2016 Annual Conference Program
DAY 1 – August 26, 2016
Day 1 of the 2016 Annual Conference will consist of 1 Keynote Address, 5 Conference Tracks, 15 Breakout Sessions, Happy Hour and a closing Panel Discussion. Buffet Lunch is included.
Tracks: Business Strategy | Leadership | Technical | Agile | Business Analysis
Track & Speaker Presentation Information
DAY 2 – August 27, 2016
Day 2 of the 2016 Annual Conference will expose participants to an "Open Space" conference experience. What is Open Space? The straight definition of OST is an environment that facilitates open human communication based on passion and responsibility. Open Space Technology is an approach to organizing meetings that has been in existence for over 30 years now. It is a framework that lets a group of people create the event schedule in real time, focusing entirely on what the actual attendees want to hear, share and talk about—the problems they want to solve and the ideas they have to solve them.There will also be a Keynote Speaker, Buffet Lunch, and closing Panel Discussion.
Open Space Meeting Information
Open Space video interview between Jimmy Godard, PMI Portland Chapter President, and Jean Richardson, VP of Professional Development.
2016 Annual Conference Schedule
DAY 1 – August 26, 2016
DAY 2 – August 27, 2016
DAY 1 – Track & Speaker Presentation Information
Keynote Address
Jeff Tobe - Coloring Outside the Lines
This high-energy, participatory, humorous session has received outstanding reviews from diverse PMI groups worldwide. Tobe brings a transformative message on perspective, that will help you consider your internal and external customers' EXPERIENCES: from first contact to “mission accomplished!” Learn to considering every one of your TOUCHPOINTS -- those opportunities you or your people have to affect the customer/stakeholder experience.
Outcomes:
- Spark innovative thinking – in yourself and others
- Shift from a service to an EXPERIENCE culture in PM today
- Learn techniques to effectively manage the change that comes with innovation
Leadership Track
Project Managers must often be change agents and are always leading. Leadership is the ability to articulate a vision and guide or influence others to help achieve that objective. This track will focus on the knowledge, skills and behaviors specific to motivating and guiding others.
Jackie Barretta - Primal Teams: Harnessing the Power of Emotion to Fuel Success
Team emotions naturally influence new team members and attract, or turn away, top talent. Learning how to inspire your team for optimal emotional energy will facilitate higher performance and prepare them for the demands of customers and projects. Unfortunately, the practices of many leaders defy team members’ emotional needs, and disregard the fundamental wiring of their brains. Join me to learn how to build teams that nurture the primal human spirit. Elevate your team’s emotional intelligence, and spark the attractiveness and sharpness that lead to success!
Outcomes:
- New knowledge of holistic leadership
- Strategies for redirecting struggling teams
- Insights into human nature and its part on project success
Kevin McCarthy - Welcome to the Blind Spot Zone - Why Good Project Managers Make Bad Choices
Have you ever said to yourself, “I didn’t see that coming!” Blind spots are those unconscious biases and thinking errors that effect our decision-making abilities. The presenter spent 33 months in a federal prison for a crime he didn’t knowingly commit. Get ready for an interactive and fun program that will keep you engaged throughout.
Outcomes:
- Learn to quickly recognize blind spots and intentionally change behavior
- Unmask hidden biases that creep into every decision-making process
- Learn new tools to mitigate the effects of your blind spots
Kevin Ciccotti - The People-Pleasing Project Manager: Why Nice Guys Make Terrible Project Leaders
A common obstacle for PMs is the paradox between being liked and being effective. Many PMs struggle between the innate desire for belonging, and desire to be the leader who gets things done. Let's explore the most common default behaviors and compensations and delve into the basics of human behavior.
Outcomes:
- Find the balance between being liked and being an effective leader
- Maintain control of your emotions
- Become rock-solid in handling conflict successfully
Matthew Douglass - Kick-off and Post-mortem: How to Craft Bookend Meetings that People Love
Love is a strong word - especially when it comes to something as dreaded as the post-mortem. Learn to utilize best practice tools for providing project framework, from inception to post-project review. So compelling - your teams will not let you close a project without one.
Outcomes:
- Toolkit of templates to kick off early project success
- Strategies to Instill confidence, motivate, and inspire co-workers to be their best
- Ironclad methodologies crafted to improve team cohesiveness and project results
Business Strategy Track
Strategic and Business Management is the ability to connect the dots between your work and larger organizational strategy to drive project outcomes. This track focuses on the knowledge of and expertise in the industry or organization that enhances performance and better delivers business outcomes.
Mike Goss, PMP - How to Align Your Business Strategy with Customers' Expectations
How do you align business strategy with customer expectations? Businesses are often defined in terms of their products and services. However, your customers aren't buying your stuff, they’re buying an outcome. Learn how to define your business the way customers see you. Then, learn how to align strategy, marketing, and your projects to make a bigger impression on present and future customers.
Outcomes:
- View your business through the eyes of your customers
- Align marketing messages to solve customer problems
- Increase sales and profits by developing products and projects to better serve your customers
Line Mørkbak - Cultivate Virtual Collaboration: How to Grow Trust and Engaged Communication in Dispersed Global Teams
Organizations grow flat as they grow globally. Applying tools from agile methodology and intercultural theory will combat the “out of sight, out of mind” mentality in dispersed teams. Remote teams need to acquire new skills to build trust with one another and overcome the perceived distance. Learn how to apply a new mindset to navigate the global complexity in dispersed teams. Experience online facilitation techniques to enhance collaboration from dispersed colleagues.
Outcomes:
- Navigate the global complexity in dispersed teams
- Develop ways to overcome the perceived distance in virtual team communication
- Apply new ideas and tools to personal work context
Jeff Oltmann, PMP - Setting Strategic Direction, or Listening to the Cheshire Cat
Stories are a great source of project management wisdom. We in the project management community have an opportunity to bring strategic clarity to our organizations. Take a lesson from Alice in Wonderland’s Cheshire Cat and learn the pitfalls of ambiguity and how to avoid them.
Outcomes:
- Why strategic planning is important to project managers
- The role of roadmapping
- Four required elements of strategic planning and deployment
Philicia Weaver - Change Management Made Easy
For many people, change management seems more like a fuzzy concept than a business strategy. In this session, we’ll demystify change management—what it actually is and how you can use it to improve project results. Develop practical strategic tools for gaining acceptance on initiatives you’re working on.
Outcomes:
- Discover the 3 biggest mistakes project managers make when initiating a change and how to avoid them
- Learn the five steps that can be taken on any project to increase its acceptance
- Have the opportunity to discuss current challenges and brainstorm solutions
Technical Track
This track focuses on the knowledge, skills and behaviors related to specific domains of project, program and portfolio management or the technical aspects of performing one’s job/role.
Tim Runcie, PMP, MCP, MCTS, P-TSP, MVP - Leverage the Latest Business Intelligence Reporting Tools to Create Powerful Dashboard Analytics
Executives and Program and Portfolio managers all thrive on good analytics to validate the direction, success, and failure of initiatives. That means accessing data for understanding trends is critical. Learn the latest in analytic reporting options and see what Microsoft and other technology companies are doing to put powerful reporting in the hands of any member of the project team.
Outcomes:
- Understand the technology roadmap for software companies and their tools
- Learn what tools are available in the Business Intelligence and Reporting space
- See how easy it is to mine and model any data type
Brad Hermanson, PE, PMP - Practical Project Risk Management: A Proven, Step-By-Step Approach to Incorporate Risk Thinking into your Project Planning
Risk is always present when we deliver projects. It exists before projects are ever authorized, it exists in the plans we make, and it exists throughout the execution of the project. Addressing risk well is critical for delivering projects that successfully meet project objectives.
Outcomes:
- Apply the concepts of project risk management in a practical way.
- Integrate risk thinking into project planning for successful execution.
- Create awareness of project risks using "risk management rules of thumb."
Lorie Gordon - Keeping up with Technology when It's Not in your Job Title: Value and Methods of Staying Current
Technology changes fast in today’s digital landscape and it’s difficult to keep up with company software shared by multiple teams and projects. Processes, HR requirements, and organizational alignment can get in the way of focusing on changes in technology.
Outcomes:
- Gain a fuller understanding of the projects you manage, participate in, or observe
- Understand the role of technology in your projects and teams
- Share methods and tactics to participate, stay relevant, and keep teams engaged
Rebecca Knight - Lean on Lean
We all know Project Management is about navigating the Triple Constraints; Cost, Time and Scope. Leaning on Lean principles expands technical acumen, and becomes a big differentiator in project delivery effectiveness. Driven by a certified Green Belt in Lean and Six Sigma, the session focuses on 5 key areas important to traditional and agile project teams: Waste Focused, Project Based, Analyze the Aggregate, Improve the Process, and Sustainable Solutions.
Outcomes:
- New revelations in Theory of Constraints, tools, techniques, and talent.
- Understand the unity of Lean and Six Sigma.
- Applied knowledge of process improvement methods.
Agile Track
Agile is at the forefront of change in project management practice. New frameworks, principles, practices, and deep theory are emerging in the project management space. This track will focus on how to support and improve team level, project level, and organizational agility overall. Project managers are eager to understand this new domain.
PMI-ACP Instructor Panel - Agile Jeopardy
Come learn from the PMI-ACP (Agile Certified Practitioner) instructors. This will not be your every-conference panel session; this will be Agile! The PMI-ACP certification carries a high level of professional credibility and is recognized by organizations globally. It requires a combination of agile training, experience working on agile projects, and examination on agile principles, practices, tools, and techniques.
Outcomes:
- Discuss and understand the differences between Agile and Waterfall
- Join PMI-ACP (Agile Certified Practitioner) instructors in a game of Agile Jeopardy!
Cristian Fuentes & Jeff Holman - Bringing Teams to the Work
Agile development practices encourage static teams with predictable velocities. But, sometimes this requires assigning projects to teams that may not be staffed appropriately, reducing effectiveness and efficiency. Jama has flipped this reality on its head and realigns focus on trusting teams to self-select. Become familiar with Jama and spark change in your organization.
Outcomes:
- Expose the need to think outside the box
- Understand the context and value of your team's work
- Develop a high level of trust and team ownership of outcomes
Michael Giard - Transforming a Waterfall Team into an Agile Juggernaut
Learn how to convince a hesitant customer to move to Agile. This presentation will offer real life examples of how Michael transformed his Waterfall team at Intel into a high-performing Agile team in under one year.
Outcomes:
- Strategies for Agile adoption
- Effective daily standup meetings
- Better customer engagement
Aashish Vaidya - Enterprise Agile Scaling Frameworks
After initially piloting an agile project, companies may consider scaling Agile to realize additional benefits. There are prevalent scaling frameworks that can help in this process. This presentation will provide overviews of some of these frameworks. It will provide a comparison of common roles and practices, and will provide insight into when to use frameworks and when to craft context-specific practices.
Outcomes:
- Agile Scaling in Context
- Overview of prevalent Agile at Scale frameworks
- Use of recipes (frameworks) in scaling is only a starting point
Business Analysis Track
Poor requirements elicitation and elaboration is one of the top two reasons projects fail. The role of the business analyst in traditional project management and the practice of building and maintaining a high quality product backlog in Agile project management are key interests of contemporary project managers. This track focuses on practices and models for ensuring the right thing gets defined and delivered to project stakeholders.
Kelly Goodwin - Project Intake: Business Case and Scope Definition as your Blueprint for Success
Imagine hiring contractors to build a house, only to overhear them arguing with each other six months after construction begins about how many bedrooms were needed. Much of the pain and suffering we experience throughout the project lifecycle can be attributed to ambiguous, poorly-vetted, or neglected business case and scope. Learn how to connect the highest level project objectives with requirements and delivery of work throughout the project lifecycle.
Outcomes:
- Improve your skill in facilitation and creation of solid up-front scope artifacts
- Learn proper due diligence in scope and business case definition
- Effectively use scope definition to on-board new team members
Stephanie Smith - Two weeks as a Business Analyst in Uganda: Do Users in Uganda Feel More Ownership for their Processes?
Do users in Uganda feel more ownership of their processes? Come and explore together what we can learn from doing business analysis in other countries. Discuss why some countries or cultures might feel more ownership and if there is anything we can do to encourage a culture where users develop or continue to embrace ownership of their processes.
Outcomes:
- Gain a new perspective on what global IT means
- Learn about the IT landscape in Uganda
- Raising the bar - discuss the importance for users to own their business processes
Sabrina Rahn, PMP, PMI-PBA - Is There an Art Behind the Science of Business Analysis?
Requirements management is an incredibly technical discipline. Logs, matrices, models, and rankings are only a few of the things you will find in a PMI-PBA toolkit. These tools enable practitioners to elicit, track, and analyze requirements to move toward project success. What is often missing is the soft skill sets needed to work effectively with each team member, stakeholder, sponsor, and customer on the project. This presentation will help you to supplement your toolkit.
Outcomes:
- Build relationships in business analysis
- Hear the customer’s voice
- Focus on the trees, but don’t forget the forest
Christine Brautigam & Stephanie Smith - How Does Deep Listening (from Theory U) Enable Better Implementations
What do you know about listening? Are you ready to improve your interactions with customers and teams? Find out what 50,000 people around the world learned from MIT Professor Otto Scharmer. Theory U has Four Levels of Listening that will enable you to view your current business analysis interactions from a whole new perspective!
Outcomes:
- Learn Theory U's Four Levels of Listening for applied problem solving.
- Contrast your current business analyst practices with those obtained through Theory U.
- Recognize your personal level of listening.
Lunch Speaker
Trish Kelley - Making Sense of PDUs
We project managers have had 8 months to experience the changes to the PDU reporting process. We’ve met some challenges and had to overcome them, sometimes through trial and error. In this presentation, Trish Kelley elaborates on the intricacies of PDU reporting and shows you how to make reporting PDUs a breeze.
Panel: What's Up with Project Management?
PMI is the largest certifying organization for professional project managers in the world. With a steadily evolving body of knowledge and tens of thousands of PMP’s worldwide, it is easy to forget other opinions on how project management can be done. Portland is a thriving community of divergent project management ideas. We will explore these differences and find out where we share strengths and where we can capture “best of breed” concepts in project management.
Outcomes:
- Discover correlations between various project management methodologies
- Build the community of practice by sharing differing views on project management
Adam Edgerton
Jimmy Godard
Lorie Gordon
Ernest Mayer
Tracy Thomas
DAY 2 – Open Space Conference
Keynote Address
Paul Pelletier LL.B., PMP - CSI Portland: Project Management and Criminal Investigations
The fictional world of CSI and Sherlock Holmes make police work on major crime scenes look glamorous and exciting. In reality, criminal investigations require meticulous attention to process, detail, and consistent evidentiary and information management. It is fascinating, but rarely glamorous - and the mind of the project manager is perfectly suited for this work. Using an international terrorism case as a reference point, this presentation will examine the impact and intersection of project management with CSI work.
Outcomes:
- Illustrate why CSIs are projects
- Understand how CSIs are project managed
- Learn about opportunities for CSI project managers
Open Space Meeting
“Here is a radical management idea: Take your best people, sit them in a circle, give them a problem, and let them solve it.” (Owen, 1997).
Welcome to our first Open Space conference day in the history of the PMI Portland Chapter! Open Space Technology is an approach to organizing meetings that has been in existence for over 30 years now. It is a framework that lets a group of people create the event schedule in real time, focusing entirely on what the actual attendees want to hear, share and talk about—the problems they want to solve and the ideas they have to solve them.
Some of the inspiring side effects are contagious laughter, hard work which feels like play, surprising results and fascinating questions.
For more information, read this article, and take a look at some Pictures of an Open Space meeting. Or watch this video interview between Jimmy Godard, PMI Portland Chapter President, and Jean Richardson, VP of Professional Development.
Following is a snapshot of how Open Space Meetings are organized.
Opening Space
The opening session takes place in the morning, with everyone attending. We ask that everyone attending our Open Space conference day show up for the opening. It’s important. During the opening session, a facilitator will explain the Five Principles and One Law of Open Space. If you have questions, volunteers and hosts will be available with answers.
The 5 Principles
- Whoever comes is the right people.
- Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
- Whenever it starts is the right time.
- Whenever it’s over, it’s over.
- Wherever it happens is the right place.
The Law of Personal Mobility
If you find yourself where you can’t learn or contribute, move yourself to a place where you can.
Creating a Session
After the introduction, we will invite those who want to convene a session to come forward and present it. It’s a simple process. There are no papers, slides, or flip-charts to prepare. You simply step forward and briefly describe the session you propose. You’ll provide just enough information for people to decide whether to attend.....or not. Generally, this takes less than thirty seconds.
After presenting a summary of your proposed session, you’ll select a time and place and post a notice on the Marketplace wall. As each person comes forward and does the same, the agenda is created.
Attending Sessions
Once the presentation ends, you will have an opportunity to browse through the notices on the Marketplace wall. As you come across sessions that interest you, sign up to attend. Signing up for a session is optional. You may attend any session you like and even move between sessions.
Adding Sessions
You may add a session to the schedule at any time during the event by posting information about it in an available slot in the agenda.
Lunch Speaker
Jean Richardson - Knowledge vs. the Appearance of Knowledge
As project, program and portfolio managers, we have important influence on the organizations we serve. It is vital that we continuously improve our skills and stay attuned to the evolution of our field. This is an individual professional responsibility that, arguably, extends beyond logging PDU’s and maintaining certifications. Our organizations and clients count on us to be prepared to provide the best guidance for managing projects, programs and portfolios available today. Given our VUCA world, this indicates the need for real knowledge and continuously evolving wisdom as opposed to the appearance of knowledge.
Panel: Contemporary Project, Program, and Portfolio Management - A View from the PMO
Organizations must complete projects effectively, manage programs coherently, and align portfolios with organizational strategy if they are to survive. PMO leaders are often on the forefront of figuring out how to navigate hurdles and pitfalls of projects, programs, and portfolios - trying new things well before they are accepted into the PMBOK.
Outcomes:
- Learn what local PMOs find useful in theory and practice
- Define skills needed to recruit vs. availability in the market
- Discuss whether industry drives practice or if everyone shares a common set of problems
- Prepare to meet emerging market needs
Jeff Ely
Mark O. Johnson
Tracey Massey
Mike McClain
Saby Waraich