The 2021 budget is ready for approval by the Board - in record time this year. Compiling a budget for the PMI Phoenix chapter is a complex process because it requires the Board to look into the future and come up with specific plans for providing members of the chapter with the services and support, they are looking for. As you might guess, there are a lot of moving parts to the process and all the VPs must be in alignment on our strategy. That alignment is reflected in the specifics of our proposed budget the 2021. Normally the process takes us into January to complete. But this year we are considerably ahead of schedule thanks to the leadership and skill of the Finance liaisons to the VPs on the Board. Specifically, they are, Andy Aiyer and Mohit Goel. Dave Casebere shared that “they have done a great job”.and the board executives (the stakeholders) echo that this project was successful.
Director of Credential Study Groups
“It’s been a tremendous privilege and honor to have made such a positive difference in so many people’s personal lives. The past six plus years were the most rewarding years of my life.”
Ken Roundtree has supported more than 200 PMP/CAPMs, by contributing more than 2000 volunteer hours. The Phoenix PMI Chapter owes a huge debt of gratitude and heartfelt thanks for his gift of time. Students remember his tone of voice and often claim to have heard Ken’s voice in their head while taking the certification exam. Perhaps it was his radio DJ background, or his magnanimous personality. He will be remembered for his humorous style of learning, and RAPs to trigger a lapse in memory.
Behind every great leader is a team. In person sessions enjoyed Mama Roundtree’s delicious baked goods. His facilitator group wrote white paper to educate and capture the learnings and they established a learning website, http://www.dokboard.org to celebrate success.
When COVID-19 struck, the chapter asked Ken to be flexible and to create a new delivery method so the study group learning could continue. Ken Roundtree rose to the challenge and the virtual study group was born by leveraging his experience as a Google trainer for the State of Arizona.
It might be the end of his journey as a lead study group facilitator, but the legacy lives on in perpetuity. The mighty volunteer facilitators group that is made up of prior students, paying it forward will continue to support future PMPs.
Letter from the President
It’s December and the Holiday Season is upon us. Many started early with decorating and putting up trees to get into the spirit of the season.
The Board of Directors and I would like to take a moment to wish you all the best through this holiday season and to give special thanks to all our volunteers that helped us maintain the course through a difficult 2020.
This year was challenging in many ways. Many of us had to adapt to working in new ways. Whether you were new to working remotely or had to adapt to everyone else working remotely. New skills were learned and shared.
I hope you had the chance to join one of the many webinars the chapter offered this year. The chapter was able to quickly pivot to virtual events and by December 31st, 2020 will have offered 131 events this year. I am proud of the volunteers in the chapter that made this possible.
We are going to continue the trend into the new year. The board met in October to begin our strategic planning for 2021. Below are some of our objectives for 2021:
- Creation of a student chapter
- Establish a Communities of Practice
- Establish a Formal Mentorship Program
- Organize 2 Community Charity Events
This will be the 42nd year for the chapter and we will continue to bring you relevant training and events to enhance your Project Management and Career skills as well. All of our initiatives for 2021 are derived from the feedback from you, our members. Please continue to provide that feedback. I would like to like to thank the board and all our volunteers for their hard work this year.
Shane Cretacci, PMP
President
PMI Phoenix Chapter
Members,
The PMI Phoenix Chapter Board has started planning for next year. To that end, we are soliciting your feedback in the annual all-member survey. We will run this survey until November 15th to solicit your feedback on the chapter and use that to assist us in planning for next year. You can take the survey here.
The board will be in attendance at the virtual Chapter All Member Meeting on November 18. We will review the progress on our goals for this year and review our plan for next year. I hope you will be able to attend. We have an excellent presentation scheduled for that evening from our Guest Speak J. Scott, the CEO of 120VC, and his presentation on “Servant Leadership that Get’s Sh*t Done”. Please register here to attend.
November is Project Management Month! We have a full calendar this month. I hope you can join us for one of the many events we have planned.
- We have partnered with Agile Arizona this year and members will receive a discount on registration. Login to the website and check out our discounts page here.
- International Project Management Day is November 5th and IIL has a full day event planned that is also available on demand. You can register for it here.
- We have partnered with IIBA for an event on 11/10 for “Effective Visual Presentation Skills” by Tom Otstot.
- Our Wednesday Webinar series will continue on 11/11 with Drew Middelton and Kornelia Homewood from Kolme Group and their presentation “Project Managers need to be Change Managers”.
- Our Breakfast Meeting is on Nov 20th due to the holiday. Our guest speaker is Balinda Strosnider and her topic is “How Train Difficult Stakeholders Like You Would Train a Bird of prey”.
I hope everyone is able to take time and spend it with family going into the holiday season. This has been a difficult year and I know for some it has been extremely difficult. The chapter is giving back to the community with our food drive for St. Mary’s Food Bank. If you can please contribute.
It’s October and the temperatures are finally starting to fall. This is typically one of my favorite months of the year. I look forward to spending more time outside and enjoying the weather that everyone to the north of us will envy come winter.
What’s happening this month.
- We have two webinars planned on October 7th and 14th. Please check the chapter calendar and reserve your spot. These webinars are free to members and are worth 1 PDU each.
- Our last study group of the year is underway and is full of approximately 45 aspiring PMP/CAPM applicants.
- We have two ProjectMasters Toastmasters meetings that happen every other Tuesday.
- We also have a partner event with IIBA on Oct. 13th on “Cybersecurity – Who needs it?”
- PMI has a Virtual Experience Event planned for October 20th.
- We have a Breakfast Meeting with speaker Barbara Chatzkel on “Managing Remote Teams” on October 30th.
What’s coming up.
We are busy planning for November which is Project Management Month. Typically, we do a week, but we have so many great events packed into November we decided to expand it. We have partnered with Arizona Agile for their conference and training sessions on November 3 – 13. We also have an all-member meeting planned for November 18th with a special guest speaker J. Scott, CEO of 120 VC on “Servant Leadership that Get’s Sh*t Done”.
The chapter is also busy planning for next year. We have an all-member survey that will go out on October 15. Please take the time to complete it and provide us feedback on what you would like to see the chapter doing next year.
We also are always looking for volunteers. This chapter is run by volunteers and the ability to present programs is based on the number of people we have available to do that. If you have the time and want to give back to the profession and earn some PDU’s then please fill out an application on the chapter website.
A few members have asked about when we will hold in-person meetings. This is being evaluated on a month by month basis by the chapter. We want to get back to the way things were just as bad as you do but we are non-essential and can meet remotely with relative ease and will continue to do so until it is safe and reasonable to meet in person.
Dear Members,
This is my first letter to you in the role of President. It’s a little earlier than expected as I was not due to assume this role until the end of the year. Cory has elected to step out of the role early to focus on some health issues. Cory will move to the role of past president and will still be engaged with the chapter. Cory has been an asset to the chapter for many years and I will continue to rely on her for counsel.
We are continuing to offer remote classes and webinars to the chapter membership. I hope you have been able to take advantage of a few. If not, then you can always view the recordings on the website if you find yourself needing some additional PDU’s or just are looking to brush up on a specific topic.
I have talked to quite a few members over the last few months that didn’t realize they had not renewed their chapter membership. If you had to renew this year your membership may not have auto-renewed. PMI recently upgraded to a new E-Commerce platform and I understand that it is fixed moving forward but you may want to check your membership status at https://my.pmi.org/ to ensure that your membership is current. We have an article on this topic on the website.
We have some great events planned this month.
- PMI’s Virtual Experience series is free to members on September 9th with an opportunity to earn 10.5 PDU’s.
- Ted@PMI has a two-day event planned for 9/25 and 9/26.
- Kim Essendrup with the Kolme Group is presenting a webinar on “How Much Does a PPM Tool Cost?” on September 16th.
- We have our final Study Group for the year starting on September 12th. We have a few seats left open but I expect those to be filled this week.
- We wrap up the month with a special multichapter event with 8 global chapters with a panel book club covering 3 books on Digital Transformation on 9/25.
We also just completed the 2020 Board election. Congratulations to the new and returning board members heading into 2021. Congratulations to the following four newly elected board members:
- Deniese Reinhardt, Vice-President of External Relations
- Joseph Brewer, Vice-President of Technology
- Christopher Gentry, Vice-President of Programs
- Eileen Marin, Vice-President of Virtual Locations
Deniese and Joseph are already serving in their roles. Christopher and Eileen are new to the board and will start their transition this year.
The PMI Phoenix Chapter is an all-volunteer organization dedicated to giving back to the profession and our community. If you have time to offer even a couple of hours a month, please reach out and fill out a volunteer application.
Shane Cretacci
President
PMI Phoenix Chapter