the most terrifying quote in the whole episode.

What you'll hear in this episode

• a kickoff already heading off the rails

• a giant status meeting from hell

• executive indecision in full view

• a technical lead bringing equal parts talent and chaos

• a release decision that gets messy fast

Key project management takeaways

• Get to purpose fast.

• Push for the real decision.

• Keep updates short and relevant.

• Make the cost of delay visible.

• Manage the room, not just the agenda.

• Don't let technical defensiveness hijack the issue.

• Find the compromise that keeps momentum.

If your work depends on steering messy rooms, stubborn stakeholders, and overloaded calendars toward an actual outcome, this episode will feel like both comedy and continuing education.

Love our content? Then join the PM Happy Hour membership at pmhappyhour.com/membership

Escalation: it's a word that can make even experienced project managers tense. But what if you approached it as a tool rather than a threat? In this Top Shelf Replay of Project Management Happy Hour, we revisit the classic episode "Embracing De-escalation," exploring how savvy project managers use escalation to enhance visibility, make informed decisions, and navigate risk—without losing their cool.

Hosts Kim and Kate dive into the nuances of escalation, showing how the best project leaders balance assertiveness with thoughtful communication. Far from being a reactive panic button, escalation can be a strategic lever to guide projects, protect team morale, and keep stakeholders in the loop. 

In this episode, we cover real-world examples of when to escalate, how to frame your message, and why keeping your sponsor engaged is critical for project success. From handling medium-urgency issues to preventing scope creep, Kim and Kate provide a roadmap for using escalation effectively—turning potential project risks into opportunities for alignment and growth.

Expect memorable metaphors, including broccoli for "healthy escalation habits" and creative exercises from the improv world to illustrate collaboration and communication. 

By the end of this episode, you'll understand how to elevate project visibility, manage competing priorities, and leverage escalation strategically, all while maintaining calm and confidence.

Key Quotes from This Episode:
"Escalation is just another tool in your project management box, and it's one of the best."
"Sometimes you almost kinda need to grab the sponsor and tell them to step up—they are the sponsor, and it's their project."
"Think of escalation as eating your vegetables: a healthy activity that keeps your project going strong."
"Escalating helps your sponsor make decisions whether they want to or not."

Key Concepts

1. The strategic use of escalation to improve visibility and decision making.

2. Balancing sponsor engagement with day-to-day project leadership.

3. Recognizing when a problem exceeds your decision-making authority.

4. Communication techniques for reducing tension during escalations.

5. Viewing project status and benefits realization beyond standard red/amber/green metrics.
   
   

Love our content? Then join the PM Happy Hour membership at pmhappyhour.com/membership

Why do smart teams still deliver failed projects?

Most project failures don't begin with a catastrophic mistake. Instead, they begin with small deviations—minor compromises that seem harmless in the moment. A warning sign gets ignored. A shortcut becomes acceptable. A risk is acknowledged but tolerated because "nothing bad happened last time." Over time, those deviations quietly become the new normal.

In this episode of Project Management Happy Hour, Kim Essendrup and Kate Anderson sit down with Dr. Bill Brantley to explore one of the most dangerous patterns in project leadership: normalization of deviance.

The concept comes from sociologist Diane Vaughan's analysis of the Challenger space shuttle disaster. Engineers had long observed problems with the shuttle's O-ring seals. But earlier launches survived those anomalies. Each successful launch reinforced the belief that the risk was acceptable. Gradually, what began as an abnormal warning became accepted behavior.

As Dr. Brantley explains:
"We survived that near miss. It's okay. Next time we'll be okay."

Project teams fall into this pattern all the time.

A design review is skipped because the team is behind schedule.

A test failure gets dismissed because it hasn't caused a real problem yet.

A risk gets documented—but never truly addressed.

Nothing breaks immediately. So the project keeps moving.

The conversation explores how this slow drift toward failure mirrors patterns seen in aviation, engineering disasters, and even mountaineering expeditions. Experienced professionals—people who know better—gradually normalize increasingly risky decisions until the system finally breaks.

But the episode goes further than just diagnosing the problem. Dr. Brantley and the hosts dive into the decision dynamics inside projects.

A typical project team makes dozens—or even hundreds—of decisions every week. Some have immediate consequences, while others take months or years to reveal their impact. One story from the Apollo program illustrates this perfectly: a weld defect made years earlier ultimately contributed to the crisis of Apollo 13.

This delay between decision and consequence creates a dangerous blind spot. Dr. Brantley jokingly calls it the "White Castle effect."

"White Castle burgers are great going down… and then at three in the morning you realize you made a bad decision."

The same thing happens in project management. Decisions that seem harmless in the moment can produce painful consequences much later.

One of the most powerful insights from the discussion is that organizations often fail to reflect on their decisions. Teams act, move forward, and stay busy—but rarely pause to ask whether their decisions are actually improving outcomes.

That reflection step is critical.

"Reflection really helps you break that normalization of deviance."

Without it, teams never notice when small compromises start compounding into systemic risk.

The episode also explores practical techniques for improving project decision-making. One of Dr. Brantley's favorites is red teaming—a method borrowed from military strategy and cybersecurity. In a red-team exercise, someone deliberately challenges the plan and tries to break it. Their job is to expose weaknesses before reality does.

It's a powerful way to counter groupthink and create psychological safety for dissent.

Another theme throughout the conversation is something many project managers intuitively know but rarely articulate: Every action—or inaction—on a project is ultimately a decision.

"Everything is a decision. Nobody is going to come after you around anything other than decisions."

Whether it's changing scope, delaying work, ignoring a risk, or choosing not to act at all, project leaders are constantly making decisions that shape the outcome of the project.

The real question isn't whether decisions are happening.

It's whether those decisions are intentional, visible, and thoughtfully examined.

Because in many projects, failure doesn't arrive suddenly.

It arrives slowly—one accepted deviation at a time.

Love our content? Then join the PM Happy Hour membership at pmhappyhour.com/membership

Have you ever gotten feedback that made you want to flip a table because it was both insulting and totally useless?

In this Top Shelf Replay, we revisit "They Told Me I'm Too Nice" and break down what that kind of vague feedback is really doing (sometimes gendered, almost always inactionable), why it hits so hard, and how to respond without spiraling - or people-pleasing your way into a personality transplant.

Then we go beyond the original episode with practical, real-world tactics: how to ask better follow-up questions, how to force examples without sounding defensive, how to "prime" your manager before a meeting so you get usable feedback, and how to figure out whether your boss is actually trying to coach you… or just dumping drive-by advice from a book they skimmed on a flight.

If you lead people, we also flip the lens: how to avoid giving your team confusing feedback that basically translates to "please be a different person," and how to coach toward outcomes instead of vibes.

Key actionable insights

• Treat vague feedback as a starting point, not a conclusion. Thank them, then ask them to say more until you have something observable and specific.

• Ask for examples on demand. Use: "Can you tell me about a time I did that well?" or "Who does that really well?" This forces specificity and gives you a model to study.

• Match your effort to their effort. If it was a drive-by comment, don't burn three weeks of anxiety trying to decode it. If they clearly invested in you, invest back proportionally.

• Prime your manager before a meeting so they know what "good" looks like. Tell them your goal (scope agreement, signature, commitment, decision) so their feedback anchors to outcomes, not vibes.

• If you want feedback, specify what kind you want. "I'm not looking for grammar edits—I want alignment on strategy" is a transferable skill for stakeholder reviews and exec comms.

• For managers: don't "coach" people who don't want coaching. Find out what they want first, or you'll waste time and damage trust.
  
  

Key Quotes - 

• "I don't need you to be my Grammarly when you review this document. I need to know if we are strategically aligned."

• "Below the line? You just crossed the line, buddy."

Love our content? Then join the PM Happy Hour membership at pmhappyhour.com/membership

"Three PMs walk into a bar: a business PM, an IT PM, and a Vendor PM…" Sounds like a bad joke, but if you don't get it right - the joke will be your project.

Very often, you aren't the "one PM to rule them all" on your project - you may have other PMs involved that you need to work with. But how do you decide who does what, and how do you prevent turf wars from turning your project into a slow-motion train wreck?

In this episode, we ditch the corporate fluff to dive into the messy reality of projects with "too many cooks". We discuss how to navigate the friction between different project management roles, how to handle "useless" vendor PMs who won't manage their own resources, and what to do when an executive buyer bypasses you to talk directly to the vendor. You'll learn how to look "one level up" in the hierarchy to identify what actually drives your counterparts and how to draw professional boundaries that keep you in the driver's seat.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• How to use the "Hierarchy Hack" to uncover your counterparts' hidden motivations.

• Strategies for handling a vendor PM who refuses to do their job.

• Why a high-level human conversation beats a technical tool every time.

• The "Time and Materials" pivot to force vendor accountability.

• How to professionally block an executive from undermining your role.

From this episode:

• "The first thing to do is to have a conversation and, honestly, call it out in the open." — Kate

• "One of the ways I like to think about situations like this is one level up in the hierarchy." — Kim

• "I've been like, 'No, you can talk to me. Shut up, talk to me.'" — Kate

• "If I and my team are going to be held accountable... I have to be able to plan what we're accountable for." — Kim

Love our content? Then join the PM Happy Hour membership at pmhappyhour.com/membership

Project managers are constantly told they need to "learn how to say no."
But in the real world—especially when the ask comes from a sponsor, executive, or important customer—just saying no often isn't productive, strategic, or even possible.

In this Top Shelf Replay episode of Project Management Happy Hour, Kim Essendrup and Kate Anderson revisit one of the show's earliest "Appetizer" episodes: Say No by Saying Yes, originally aired in 2017. Short, deceptively simple, and still painfully relevant, this episode breaks down a technique that helps project managers protect scope, schedule, cost, and sanity—without sounding combative or inflexible

The core idea is straightforward:
Instead of responding to tough requests with a flat "no," you respond with "yes—but" or "yes—and here's what that would require."

"Yes, we can do it faster—but it will require triple the resources."
"Yes, we can release both languages at once—but we'll need more budget or a delayed launch."
"Yes, we can remove that resource—but you'll need to help me explain the downstream impact to the sponsor."

This approach reframes the conversation away from emotion and into trade-offs, which is where real project leadership lives.

As the conversation unfolds, Kim and Kate explore why this technique works so well psychologically. Leaders—especially busy executives—often don't have full context. Their "ridiculous asks" aren't always malicious; they're frequently driven by incomplete information, pressure from above, or a misunderstood business constraint. Saying "yes" first acknowledges their goal, signals partnership, and keeps them engaged long enough to hear reality

The episode also connects this technique to a broader leadership pattern the hosts have refined over the years: what they now describe as "affirm, caution, query."
You affirm the request.
You surface the risk or constraint.
You return the decision to the person who actually owns it.

In other words, you stop absorbing problems that don't belong to you—and you stop shielding leaders from the consequences of their own decisions.

The replay discussion expands the idea further, touching on burnout, executive presence, and why many project managers get stuck in a defensive "control mindset" around the triple constraint. Kim and Kate argue that stepping back—mentally taking off the project manager hat and putting on the sponsor's hat—makes these conversations easier, calmer, and more strategic. When you focus on outcomes instead of guarding boundaries, you stop reacting and start partnering.

There's also an unexpected but memorable parallel: gentle parenting.
The same structure used to redirect an emotional five-year-old ("I see what you want—but here are your options") turns out to work remarkably well with stressed executives, difficult customers, and unrealistic stakeholders. You don't remove agency; you structure it.

Ultimately, this episode is about more than saying no politely.
It's about changing the power dynamic—from executor to partner.
From order-taker to decision facilitator.
From "blocking progress" to helping leaders make informed choices.

If you've ever been handed an impossible deadline, an under-funded scope change, or a request that made your stomach drop, this episode gives you language, structure, and confidence to respond without burning trust—or yourself.

 

Thinking about going contractor? Kate and Kim share how they each left corporate and made the leap—two very different stories (burnout vs acting early) with the same core truth: contracting is built on relationships, reputation, and value… not job boards and commodity rates.

We cover how to know if you're ready, why sales is part of the job, what to watch out for (hello, 2008), and how to avoid racing to the bottom.

Want us to teach the full process with scripts + steps? Head to http://pmhappyhour.com/be-free.

 

As project managers, we spend a lot of time talking about tools, processes, and delivery frameworks—but far less time talking about the invisible structure that holds projects together: trust.

In this Top Shelf Replay episode of Project Management Happy Hour, Kim Essendrup and Kate Anderson revisit one of the show's earliest and most enduring concepts: Trust Bricks. Originally recorded in 2018, this short but powerful episode explores how trust is built—not through grand gestures or heroic saves—but through consistent, everyday actions that compound over time.

The core idea is simple: trust is predictability. When you repeatedly do what you say you'll do—whether that's sending meeting notes on time, honoring estimates, or showing up prepared—you lay one small Trust Brick at a time. Over weeks, months, and years, those bricks form a structure strong enough to withstand missed deadlines, bad news, or the occasional broken promise.

Kim and Kate break down why Trust Bricks matter so much in project environments:

• Teams are more honest with you when they trust you

• Estimates improve when people believe they won't be punished for telling the truth

• Difficult conversations become easier when everyone believes you're on the same side

• Sponsors give you more latitude when your track record is consistent

The conversation also explores what happens when trust breaks—and how the same Trust Brick approach can be used to rebuild credibility. Rather than trying to restore trust with a single "big win," the hosts argue that rebuilding starts small: partial deliverables, frequent check-ins, and deliberately meeting micro-commitments until confidence is restored.

In the replay commentary, Kim and Kate reflect on how their thinking has evolved since the original recording. They discuss:

• The role of showing up consistently, even when no explicit promise was made

• How trust operates differently in virtual and remote teams

• Why strong performers can accidentally set expectations that lead to burnout

• How leaders vary widely in how much "trust damage" they tolerate before overreacting

The episode also revisits the journey of Trust Bricks beyond the podcast, including Kim's experience delivering a TEDx talk on the topic and refining the framework into three enduring lessons:

1. You are always building or breaking Trust Bricks—whether you realize it or not

2. Missed expectations don't pause trust building; they actively tear it down

3. Unspoken expectations are the fastest way to accidentally destroy trust

This episode is a reminder that trust isn't soft, vague, or optional—it's a core delivery skill. If you want stakeholders who back you, teams who tell you the truth, and projects that don't require constant firefighting, it starts with sweating the small commitments.

The next time you make a commitment—big or small—ask yourself:
Am I laying a brick… or cracking one?

Check out Kim's TEDx talk at trust-bricks.com or on the TED youtube channel

Want more PM reality without the fluff? Join the PMHH membership for courses, templates, community, and direct access to Kate and Kim.
https://pmhappyhour.com/membership

Kim and Kate settle in for a classic PM Happy Hour episode — the kind where the drinks are metaphorical, the conversation is wandering in the best way, and the insights sneak up on you. This one covers three big themes that hit close to home for project managers, leaders, and anyone who's ever had to keep a project — or a career — moving forward despite chaos.

It starts with a deceptively simple question: How do you describe what a PM actually does for a living? Kim brings his favorite one-sentence description, and Kate immediately pokes at it (lovingly) to reveal the gaps between a tidy definition and the messy reality of day-to-day PM work. Together they break down the core functions that aren't on the job description: expectation-setting, alignment-building, timeline-translating, political-atmosphere-reading. Yes, PMs manage plans — but they also manage humans, assumptions, ambiguity, and the definition of "done," which shifts more than anyone wants to admit. The conversation hits on why this matters so much for stakeholder alignment, project success, and your own sanity.

From there, the discussion pivots to fear in decision-making — specifically, how fear quietly creeps into choices that leaders and teams make every day. Kim shares a general's perspective on why big decisions get stalled ("people won't make hard decisions if it forces them to change"), and Kate adds their own real-world examples of hesitation disguised as caution. They unpack how fear leads to risk-avoidant behavior, analysis paralysis, unnecessary escalations, or decisions that look safe but actually create more work downstream. This part of the conversation digs into the psychology of leadership, the emotional drivers behind "bad" decisions, and how project managers can spot when fear — not logic — is driving a stakeholder's position. Along the way, they also reflect on why PMs sometimes avoid decisions themselves, even when they know the right call.

Finally, Kim and Kate open up about what they've learned from going out on their own and being their own boss — the good, the bad, and the "wow, nobody warned me about this part." They talk candidly about leaving stable corporate paths, the discomfort of striking out solo, the thrill of autonomy, and the realities of running a business while also running your own mental health. Listeners get the inside picture of what independence really looks like: the freedom, the discipline, the failures, the self-doubt, and the eventual confidence that comes from owning your decisions and your livelihood. This segment offers honest lessons learned for anyone considering consulting, freelancing, starting a business, or just trying to build a healthier professional life.

Through all three topics, the conversation carries the familiar PMHH rhythm: candid laughter, a little self-roasting, and the practical wisdom that comes from having been around the block more times than they're willing to count. It's not a tidy thematic episode — it's better than that. It's a Happy Hour catch-up that turns into real insight about project leadership, stakeholder psychology, career development, and the everyday challenges PMs face.

If you've ever struggled to explain your job, watched fear take over a meeting, or wondered what life might look like outside the corporate bubble, you'll find something in this episode that feels uncomfortably familiar — and maybe a little inspiring.

Want more PM reality without the fluff? Join the PMHH membership for courses, templates, community, and direct access to Kate and Kim.
https://pmhappyhour.com/membership

 

What happens when you drop a senior project manager into a room full of attorneys, tribal leaders, political operators, and massive personalities?

In this Top Shelf Replay, Kate & Kim revisit one of the most beloved—and re-listened—episodes in PM Happy Hour history: "Stage Direction in the Boardroom" featuring master facilitator Sheila Morago.

If you've ever wondered how elite leaders steer complicated, high-stakes conversations without losing their cool (or losing six months of work with one careless comment), this episode is your new playbook.

Sheila shares the tools, tactics, and emotional intelligence behind managing senior stakeholders, building trust, engineering alignment, and yes…occasionally staging a fight to get everyone to "yes."
Get ready—this episode is full of real-world policy drama, tribal gaming insight, negotiation theater, and powerful lessons for any PM trying to move from "task master" to strategic leader.

Great Quotes From the Episode

• "Never ask a question you don't already know the answer to."

• "These aren't meetings—they're Kabuki theater."

• "Nothing brings people together like a common enemy."

• "If you don't let them vent early, they will vent later—and at the worst possible moment."

• "Policy takes years. Tech takes a week."
  
  

What You'll Learn (Key Outcomes) 1. How Senior Leaders Actually Negotiate

Sheila breaks down what it takes to orchestrate alignment among executives, attorneys, policymakers, and stakeholders—none of whom work for you, all of whom report to someone powerful.

2. The Secret Skill That Makes PMs Into Leaders

How listening (really listening) becomes your most strategic tool at the senior level.

3. Managing High-Stakes Meetings Without Losing Control

Why should one person guide the conversation?
How to posit their positions to draw out quiet or hesitant stakeholders.
How to keep the emotional temperature safe but not silent.

4. The Power of the 'Safe Zone'

Why must you create a space where stakeholders can speak unfiltered, off-record, and without fear of political consequences.

5. Relationship-Building: The Long Game

Happy hours, lunches, hallway conversations—how the "work between the work" makes the boardroom possible.

6. The Art of the Staged Fight

Why conflict must be visible.
Why letting people "win" (feel like they won) is essential.
Why is the real battle scripted before the meeting starts?

7. Using Common Ground—and Common Foes

When "we all want the same thing" works.
When "the real enemy is over there" works even better.

8. How to Lock Down Decisions So They Don't Backslide

Why immediate execution is key.
How implementation momentum prevents second-guessing.

9. Lessons Kate & Kim Learned 8 Years Later

Why parts of this episode hit harder after a decade of PM leadership.
How letting emotions into the meeting leads to better outcomes.
What PMs often overlook when they're new to senior-level facilitation.

If you want to level up from "planner of tasks" to leader of leaders, this replay is essential listening.
Whether you're negotiating policy, driving enterprise transformation, or just trying to get two teams to agree on anything—Sheila's battle-tested tools will help you steer the room, keep your cool, and bring people with you.

ABOUT OUR GUEST, SHEILA MORAGO

Sheila Morago is the Executive Director of the Oklahoma Indian Gaming Association. OIGA has 30 member tribes and numerous associate members.  Oklahoma now ranks third in the United States in gaming revenue, with 118 casinos ranging from small fuel stops to full resort casinos.  

Prior to working for OIGA, Ms. Morago was Executive Director for the Arizona Indian Gaming Association. She has also served as the Director of Public Relations for the National Indian Gaming Association, based in Washington, D.C. 

Ms. Morago began her career in tribal gaming in 1994 when she was appointed Director of Marketing for the Gila River Casinos, where she built the marketing department for this multi-million dollar enterprise and opened two successful tribal casinos.  Before joining AIGA, Ms. Morago was Vice President of National Relations for Initial Impressions based in Tempe, Arizona, where she was responsible for all political and public relations for tribal and non-tribal clients.

In January 2006, she was named one of 25 people to watch by Global Gaming Business. She was named one of the "Great Women of Gaming" by Casino Enterprise Management in 2004, and inducted into the Indian Gaming Hall of Fame, presented by Indian Gaming Magazine, in 2012.

And if you're tired of carrying the emotional labor for your entire project team, come get some backup and community. Join us at: https://pmhappyhour.com/membership
 © Project Management Happy Hour

Kate didn't plan to measure their burnout by the number of bags of pink-and-purple Mother's animal cookies consumed at their desk…but here we are. Kim's clue was a rotating cycle of stomach aches and "maybe these aren't panic attacks but the room is definitely spinning." And our guest, Norlander Wilson, talks about showing up to work without showering or brushing her teeth for days because she literally couldn't.

This one is about burnout at work — not the "I need a weekend off" kind, but the kind that rewires your nervous system and convinces you you're the problem.

About our guest:
Norlander Wilson is an experimental psychologist and an orbit disruptor by calling. She is the founder and CEO of Becoma, an operational strategy firm that helps leaders, creatives, and organizations move from survival mode into clearer systems and healthier energy. Through her work, Norlander blends psychology, strategy, and system design to challenge the patterns that keep people stuck and to create ways of working that don't require self-sacrifice. She's also the host of the podcast "She Don't Work Like That, No More," where she unpacks wounded leadership patterns and reimagines what it means to build, lead, and live without breaking yourself in the process.

The theme today: burnout at work, and how project managers — the people everyone counts on — get trapped in it.

Norlander doesn't sugarcoat it:
"Burnout is a collective conversation, especially in an organization."

She calls out how burnout starts at the top. If leadership pushes 100 hours, teams assume they should push 150. If leaders are exhausted, their teams are exhausted.

Burnout isn't a personal failing; it's a system failure — and PMs often absorb the blast radius.

Kate opens up about their 2024 breakdown:
crying daily, losing appetite except for cookies, medical leave, and the creeping belief that if they just tried harder, they could fix everything. Kim shares his own burnout and the helpless feeling of watching teammates slide into it — seeing that "day-five-I-haven't-showered look" on Zoom and wanting to save them.

And then there's the half-million-dollar moment.

Kate negotiated nearly $500,000/year in compensation and turned it down because walking into the building made them feel sick. Not metaphorically — physically.
"I'm not getting on that wheel unless I want to."

Norlander validates it:
"If it's profound burnout and everything triggers you at that job, yes, it's time to leave."

She gives language PMs desperately need:

• Capacity check-ins, not productivity interrogations

• Systems that hold boundaries so you don't have to

• Stop parenting grown adults at work — "You are not an emotional container."

• Let people fail so they learn the consequence, not you

Kim connects it to the "mouse on the wheel" experiment — the difference between choosing to run and being forced to run. The stress chemicals — literally — are not the same.

Norlander's tools for burnout prevention and burnout recovery:

• Audit your systems quarterly

• Build boundaries into SOPs

• Protect scheduled joy like you protect deadlines

• Delegate to the system, not your nervous system

Kate shares how protecting Tuesday riding lessons became non-negotiable. Not because horseback riding is magic (although…it kind of is), but because no one else will protect your time but you.

Norlander's toast at the end is the line we're all putting on sticky notes:
"When you do find your boundary… don't compromise it for anyone."

If burnout at work is starting to feel familiar — if you're living on cookies, caffeine, and dread — pull up a chair. You're not lazy. You're not failing. The system is failing you.

And if you're tired of carrying the emotional labor for your entire project team, come get some backup and community. Join us at: https://pmhappyhour.com/membership
© Project Management Happy Hour

 

Ever freeze up in a tough project conversation? Or worse—blow it up? In this episode of Project Management Happy Hour, Kim and Kate revisit their all-time favorite: Crucial Conversations by the team at VitalSmarts (now Crucial Learning). This book completely changed how they lead, negotiate, and manage conflict. Learn how to spot when a conversation turns "crucial," stay in dialogue instead of defensiveness, and use "don't-do statements" and "start with heart" to navigate conflict like a pro.

We're not sponsored—just obsessed. If you lead projects or people, this book will change your life.

🍸 Pull up a stool at the bar—here's what we're talking about this round: 🍸

Every project manager has been there: a stakeholder meltdown, a team standoff, or that one sponsor meeting where your pulse hits 200. The question is—what do you do when the conversation turns crucial?

In this PM Happy Hour throwback, Kate and Kim revisit one of their most popular and enduring episodes—based on the book Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High by the VitalSmarts team (now Crucial Learning). They aren't paid to say this—but this book changed their lives and careers.

Seventeen years after Kate's colleague first handed her this book, they still call it "the single most important leadership book for project managers." Forget the PMBOK—start here if you want to build trust, executive presence, and influence.

You'll learn how to:

• Recognize when a conversation becomes crucial: differing opinions, high stakes, and strong emotions.

• Avoid the "fool's choice"—the false belief that you must choose between honesty and peace.

• Create a shared pool of meaning, so everyone's ideas and emotions contribute to better decisions.

• Use "Start With Heart" to keep your cool and focus on what you really want—for yourself, others, and the relationship.

• Apply "Don't-Do Statements" to set boundaries, de-escalate tension, and build empathy.

From team conflicts to sponsor negotiations, this episode gives you practical, human ways to talk about hard things—and actually make things better. Kim and Kate share real-world examples from project meetings, resource battles, and even personal life to show how dialogue beats defensiveness every time.

And they're not just quoting theory. Crucial Conversations is built on decades of behavioral research and communication psychology—and it's as relevant today as ever. Whether you manage projects, programs, or entire teams, mastering these techniques can level up your leadership, reduce drama, and get you promoted faster.

📚 Get the Book:
Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High
by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler
Available anywhere books are sold (we're not sponsored—we just love it).

JOIN THE HAPPY HOUR!
Want even more? Join us at pmhappyhour.com/membership to get PDUsfor episodes, downloadable templates, access to our PM community, and 1:1 time with Kim and Kate.

Are you defining project success the wrong way? Most project managers are — at least according to PMI's Dave Garrett.

Project Management Happy Hour hosts Kim Essendrup and Kate Anderson sit down with Dave — Senior Advisor at the Project Management Institute (PMI) and co-founder of ProjectManagement.com — for a frank and real conversation about PMI's new definition of project success to talk about how realistic it is, and what it means for the future of our profession.

For decades, project success was judged by the "iron triangle" — scope, schedule, and budget. But PMI has officially redefined it:

"A successful project is one that delivers value worth the effort and expense."

Dave explains how this updated definition shifts the focus from checking boxes to delivering outcomes that truly matter — and how every PM can start measuring success through value creation instead of rigid constraints.

The discussion digs into PMI's new M.O.R.E. framework — a practical mindset for modern project leaders:

• M – Manage Perceptions: Build trust and alignment with stakeholders.

• O – Own Success: Don't just deliver; ensure the value lands.

• R – Relentlessly Reassess: Constantly re-evaluate priorities and adapt to change.

• E – Expand Perspective: See the bigger picture across business strategy, customers, and society.

Dave also shares lessons from his early startup days building Gantthead.com, the dot-com crash, and how those lessons apply in today's AI-driven project world. You'll hear how the rise of automation is making project management more human, pushing PMs to lead through empathy, influence, and strategic insight rather than process checklists.

If you've ever struggled with the question, "Was my project really a success?"  this episode will give you a fresh, empowering way to answer it.

Key Takeaways

• PMI's official definition of project success now centers on value, not just time, cost, and scope.

• The M.O.R.E. mindset helps PMs evolve beyond administrators into strategic leaders.

• AI will augment, not replace, project managers — freeing them to focus on human connection and business impact.

• "Success" is contextual: a delayed project that delivers exceptional value can still be a win.

Guest Links

• Learn more about PMI's Project Success initiative: pmi.org/projectsuccess

• Connect with Dave Garrett on LinkedIn

• Explore PMI's AI resources: pmi.org/ai 

Want even more? Join us at pmhappyhour.com/membership to get PDU certificates for episodes, downloadable templates, access to our PM community, and 1:1 time with Kim and Kate.

 

 

 

Ever been dropped into a troubled project that's already gone off the rails? Welcome to life as "The Wolf." Inspired by the fixer from Pulp Fiction, Kim and Kate revisit one of our most popular episodes—now a PMI Global talk! —and break down how to step in, take charge, and rescue a broken project without losing your cool.

Kim shares his new 3-part formula for project recovery:

• People first – You aren't just fixing a plan, you're fixing an organization.

• Calm – Calm is contagious, and you can only control yourself.

• Clarity & Courage – Seek out misalignment, bring truth to light, and have the guts to ask, "Does this project still make sense?"

Of course, Kate keeps Kim honest, adding the perspective (and laughs) that make the tough lessons go down easy.

If you've ever been handed a project that feels unsalvageable, this episode is your playbook.

👉 Want even more? Join us at pmhappyhour.com/membership to get PDU certificates for episodes, downloadable templates, access to our PM community, and 1:1 time with Kim and Kate.

Why bother with risk management when you can just deal with problems as they happen? In this episode, Kim and Kate dig into the heart of that question—and the answer might just save your future self a world of pain.

You'll hear:

• Hard-hitting stats: 1 in 6 projects go 200% over budget (Harvard Business Review), 17% of major IT projects threaten company survival (McKinsey), and why 69% of projects don't succeed.

• Firefighting vs. fire prevention: why controlled burns (boring, thankless prep) prevent disasters while the "heroes" just put out fires.

• ROI of risk management: the surprising 20:1 return on time spent planning versus cleaning up issues later.

• Language hacks: how swapping "risks" for "obstacles" (credit to Dr. Josh Ramirez) can get your team—and executives—on board.

• Practical techniques: from whiteboarding failure points to slicing your project into risk categories, simple ways to start risk management without drowning in templates.

Whether you're a seasoned PM or just tired of project disasters, this episode shows why risk management isn't about doom and gloom—it's about giving future you a fighting chance.

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Please. Let it end. PLEASE!
A defining characteristic of a project is that it ends. Finally. Just finish it, right? If it were only that easy! 

In another Top Shelf Replay, Kate and Kim revisit one of their classic past episodes, "The Closer." We play highlights from the original Closer episode as they talk about how to build up to a crisp conclusion to your project, making it a win for everyone. Then, Kate and Kim talk through their revised perspectives and learnings since the original airing of the Closer - and some of their hard learned lessons since then! 

 

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Projects aren't remembered for how they started—they're remembered for how they ended. In this PM Happy Hour episode, Kim Essendrup and Kate Anderson unpack why finishing strong is critical to your reputation and your project's legacy.

Drawing on real project stories, they explore the axiom that people will remember your project the way it ended—and two key corollaries every project manager needs to know:

• Corollary 1: People naturally forget past wins and focus on the most recent problems.

• Corollary 2: People will redefine success to fit the outcome—if it gives them a win.

You'll learn practical practices to keep your stakeholders focused on value, even when things get bumpy, including:

• How to keep your team and sponsors aligned on the value proposition

• Why PMI has redefined project success around value delivered (not just the triple constraints)

• How to reframe challenges as wins without whitewashing reality

• Why a strong finish can redeem a rocky project—and a weak finish can ruin a good one

If you've ever had a project limp across the finish line, this episode will give you tools to finish strong and leave stakeholders with the story you want them to remember.

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Ah, executives. They fund your project, cheer you on, and sometimes… ask for things that make you want to slam your head into your Gantt chart.

Like:

• "The project's almost done—let's change everything!"

• "I read about [X] in CIO Magazine—can we bolt that on?"

• "Why are we doing it this way? Let's redo it completely differently… and badly."
  
  

In this Top Shelf Replay, we revisit the best parts of this classic episode, then Kate & Kim reflect on what they've learned since—especially now that they're the execs making the asks (hopefully less stupidly).

Oh, and yes—this is the episode where we try to talk Darth Vader out of building an infinity pool on the Death Star. 

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"Well begun is half done" 

— Aristotle (or Mary Poppins, depending who you ask)

The beginning of a project is a time when all stakeholders THINK they know what they want, and maybe the team thinks they know what they are supposed to do. Or maybe they are just wondering, "what the heck is this new madness that I'm getting drug into?!"

 

Regardless, it's a near certainty that your team, your stakeholders and your sponsors - someone is NOT on the same page. And if you launch your project with that misalignment, you are lighting the fuse on project troubles.

Enter the Kickoff meeting, one of the goals of which is to try to bring everyone's expectations of the project into alignment. 

 

Join Kate and Kim as they talk about how to approach this most critical meeting, and ensure your project is off on the right step. Be the Aristotle (or Mary Poppins) of your project! 

🎯 What you'll learn in this episode:

• How to structure your kickoff meeting

• Key questions to ask your stakeholders

• Tips for getting your team engaged from the start

• How to align goals, roles, and expectations

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Think your project's on fire? 🔥

Come hear how Maine tried to swap a 30‑year‑old COBOL HR/payroll system for something cloud‑friendly … and wound up with six years, two vendors, and ± $35 M spent—with no live system to show for it.

(Psst—Love this kind of real‑world PM talk? Join our member community for templates, monthly problem‑solving Happy Hours with us, and coaching: PMHappyHour.com/membership.)

 

👋 Your Hosts

Kim Essendrup – PM coach, speaker, project‑failure super‑fan

Kate Anderson – coffee‑powered realist & co‑host of Project Management Happy Hour

 

What We Cover

Why Maine's 2016 "$15 M, 2‑year" vision looked reasonable on paper

Vendor #1: Infor hired for $13.5 M … then fired after two years with nothing working

Vendor #2: Workday lands a $15 M deal—hope (briefly) restored

2019–2020 red flags: missing staff, test cycles where 50 % of paychecks were wrong, "rosy" status decks

Feb 2021: Maine's 30‑day ultimatum & $22.16 M demand letter to Workday (spoiler: lawyers ensue)

Project culture bombs: 400 % team turnover, a toxic manager, and a "rescue PM" married to the sponsor

Independent audit slide‑deck gold: zero items "ready for go‑live," chaotic configs, no data owner

Accenture steps in (another $10.9 M) while employees still depend on the 1980s mainframe

 

5 Brutal Lessons You Can Use Tomorrow

1) Write it down or write a check – fuzzy requirements = infinite rework.

2) Freeze configs, then test – moving targets make every cycle worthless.

3) Own the data – bad source data means bad payroll, period.

4) Toxic leadership kills progress – harassment & turnover wipe out continuity.

5) Audit early, not post‑mortem – an external sanity check at first failure could have saved millions.

 

You Might Be in Trouble If …

Your payroll test run is half wrong but the go‑live date stays.

A core requirement (e.g., labor‑cost distribution) is "coming later"—after all testing.

Status decks stay green while teammates are crying in their cars.

The new "fix‑it" PM just happens to be married to the exec in charge.

Nobody can explain entrance‑/exit‑criteria, yet QA keeps restarting.

Ad‑hoc reports only work if you strip every security role.

Steering committee = five‑minute victory lap + fifty‑five minutes of blame ping‑pong.

Backup plan is still "keep the COBOL mainframe running indefinitely."

 

If any of those hit home, open your RAID log—now—before your $15 M idea turns into headline fuel.

 

Why listen?

Rolling out HRIS, ERP, or Workday? Spot the landmines first.

Tired of sanitized "success stories"? We tell it like it is—with a dash of salt.

Exec or sponsor? See how weak governance detonates budgets—and morale.

 

👉 Subscribe for more Lessons Not Learned, salty PM rants, and practical tips.

💡 Grab our free RAID Log template & on‑demand training at https://PMHappyHour.com

 

Sources & References

Maine Legislature. Government Oversight Committee Report on Workday Implementation (2021).

Maine Legislature. IJA Strategies Independent Assessment (2020).

Portland Press Herald. "System failure: Inside Maine's $35 M HR software meltdown" (Jun 20 2021).

Sun Journal. "Maine hires new contractor to complete long‑delayed software upgrade" (Jun 7 2022).

The Register. "Maine threatens to terminate Workday contract over delays" (Mar 31 2021).

The Register. "No accountability for Workday's HR system failure, officials claim" (Apr 14 2021).

Views are the hosts' own. Brand names belong to their respective owners.

#ProjectManagement #LessonsNotLearned #Workday #ProjectFailure #PMHappyHour

 

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Our D&D-style project role play was such a hit, we did it again - in a different universe. One far, far away…

This time, it's Kim's first day as a project manager working on a secret government project for the Empire. As he shows up, he finds that his predecessor… well, let's just say he didn't get-on well with his exec sponsor.

Kim's new project is behind schedule, roadblocked with supply chain issues and is out of funding. Can he get the "RTDU" project back on track by the end of the day, or will he have to give an awkward project update to his black-cloaked project sponsor? You can bet Game Master Kate has some fun in store!

And… you can get the mug! For a limited time, you can go to https://pmhappyhour.com/merch and get a commemorative PM Happy Hour mug with an image of the "RTDU" in use!

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Ever had a moment where you saw a problem in the world and thought, "Someone should fix that"? What if that someone was you? Mick Ebeling, founder of Not Impossible Labs, joins us to share how he turned a bold promise into world-changing innovation. From helping a paralyzed graffiti artist create art again to launching life-changing tech solutions, Mick's story is a masterclass in fearless problem-solving. In this episode, we dive into what it takes to commit to the impossible, build the right team, and use project management superpowers to change lives. If you've ever doubted your ability to make an impact, this conversation will prove otherwise.

Cheers to embracing audacity—tune in now! 🍻🎧

 

About our amazing guest, Mick Ebeling:

Named Fortune's Top 50 World's Greatest Leaders and honored with the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian of the Year Award, Mick Ebeling is a groundbreaking innovator dedicated to changing the world through innovation and story.  As the Founder of Not Impossible Labs – an innovation incubator disrupting the status quo and tackling seemingly impossible problems – Mick has spent over a decade driving a movement of positive impact for the sake of humanity. 

Through his "Help One. Help Many" approach, Mick and his team have created some of the most internationally celebrated inventions, including The Eyewriter, Project Daniel, and Don's Voice, as well as their most recent spin-off companies, Bento (formerly Hunger: Not Impossible) and Music: Not Impossible. His work has been recognized as a 3x recipient of TIME's Best Inventions and Fast Company's World Changing Ideas.

Mick continues to inspire, empower, and teach individuals, organizations, and communities to take bold action, so they too can make the impossible, NOT impossible.

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We cannot believe it! It's been 100 episodes of PM Happy Hour! 

In this very special episode, we have a retrospective, looking back at when we first decided to do this crazy podcast, to our highlights, lessons, and favorite episodes. 

We are so filled with gratitude for our amazing community who have supported us these 100 episodes, and the many incredible leaders who have joined us as guests over the years. 

Note: we recorded this episode as a Linkedin livestream. If you want to watch the video version, it should be out there on Linkedin! 

Cheers!

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If you are looking for a PM job or considering doing so, you are definitely not alone! The project management field has always had a good amount of mobility, but it sure seems like change has been accelerating the last couple years. 

And if you are in the hunt for a job right now, it can feel like the market is harder than ever!  

So what do you do? Focus on getting more certs? Get a recruiter? Submit 500 more applications through Linkedin? 

To help understand how to land a great PM job in today's job market, we talk with Kayla Quijas, practicing project manager and professional Project Manager career coach. Kayla helps her clients develop their profiles and land fantastic PM jobs. Kayla gives us the low-down on today's PM job market, and shares her own "Iron Triangle" of things to focus on to land that great job. 

About our amazing guest, Kayla Quijas

After five years as a cake decorator and feeling stuck in a dead-end job, Kayla Quijas made a bold move: she quit after being asked to return to work after a grueling 12-hour shift. 

Determined to break into the corporate world, she started as a receptionist at a law firm and rapidly climbed the corporate ladder. Now, Kayla is a senior project manager at a global law firm, overseeing one of its largest accounts. 

Realizing the invaluable role her coaches played in her journey to success, she found her true purpose: inspiring others to escape dead-end jobs and pursue fulfilling careers. Now, as a certified Senior Career Coach, Kayla empowers individuals to make intentional career transitions.

You can connect with Kayla and get help with your PM career via the links below: 

 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kayla-quijas/

Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thepmcareercoach

Website: Kayla Quijas Career Coaching | Project Management Career Coach (kaylaqcareercoaching.com)

As a professional in today's working environment, you are constantly bombarded by things that demand your attention, your action, the very limited moments in your finite life. (wow, heavy).

OK, so there are infinite demands on our time, but finite time. How do we balance those? SWOT analysis?! Of course not!

To help us understand how to effectively prioritize in today's crazy world,  Kate and Kim are joined by James Louttit, author of Leading Impactful teams. We talk about prickly pears, paw-paws, and practical ways to prioritize in today's demanding world. Spoiler: It's not SWOT, MoSCoW or the Eisenhower matrix ;-) 

About our amazing guest, James Louttit

James Louttit knows what it's like to have to deliver complex projects under pressure, and what it costs when we get it wrong. In 2016 he ended up in hospital because he was trying to run his projects with effort rather than IMPACT. That story, which forms the introduction to his book "Leading Impactful Teams", inspired him to figure out how to deliver projects better. He learned everything he could around the subject, from the PMP and Agile worlds that we all know and love, to Design Thinking, Facilitation Techniques, Psychology and Human Nature and everything that might be useful to people delivering projects. His career took off. He became the Head of Project management Competency at a large Bank and then Chief Information Officer of a major PLC in Ireland.

What he learned, and put into practice made a huge difference to the effectiveness and stress levels in his teams. People kept asking him for help, so he found an artist and started drawing cartoons to explain the concepts in more human, memorable and fun ways. He wrote "Leading Impactful Teams" to help anyone who is managing any type of work or project that involves real, imperfect people in real, imperfect organizations. 

Now he works with the biggest companies in Ireland to help their teams cut through the noise, and build a toolbox of practical techniques and approaches that reduce stress, improve outcomes and help people face the challenges of project delivery with confidence and positivity.

You can connect with James and check out all his amazing content and the knowledge he shares at the links below: 

James' book Leading Impactful teams: 

https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/B0DN7GP2XB?source_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdpv 

And on Amazon:  https://a.co/d/9rFmDwt 

James Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-louttit/ 

His website:  https://www.impactfulpm.com/ 

The Brilliant Beaver Guidebook - https://a.co/d/hM4gfz7 

The Brilliant Beaver Audiobook (😊) - https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/The-Brilliant-Beaver-Guidebook-Audiobook/B0DKZ7G93J?source_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdp 

 

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AUDIO QUALITY NOTICE!  Apologies, we have a little static on one of the mics during our recording - sorry for the occasional audio issue. 

As a project manager, an organizational structure that will have a big impact on your life is the PMO. But if you aren't used to working with a PMO, what should you expect? Are they going to make your life and projects easier, or crush you with red tape? If you are interviewing for a job where they have a PMO, what questions should you ask to get a better understanding of how they work? And, what should you expect from a PMO - and what are they expecting from you? 

With all these questions, we thought we should reach out to a couple of the most well known minds in PMO: Lindsay Scott and Eileen Roden. Their UK based "House of PMO" organization does some great things in the PMO space (plus they are a lot of fun!) so we feel very fortunate that Linsay and Eileen agreed to join us and help us understand a bit more about whether PMO's are our friends or foes. 

 

About our amazing guests, Lindsay Scott and Eileen Roden

Lindsay has worked in and around project management and PMO for over 20 years and is a Director at PMO Learning, a training company focused on PMO.  She is Co-Founder of the House of PMO, a professional membership organisation for PMO practitioners.

Lindsay is the co-author of the PMO Competency Framework and editor of the Handbook of People in Project Management. She speaks regularly on project management and PMO career topics – and provides 1-2-1 coaching for those looking to advance their careers in PMO.

Eileen has 15 years practitioner experience in a variety of project management roles (predominantly PMO management) along with IT and functional HR roles, with a variety of UK, EMEA and global responsibilities. 

Her practical experience is supported by both academic and professional certifications including a Masters in Applied Project Management (with distinction), AIPMO-E, PRINCE2®, MSP®, MoP®, Managing Benefits®, Better Business Cases®, Programme and Project Sponsorship®.  She is now a Consulting Director of PMO Learning and co-founder of the House of PMO.

She is the author of P3O® Best Management Practice and lead author of the PMO Competency Framework, co-author of Knowledge Management in a Project Environment, along with contribution to many APM publications.  She is a frequent conference speaker throughout UK and Europe.

You can learn more about all the amazing things that Lindsay and Eileen are doing around PMO and even join their great community at https://houseofpmo.com/ 

 

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In this episode, Kat and Kim talk to Erik Rueter about design thinking in our projects. 

What's design thinking, you may be thinking? Design thinking is a methodology that focuses on the end users of a system when we are problem solving. Erik will share 5 different design thinking methods for understanding user needs in a way that not only helps your project provide better deliverables but can also help build a better project team.

 

About our amazing guest, Erik Rueter

Erik K. Rueter, PMP, PMI-ACP, has over 20 years of experience in diverse industries, including tech startups, academia, healthcare, and entertainment. Currently, he serves as a senior project manager at the American Marketing Association and has held multiple senior staff positions at various organizations. Erik holds a BA in neuroscience from Wesleyan University, with further education in digital design, Irish studies, and MicroMasters in Design Thinking and Project Management from the Rochester Institute of Technology. He is also certified in diversity and inclusion by Cornell.

Erik's contributions to the field include co-authoring papers on health inequity, lecturing at Boston and Emerson Colleges, and advocating for diversity and inclusion with organizations like Medtronic, VSP, and the San Antonio Spurs. He has spoken, in person and virtually, at PMI Greece, PMI Michiana, and PMI Western Michigan, among others. He has appeared on podcasts such as "Confessions of a Higher Education CMO"; and "I Wanna Work There!" and contributed to "The Evolution of the PMO", a key resource for project managers. He founded Human-Centered Success LLC to promote inclusive leadership which is National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce certified as an LGBTQIA+-owned business.

Residing outside Pittsburgh with his husband and two dachshunds, Erik enjoys marathons, gaming, and sharing his insights. Contact: erik@humancenteredsuccess.com.

To learn more about the amazing things Erik is up to: 

Check out his website at: www.humancenteredsuccess.com

Learn about solution delivery: Mastering Solution Delivery

Erik's Upcoming Speaking Engagement:

PMI Global Summit 2024

Rock Lobster Leadership: Lessons from The B-52s

Resilience and Relatability: A New Paradigm for Project Leadership (With Jake McGaffin and Olivia Montgomery)

 

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Although an essential part of our project-driven world, most project leaders didn't set out to be one. For many of us, our first steps into project leadership won't come with an official title. So, if we are not 'officially' project managers, how are we supposed to lead the project? 

There are a lot of answers to this question, but one approach all project leaders need to master is the art of managing with informal authority. Without being people's 'boss,' we need to pull a team of seemingly random people, give them common purpose, build a team and help them successfully deliver a project. 

But, seriously, what really is 'informal authority?' What's involved and how can I master this mystical art? To help us understand this superpower, we are joined on this episode by Kory Kogon, author of the book, "Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager." Kory takes us through the 5 pillars of informal authority which include: 

1. Demonstrate respect

2. Listen first

3. Clarify expectations

4. Extend trust

5. Practice accountability

About our amazing guest, Kory Kogon

Kory is FranklinCovey's Vice President, Content Development, and a Senior Leadership Consultant. She is a co-author of the #4 Wall Street Journal bestseller, The 5 Choices: The Path to Extraordinary Productivity, in addition to Project Management Essentials for the Unofficial Project Manager, and Presentation Advantage. Kory

has been featured on Inc.com and in its Productivity Playbook online series, on Fast Company.com, Forbes.com, and in Investor's Business Daily. She has also appeared on NBC's TODAY with Hoda Kotb.

Kory has over 25 years of business expertise from frontline positions to serving as an executive team member for a global franchise organization. This provides her a unique perspective on the application of FranklinCovey's world-renowned content within organizations. Kory not only understands the strategy

and principles necessary to build great leaders, systems, and winning cultures, but she understands how FranklinCovey's blended learning offerings deliver practical solutions that enable the behavior changes required for transformational results in organizations with both formal and informal leaders.

To learn more about the amazing things Kory is doing and to get her great book:

• Book: Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager | FranklinCovey

• Learn about the Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager Course: Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager™ | FranklinCovey

• About Kory Kogon: FranklinCovey Speaker: Kory Kogon | FranklinCovey

• Connect to Kory Kogon on linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kory-kogon

 

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For the first time, Kate and Kim find an Agilist brave enough to join them on the podcast to talk about some really hard questions about working Agile vs Waterfall. Let's get it on!

We ask the questions that PM's want to ask - frustrated, annoyed PM's who are told to work "agile" by people who maybe don't even understand Agile - or Waterfall, for that matter.

In this refreshingly honest talk about the reality of ways of working, Kate, Kim and their guest Agilist, David Asch, talk in real-world terms about Agile, Predictive and the reality in-between.

About our amazing (and brave) guest, David Asch

David Asch has a 36-year career in startup and mid-stage commercial software companies. He's worked in various industries, including transportation, supply chain, retail analytics, scientific marketing, blockchain, and secure communications. From his experience with the challenges and successes of delivering software over a long career, David founded 10xPrinciples, a management/organizational consulting company, to help technology companies navigate the transition from startup to mid-stage. 

During a time of rapid growth and change, teams typically find that the "wearing many hats" culture from their startup days is no longer the best approach to honoring commitments. David helps these companies weave Agile practices into the fabric of their cultures. David's recognized expertise in companywide Agile-driven management makes him invaluable to clients who need to implement Agile principles and methodologies into their unique business environments.

Get David's book, The Agile Enterprise: Applying Agile Principles to Drive Organizational Success, on Amazon here: https://www.amazon.com/Agile-Enterprise-Applying-Principles-Organizational/dp/1637425473/ 

Connect to him on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidasch1/ 

And check out his website: https://10xPrinciples.com 

 

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Project Management is weird. You can have the same job title and be a very tactical execution-minded project manager - which is the way most of us start. Or you can be a strategic part of the leadership team, recognized for your ability to help executives make their vision a reality. 

So, how do you develop yourself from tactical implementer to strategic partner? 

This episode we are joined by two experienced leaders, Ralph Kliem and Gregg Richie, who have made this transition, and rose to provide pivotal strategic partnership roles with executive teams to help them develop Disaster Recovery capabilities. In fact, they wrote the book on it: Business Continuity Planning: A Project Management Approach. Ralph and Gregg will talk us through how to step beyond the mindset of a tactical project manager and engage with our leadership teams as a strategic partner.

About our amazing guests, Ralph Kliem and Gregg Richie

Ralph Kliem, M.A.,PMP, CBCP, is the author or co-author of twenty books, including the Management Lessons of the Great Explorers; Political Risk Management and the Global Supply Chain; Business Continuity Planning; and Leading High Performance Projects. He has also published in the Project Management Journal and PM Network. 

He managed numerous business continuity projects and programs for major airplane programs at The Boeing Company as well as financial, operational auditing, and information systems projects. He is now retired after over 40 years in the private and public sectors. 

Gregg D. Richie, has over 40 years of experience in project management.  His education includes a MBA with a specialization in Project Management from Indiana Wesleyan University, a BS in Workforce Education and Development from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and a Master's Certificate in Applied Project Management from Villanova University.

He has managed, participated in, or consulted on more than 1200 projects in his career, and  He authored three books on Microsoft Project.  As a retired member of the US Navy SEABEES, he uses real-world experiences in teaching project management concepts.

You can follow or connect with Gregg at: 

 @GreggDRichie

https://www.linkedin.com/in/greggrichie/

 

You can find their book on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Business-Continuity-Planning-Management-Approach/dp/1482251787/ 

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Meetings. Love them or hate them, they are core to what we do as project leaders. We need to pull people together (real or virtually) to discuss, plan, check-in, and get things done. But as we know, when we get people together, sometimes their misbehaviors - "goblins" - tag along, too!

Being able to manage effective meetings can make or break us as PMs. And learning how to manage these misbehaviors in meetings can make or break each meeting. Fortunately, we have help! This episode we are joined by Rich Maltzman of Boston University. Rich and his colleague Jim Steward wrote the book, "Great Meetings Build Great Teams: A Guide for Project Leaders and Agilists." In this book, Rich and Jim write about these "meeting goblins" - how to identify them, and how to respond effectively to keep your meeting on track. 

Join us and learn how to tame the meeting goblins! 

You can find Rich's book on Amazon here: https://www.amazon.com/Great-Meetings-Build-Teams-Agilists/dp/1637424752/

And check out the website here: http://projectmeetings.us

You can connect directly with Rich and his co-author, Jim on linked in here: 

Rich: https://www.linkedin.com/in/exclaim/

Jim: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimstewartpmp/

 

And if you would like to study project management with Rich at Boston University, you can read about their globally respected program here: https://www.bu.edu/met/programs/project-management/

 

About our amazing guest, Rich Maltzman

Rich considers himself a 'pracademic' – and is now Master Lecturer at Boston University, an author, and a consultant, providing clients with a deep learning experience and improved results. He had a 40-year career in telecom, mainly in engineering and project management.  At the University level, his focus is always on converting weaknesses into strengths while teaching clients/students how to apply learned skills to everyday situations. 

Rich co-founded EarthPM, LLC, a company devoted to integrating sustainability thinking into project management. His integration of a holistic, global view of project management has resulted in international consulting and speaking engagements in which the focus is the long-term success of projects, with an eye towards ecological and social systems. His blog at the projectmanagement.com site has become very popular.

A co-author of seven books on project leadership, Rich is a former VP of Professional Development for PMI Mass Bay (the Boston area PMI Chapter), and was on the Review Committee for the 7th Edition PMBOK® Guide, helping to assure that sustainability thinking finally made it into the Standard and the Body of Knowledge.

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"What percent done are you?" 

Status reporting is a core skill (and responsibility) of project managers. It is an opportunity for you to check in with your team, and to build rapport and engagement with stakeholders. But it's also something we often take for granted. 

In this episode, Kate and Kim talk about how to approach status reporting whether your project is big or small, and how to leverage this key communication point to help with overall project success.  

• Why Status Reporting? 

• Essential for communicating project progress and challenges

• Builds trust with stakeholders by demonstrating progress

• Tailoring Status Reports

• Reports should be adapted to audience needs

• Understanding the audience (executives, team members, stakeholders) is crucial!

• Components of an Effective Status Report

• Executive Summary: A clear, concise overview

• Accomplishments: Completed tasks or milestones

• Upcoming Tasks: Planned activities or next steps

• Risks and Issues: Key challenges and potential problems

• Go-to-Green Plan: Strategy for addressing significant off-track areas

• RAG Status: Red, Amber, Green indicators for project health

• Budget Status: Financial overview (where applicable)

• Timeline Overview: High-level graphical representation of key events

• Approaches to Percent Complete

• Debate on the utility and accuracy of percent-complete metrics

• Preference for tying status to key milestones over percent completion

• Status Report Frequency and Medium

• Weekly status meetings with teams

• Different report cadences for different audience levels (e.g., executive status monthly)

• Possible mediums: Email, PowerPoint, Slack, or other communication tools

• Challenges in Status Reporting

• Ensuring stakeholder engagement and consumption of reports

• Potential pushback on RAG status, especially when reporting red or amber

• Importance of team input and alignment on report content

• Additional Recommendations

• Focus on highlighting value and progress in reports

• Importance of clear, effective communication in status reports

• Using status reports for accountability and project alignment

 

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Being a project manager is tough. You are assigned a team of people who may never have with each other (or you) before, and you need to lead them to accomplish a task, solve a problem, or create a new deliverable. And by definition, this is a unique task - so it hasn't been done before, at least not in this way, for these stakeholders. 

In among these challenges is perhaps the toughest one: you have to lead this group of people. As project managers, these people almost never report to us - someone else is their boss. So, how do we provide leadership and direction to a group of people when you are not their boss? How do you tell them what to do? 

Sure, we could talk about servant leadership and how a PM is a facilitator, who should be working to enable, motivate and coach the team. But in the real world, you need to get these people to get stuff done, or you are all going to fail. 

In today's episode, Kate and Kim talk about this conundrum, and offer advice based on their real-world challenges trying to get people to do things - who don't report to them. 

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It can be hard getting a project started correctly: getting the right executive and stakeholder sponsorship and support, getting them all to agree on the scope and approach, getting funding, approvals, and all the other things required to get a project off the ground.

You negotiate with other departments and get committed resource assignments and timelines. You finally get your amazing project off the ground, you're humming along then, BOOM! The organization changes. 

Your stakeholders change. Your executive sponsors change. The structure or ownership of the organization changes. Your resources are all moved to different teams. 

And you're caught-out like a PM with a flip-phone at an iphone convention. 

What now? What do you do? How do you re-align your project and ensure its success in the new (or ever changing) organizational environment? This is the problem that Kate and Kim are painfully familiar with, and tackle on this episode. 

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Projects are hard. And a lot of them - maybe most of them - fail to live up to their expectations. Missed timelines, quality issues, budget overages, customer dissatisfaction - it seems sometimes like projects miss the mark more often than they hit it. But why is that? What can we learn from all those past projects that can help us make future projects more successful? 

This is the question Jim Johnson set out to understand. In his years with the Standish Group, he and his team set the benchmark for one of the most respected analysis on project outcomes: the CHAOS Report. Join us in this short chat with Jim, as he tells us about the CHAOS report and some of his most important findings over the years. And maybe like Kate and I, you can also learn some important lessons from all those past project challenges.

About our esteemed guest, Jim Johnson
Jim Johnson is the retired founder and past chairman of the Standish Group, a globally respected source of independent primary research and analysis of IT project performance. He is best known for his research on why projects fail, as well as on system costs and availability. He is also a pioneer of modern research techniques such as virtual focus groups and case-based analytical technology.

Get your copy of the CHAOS report here: 

https://standishgroup.myshopify.com/ 

 

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Creative decision making is key to what we do in all our projects. According to FourSight, there are 4 distinct voices in the decision making process. Do you have these voices in the room when you make decisions? Do you know when you need all 4 voices - or only a couple specific ones? 

We are joined today by Teresa Lawrence who gave one of the most fun and engaging talks at this past year's PMI Global Summit in Las Vegas. She talks us through the FourSight approach to creative problem solving, the 4 voices in decision making, and also reveals the results of Kim and Kate's FourSight assessment on the air! 

Best of all, you can do this too! Check out our page at https://pmhappyhour.com/foursight and sign up to get your own FourSight assessment and join Kim, Kate, Teresa and your fellow Happy Hour fans as we get our results and learn how we can better approach creative problem solving ourselves and with our teams. 

About our amazing guest, Teresa Lawrence, PhD, PMP, CSM
Teresa Lawrence is an influencer and SME on the integration of creativity and Creative Problem Solving (CPS) into Project Management. Since 2017, she has facilitated, trained and consulted to over 85K people since 2017. Investing years of experience in you.  She was a 2019 Small Business Administration Home-based Business of the Year. A cognitive diversity trainer, she joins us today from Florida.

Find out more about the Teresa's work and FourSight

• You can read more about Teresa's work and even engage her to help facilitate your team here: http://internationaldeliverables.com/ 
• You can read about the FourSight assessment here: https://www.foursightonline.com/ 

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"I know the world is ending, but do you have wifi here?"

Sounds funny, but it's deadly serious. Natural disasters impact critical infrastructure that we depend on every day: shelter, fresh water, food distribution, and power. These are the ones we think about. 

But what about communication? 

How do relief agencies, police, fire, and government coordinate a disaster response when there is no power, no cell signal, no wifi? How do community members communicate with each other, find out where to get aid, or reach out to loved ones who are worrying about them if there is no functioning communication infrastructure - or even a place to charge your phone? 

Enter the ITDRC! The Information Technology Disaster Resource Center is a non-profit organization that sends teams and equipment to disaster areas to provide communication and technology services. The PM's involved are truly project management heroes, and we get to hear from one of them today, Charis Mayhorn.  

About our amazing guest, Charis Mayhorn

Charis Mayhorn is a Network Architect.  In her day job, she designs IP networks, advises leadership and boards on infrastructure best practices, and guides cross-team collaboration.  In her free time, she volunteers with ITDRC.

Find out more about the ITDRC here:

• Volunteer and read more about the ITDRC on their website, https://itdrc.org/ 

• Check out this video of a 2 day ride along during Hurricane Ian response: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgbzRiqHnvE  

• Read about the ITDRC's other activities at https://medium.com/@ITDRC 

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Decisions make or break your project - starting with the decision of whether or not to even do your project. Beyond that, we have planned decisions / phase gates and ad-hoc decisions that happen throughout the entire life of our project. And if you've been around long enough, you know that one bad decision can sink your whole project - or at least have it taking on water, fast. 

So, how should we approach decision making in a logical way which helps ensure that:

1. The right decisions get made

2. Decisions get made by the right people

3. Decisions are not revisited any more than they absolutely have to

To help answer these questions, this episode we are joined by Project Management mentor, consultant and YouTube PM star Kandis Porter! If you don't know Kandis, you must check out her extensive youtube channel covering a lot of great Project Management topics. 

In today's episode, Kandis will help us understand: 

• Why should we care so much about project decisions? 

• How should you approach decision making? 

• Kandis shares her "D.I.D.I." framework for decision making

• How do you ensure your decisions stick? 

• What are some "worst practices" for decision making that we should avoid

And along the way, we may throw in some horror stories about bad decision making that we can hopefully learn from

About our amazing guest, Kandis Porter

Kandis Porter is the Founder and Managing Director of Effective Flow Connections (EFC), a management consulting company that helps transform organizations through project management, process improvement, change management, facilitation of key meetings, and training. Kandis also works one-on-one with clients, focusing on Leadership development and growth. EFC enables organizations to do what they do, even better! 

Kandis Porter has more than 18 years of experience managing people and large projects in both the government and private sectors. She has supported clients in various industries, to include the Department of Defense, Federal Aviation Administration, utilities, medical device, health care, non-profit, and learning & development. 

Kandis has a Master of Science Degree in Project Management (MSPM) from The George Washington University and Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Human Resources. In addition, she is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP), PMP Exam Prep Course Instructor through Project Management Institute, Prosci Change Manager, and Six Sigma Green Belt. She is also certified as a Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) Practitioner, Thomas-Kilmann Instrument (TKI) Practitioner, and is a Wiley DiSC Workshop facilitator. 

Before joining the consulting industry, Kandis proudly spent more than seven years on Active Duty in the United States Air Force and is passionate about giving back to veterans and their families. 

Check out some of Kandis' amazing content here:

YouTube: Kandis Porter - YouTube

Website: Kandis Porter - effectiveflowconnections.com

Kandis also has a book being released in early 2023 called 'Good Decisions Equal Success'; coauthored with good friend and CEO, Damon Lembi

 

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