---

---

Well, that date is here. Our book is available. We’re of course hoping that there’s a lot of interest, and to that end we are providing with this “launch” post a couple of links to interviews with us and ‘teasers’ from some well-known sites that just popped up in the past few days.

Elizabeth Harrin, blogger extraordinaire , known for her outstanding blog, A Girl’s Guide to Project Management, has interviewed us and that can be found at this Gantthead posting .

And a great growing company called Green Nurture has an interesting post based on a discussion with us – and that can be found here.  This post focuses on the use of our new word, greenality which we are seeing in increasing general use – which is very satisfying for us to observe.

We’re also beginning to hear from professors at major Universities with interest in the book for their green business courses.  Stay tuned, as we are working directly with them to assure that their courses, just being launched themselves, are a good match for our book and vice-versa.

Now.  We’re wiping off that champagne and setting the ship to “cruise”!

Steven Wright is a tremendous comedian.

You should check out some of his work here.

We also provide some text examples as well:

“Why is the alphabet in that order? Is it because of that song?”
“What’s another word for thesaurus?”
“I bought a house, on a one-way dead-end road; I don’t know how I got there.”
“I wrote a song, but I can’t read music. Every time I hear a new song on the radio I think ‘Hey, maybe I wrote that.
‘”The restaurant’s sign said “Breakfast Anytime.” So I ordered French Toast in the Renaissance.”

And one of our favorites:

• I’ve got some powdered water, but I don’t know what to add to it.

Well, this is s a story about real powdered water.  “Dry water” they’re calling it, and it has the potential to fight climate change, and it may initiate some projects in the pharmaceutical industry that change the way drugs are created.

We aren’t huge fans of games, but this one has a “teachable moment” and a true reward for one lucky winner.

The rules are simple and the prize is flexible.

Let’s start with the prize: it’s a free license to OSP International’s PDU Podcast or the PMP Prepcast – excellent downloadable media products that help you keep your PMP Credential if you already have it, or earn it if you don’t yet have it.  The winner would be saving somewhere between $100 and $200!

Now let’s get to the rules.

As usual, we want each post – even a game – to be educational.  So with this post we expose one of the ideas from our book – the ‘green spectrum’ -  and ask you to comment on this post with a reaction that tells us:

• where you think your current project fits on this spectrum (choose one of the four points below)
• why you think it’s where it is (just a sentence or two)

Here you see a figure from our book, Green Project Management.  You’ll need to read the book for the juicy details.  Here’s a summary: we describe a spectrum of projects – from those that are “Green by Definition”, because the projects themselves have a deliverable related directly to sustainability – such as the turn up of a wind farm – to those projects which may not have any obvious connection to sustainability, like a new software release.  In the text, we describe the PM’s role in each of these four points along the spectrum.

We’re interested to know where you and your project sit on this spectrum.

Respond by answering the two questions above with a comment below, we’ll draw a winner by the end of September.

Continue reading…

In the film Blade Runner (at least the original that I’m familiar with), Rick Deckard, played by Harrison Ford, had a job to do.

From Wikipedia:

The film depicts a dystopian Los Angeles in November 2019 in which genetically engineered organic robots called replicants—visually indistinguishable from adult humans—are manufactured by the all-powerful Tyrell Corporation as well as other mega manufacturers around the world. Their use on Earth is banned, and replicants are exclusively used for dangerous, menial or leisure work on Earth’s off-world colonies. Replicants who defy the ban and return to Earth are hunted down and “retired” by police special operatives known as “blade runners”. The plot focuses on a brutal and cunning group of recently escaped replicants hiding in Los Angeles and the burnt out expert blade runner, Rick Deckard, who reluctantly agrees to take on one more assignment to hunt them down.

As project managers, we’ve also got jobs to do.

Unless we don’t.

Well, thanks to green energy efforts – and in particular, green energy projects, there should be more opportunities for project managers.  Case in point (yes, another ‘blade’ reference) – a recent posting by the energy collective talks about a huge number of green energy jobs coming to Canada, in particular, to Ontario, thanks to huge efforts on solar and wind power projects.

The Ontario government discusses this in detail here in their Green Energy Act in which Ontario has set its intent (and call to arms?) to be the “North American green energy leader”.  Here are the Green Energy Act’s main points:

• Spark growth in clean and renewable sources of energy such as wind, solar, hydro, biomass and biogas in Ontario.
• Create the potential for savings and better managed household energy expenditures through a series of conservation measures.
• Create 50,000 jobs for Ontarians in its first three years.

They want to give Ontario the edge.

The key is the 50,000 jobs.  These are project-focused efforts.  So there will be a lot of work for project teams.  And so, there will be many jobs for project managers.

The reference to Blade Runner is mainly from this story in which Siemens will be building a turbine blade factory in southern Ontario.  The project managers overseeing the manufacture and distribution of the product from these factories are today’s blade runners.

The moral of this story?

It underlines our assertion that project managers should be learning about sustainability, building their green vocabulary, and practicing looking through their “green lenses”. You can do that by keeping up to date with our blog here at EarthPM and of course by buying and reading our book.  It will give you an advantage in the coming years that will (we couldn’t help this, sorry) cut like a knife.

Our site – and our enterprise, EarthPM – is (as we say in our tagline) “at the intersection of green and project management”.

Most of our postings are smack-dab inside that junction, some lean a little towards the environmental side in their focus and some on the project management side.

This one takes a little twist, based on the very name of our company:  EarthPM.

One thing we all have in common is that we manage projects (mainly) on this little rock (Earth).  So what happens if we had to describe our work – our profession – to someone from a different rock?  Not so easy, eh?

Peter Taylor, author of  The Lazy Project Manager, posed this challenge on one of the many LinkedIn discussion groups.  The question was an intriguing one, and it got so many responses, he posted a story on it which we’ll quote from and reference here.

So… what was the challenge?  Here it is:

Describe Project Management to an Alien from Outer Space

We all know the terms of definition for project management but, to get outsiders to understand what we do, how would you simply describe project management to someone who has no idea what it is.

Because of the way that Peter framed the challenge, he got quite a bit of creative thinking in the responses.  So that’s one lesson learned, right there.  One could ask a stakeholder to define what their contribution to the project is, or one could ask them in a more unique way.  Think about that when you need to pose an important question.  Frame it thoughtfully.

So…what did Peter get back when he posed this challenge?  How did people describe project management to aliens?

Here’s my favorite:

‘If they got here, shouldn’t we be asking them the question? No offence to the team from NASA, but we must learn from the market leaders.’

There’s another lesson learned: sometimes the information has to flow in the other direction!

For comedic reasons, here was my answer to Peter’s question:

Project Management is getting a clear understanding of the successful outcomes of a project, collaboratively planning the “who”, “what” , “where”, “when” and “how” of getting to those outcomes, and keeping the “why” in the face of the team (because nothing gets done without people*) executing toward those outcomes.

And, importantly, it’s doing all of those things knowing that – by definition – it’s never been done before, and constantly facing exposure to risk (known unknowns) and uncertainty (unknown unknowns).

*since this is being explained to an Alien from Outer Space, please feel free to substitute words like Zygons, Florx, Nduli, or Pandorian.

Yep, it’s a little too long and weird, but I must say I think it has some redeeming qualities…

The whole article can be read here.  And check out Peter’s book (actually his really nice site) here.

Live long and prosper!  Promise!