Craig’s School of Project Management

One of my longest-standing clients refers to the coaching, mentoring and training I provide his team as “Craig’s School of Project Management.” Now that I’ve announced my availability to provide this service more broadly, I thought it would be beneficial to share an outline of the process.

1. Introduction
   • First, we’ll get to know one-another a bit by discussing:
     • How we arrived here:
       • Background
       • PM-related experience
       • Baseline skills
       • Any known deficiencies or gaps which are crucially important to address?
       • Were these deficiencies self-identified, and/or based on feedback?
   • We’ll then discuss near and longer-term goals in the area of PM (whether it be simply to bolster PM skills regardless of role, or if the goal is to make PM one’s profession).
2. Coaching and Mentoring – The following items are considered based on our dialog, and could include, but aren’t necessarily limited to:
   • Discussing key issues impacting a project, team or project organization, and approaches to address each.
   • Providing a second set of eyes to review project artifacts (e.g., presentations, scoping documents, plans, issue and action logs, etc.) to ensure each is comprehensive and serves the intended purpose for all relevant audiences.
   • Shadowing the PM by attending meetings (video, con-calls or in person) to observe the project team and PM.
   • Competency model definition and implementation, determining critical competencies for a PM to succeed in the particular organization / setting, evaluating existing PM(s) against those competencies and then coaching, mentoring and training to help individuals bolster their skills to reach higher levels of competency.
   • Top-down review / assessment of crucial programs to determine any gaps that may need to be addressed and strategies to do so.
   • Recommended readings and other resources that a PM may benefit from, such as…
3. Training – Over the last 2+ decades I’ve evolved a PM training deck (originally delivered to an audience of PMI members), in which I cover:
   • Project Management Orientation
   • Foundational Skills
   • Project Management Framework
     • The Team (People)
     • The Process
     • The Tools
   • Guiding Principles
   • Medical Device Industry-related Project Considerations (when applicable)

Bottom-line: A coaching, mentoring and training engagement will include elements of the above, based on dialog, identified needs and the allotted time. Other items will be considered, if there is something not explicitly listed above, that would benefit the client.

Now that I’ve shared a top-level outline of the process, feel free to reach out if you’d like to learn more, or to book your spot on my calendar!

Next, I’ll begin sharing posts containing valuable insights, resulting from my “scars of experience”, to aid PMs in their quest for successful project outcomes, and more importantly a highly rewarding career: regardless of the role played!

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