4/9 Class

Reflection: For me, Rodney's presentation was good in the sense of "wow, so that's what the corporate world is like". I guess I've been in nonprofits and academia all my working life so I was a little perplexed by Rodney's comment about Chevron. He urged us would be PMs to just focus on the people, nevermind the nasty things that the company does. Elsewise, I think there were some good nuggets about the importance of how project management pervades most of the endeavors of our lives nowadays. Also, I wonder how others felt when the hourly rates were mentioned - I was like... hmmm wow money, but also at what cost? Sigh.

- Ty

Rodney Dunican Background
- ITEC grad (1999)
- Wrote a lot of online learning courses, Instructor Led Training (ILT)
- Different roles: Project Manager, Instructional Designer
- Business of learning is very different from learning itself ($, numbers of learners through a course, training = less lawsuits)
- Ex. of what Rodney has done: "Change Management", year-long Management Immersion, soft/hardware, softskills, sales

PROJECT MANAGEMENT
- Do the things that turn you on.
- "Temporary endeavor undertaken to produce a unique product or outcome".
- Defined set of tasks, timeframe, milestones. Desired results.
- Almost all jobs are project-based.
- Billing project milestones
- Project Managers are in charge (finances, etc.)
- In the business world, its about the learning bottom line.
- Grease (keep things moving), glue (keep things synched), ring leader (time management).
- Scope, time, cost, resources, quality. Leadership + team building
- Project Management Certifications available
- Desired learning results, client goals, communication, internal business needs, development team needs/goals, cost/time/quality
- Risks are potential problems.
- Kim: AGILE Model (throw all the folks together and brainstorm)
- Applying specific parts of past knowledge to problems OR creating something brand new.
- TEAM: ID, SME, Web Designers, Web Developers, Solution Architects (LMS), Clients, Talent, etc.
- Collaboration, shared vocabularies, using people's expertise (to inform and enhance the project)
- 5 Phases: Initiate, Plan, Execute, Monitor, Close

INITIATE
- Sales, solution planning (key stakeholders, needs assessment. Sometimes its not a training issue, but an incentives issues). SOW (Statement of Work- Contract, $60, 80, 100/hr. Average ID: $90. PM: $100+). Contractors - Professional/General Liability, Insurance, Marketing, etc.) Identify the person to do the final sign-off on the project.

PLAN
- Solution design. MS Project: for mapping out the project.

EXECUTE/MONITOR
- Solution development. Task updates, status mtgs, change requests, issues/risk log, milestone sign-off and documentation, QA testing. Alpha+Beta TEsting. Report project to finance. Early changes easy, later changes difficult. Signing off helps to allow for invoicing and project flow.

CLOSE
- Celebrate success

Resources:
- PMBOK - www.pmi.org (Project Mgt Body of Knowledge), certification
- www.4pm.com (Newsletter w/ articles on best Practices)
- "Making It Happen" fictional account of project mgt. 180pp.

Other
- Each team member does PM on their own.
- How does one brag in a good way?