Inspired Project Teams

I’m teaching a free, live video class on eduFire: “Become a Project Management Minimalist!“ on Friday, September 24, 2010. To learn more and to register, click the graphic below.  Hope to see you there!

Can’t attend the class? Then check out the free video series, Free Video Series: Become a Project Management Minimalist.

Some recent feedback from one of my students helped me step back and see the field of project management, and my role as a PM trainer,  in a whole new light. His words were truly inspirational. To share this inspiration, check out my blog post at my other website, Michael Greer’s PM Resources:

• Project Management: “A Technology of Manifestation…”

I’m taking a bit of a holiday from my work on this blog. However, you might be interested in my post from last month’s collection on The Best Free Training. The object of the game:  Learn to meditate and be able to generate your own mini-vacations as needed! It includes info and links to free resources:

Yearly Vacation? Why Not a Daily Vacation? — Learn to Meditate!

URL — http://www.bestfreetraining.net/?p=1999

Enjoy!

July typically means summer vacations and recreation. But how about your project team? Have they had a major inspirational makeover?  Have you been involved in some PM team “re-creation?”  So how’d you do it? You’ve seen my blog posts and heard my podcasts. Now I want to hear from you.

Trade your success stories for a free Coaching Guide!

All this month I’m offering a free IPT Coaching Guide in exchange for your project management and team building success stories. Specifically, I’m looking for answers to these questions:

• What are the most difficult challenges your project team has ever faced and ultimately overcome? How did you overcome these?
• What are your favorite team-building practices… things that you regularly do to keep your team motivated, engaged, and energized? Why do they seem to work so well?
• What’s the most inspiring event (or experience) you have ever been part of that directly led you to become a better project manager? How might this event or experience be applied to other project managers and their teams?

Simply send me an essay (a page or two) that addresses one or more of the questions above. If I decide to publish it here for the inspiration of our readers, I’ll send you a special link to download your free Inspired Project Teams Coaching Guide. The coaching guide includes 30 podcasts (over 5 hours of audio), a 58-page guidebook with hundreds of inspirational Challenges, quotes, ideas, and other great info to help you “re-create” your project team in a more inspired form.

So please… share your wisdom! And help other project managers and their teams stay inspired!

Email your essays to:  greers_pm@yahoo.com

I’m teaching a free, live video class on eduFire: “Become a Project Management Minimalist!“ on Friday,July  23, 2010. To learn more and to register, click the graphic below.  Hope to see you there!

Can’t attend the class? Then check out the free video series, Free Video Series: Become a Project Management Minimalist.

Let’s face it. It’s almost impossible to inspire and motivate people who don’t have the simple skills they need to do their jobs! If your project team isn’t literate in the basics of project management (PM), they are quite likely frustrated and ineffective. So why not train them in PM basics?

This may be the only PM Training your people need! And it's FREE!

Unfortunately, some senior managers believe that PM is so complex that it requires many days of formal training. Paradoxically, the very people who need this basic training are the ones who “don’t have the time” because they are struggling (due to lack of basic PM skills) to keep their projects moving.

So why not break the cycle of PM ineffectiveness and frustration? These 8 free videos (just under 1 hour total!) are designed to help you apply “just enough” project management (PM) to manage your projects effectively — without burdening your team (and you!) with a bunch of unnecessary PM administrivia.

Whether you show these at lunchtime or set them up to run in the break room, they will provide the PM basics in an easy-to-assimilate form. By exposing your team to these videos, you’re likely to raise their PM consciousness, increase their effectiveness, and — just maybe — elevate their sense of professionalism. And that, after all, could be quite inspiring!

P.S. — Did I mention that I teach customized, on site PM classes? So if you decided to “dig deeper” and set aside a couple of days to focus on your team’s PM skills, let me know! (See: About Michael Greer’s Customized, On Site PM Workshops (“First do no harm!”)

Weary of all the negative, nasty, contentious noise and ranting that passes for news or commentary these days, I just published a permanent page on this blog titled:  It’s OK!
(See main menu, just under banner above.)

Please check it out and post your Comments that provide evidence that things are OK in your world! (And, since I intend to maintain this page as a permanent feature linked to the front page, please return to it whenever you get new good news and post it in another Comment.)

Topics discussed on the page include:

• Why, despite the media rants, things are generally OK!
• How optimistic teams are more likely to succeed.
• How your brain is pre-wired to help you collect bad news if you choose to do so.
• Evidence (and links to more evidence) that things are generally OK

The point of all this: To succeed as an individual or as a project team, you need to have an optimistic outlook. And such optimism is a choice. And it is also a habit that can be learned. So this new page is designed to help you begin to develop the habit of finding evidence that: It’s OK! … and to share that evidence with the world.

Again: Please add your Comments at the end of the article and help us all focus on good news!

I’m teaching a free, live video class on eduFire: “Become a Project Management Minimalist!“ on Friday, April 23, 2010. To learn more and to register, click the graphic below.  Hope to see you there!

[UPDATE:  If you missed this class, I’ve scheduled another for July 23. For info about this and all my upcoming free online video classes, go to:
http://edufire.com/search?q=Michael+Greer&commit=Go! ]

As you might have read elsewhere on this blog, I listen to inspirational or motivational podcasts every day when I am exercising. I’ve found that they help my mind/spirit with a quick energy boost in the same way that the exercise boosts my physical energy. In this podcast, I’d like to share a few of the podcasts I find myself returning to again and again.

Read the rest of this entry »

Looking for a little inspiration and motivation for yourself and your project team members? Or maybe you’d simply like to get all the Inspired Project Teams podcasts and Challenges published so far in one big download. Well, have I got a great deal for you!  The Inspired Project Teams Coaching Guide is a collection of 30 podcasts (over 5 hours of audio!), along with a 58-page project team leader’s Guide that contains hundreds of specific Challenges for you and your team.  Hundreds of hot links to online resources (just “click and go!”) are included in the Guide. Check it out!