Episode 421: Maximize Career Advancement with Project Management Training (Free)




The Project Management Podcast show

Summary: Play Now: Project Management Professional (PMP)® Exam: PMP Exam prep : Marie Spark and Cornelius Fichtner Do you want to take your career as a project manager to the next level? Yes? We have a suggestion for you: project management education. This interview with Marie Spark (LinkedIn Profile) was recorded at the energizing Project Management Institute (PMI)® Global Conference 2018 in Los Angeles, California. (Well... Actually... it was recorded a couple days before at the PMI® LIM). In the interview, we see how adult education has changed in the past decade, what changes we can expect in the future, and how we project managers can (and should!) take advantage of various training opportunities in order to advance our careers. Episode Transcript Below are the first few pages of the transcript. The complete transcript is available to Premium subscribers only. Podcast Introduction Marie Spark: In this episode of The Project Management Podcast™, you’ll discover how to take your project management education to the next level. Cornelius Fichtner: Hello and welcome to The Project Management Podcast™ at www.pm-podcast.com. I’m Cornelius Fichtner. We are coming to you live from the energizing 2018 PMI Global Conference in Los Angeles. Podcast Interview Cornelius Fichtner: And with me right now is Marie Spark. Good afternoon, Marie! Marie Spark: Good afternoon, Cornelius! Great to be here! Cornelius Fichtner: I cheated a little bit because I said that we are at the PMI Global Conference. We’re not yet at the conference. We are at the PMI Leadership Institute Meeting to be absolutely precise. It’s a couple of days before the conference actually starts. How is the LIM for you? Marie Spark: Oh, the LIM is fantastic. The Leadership Institute Meeting brings project managers from allover the world. I sat down at the table with people from Nigeria, Portugal and Vietnam and we had a great talk from people PMI Global and someone from Pixar relating project management to wonderful animated movies. How can you tap that? Cornelius Fichtner: Our topic is career advancement through project management training. What can out listeners expect to learn from our conversation? Marie Spark: Well, the world of project management training keeps changing in disruption just like everything else but the exciting thing is I think our listeners can think about going beyond the traditional bounds of what is learning and hopefully we can explore the possibilities in this conversation. Cornelius Fichtner: Yeah! Let’s take a step back and start at the very beginning. Marie Spark: Sure. Cornelius Fichtner: What is your background in project management and also in project management education? Marie Spark: Sure. So the funny thing on me is I am a full-time faculty member now in academics. But that is not where I started and I never would have guessed that I’d be here. So I was an IT project manager in banking and operations and I also is a Six Sigma Black Belt and I really fell into being in education after leaving my last job and suddenly realizing that my favorite thing I did was Six Sigma coaching. And thinking I would be in professional training to make a long story short, I am now the director of a project management program and I really enjoy the fact that I combine my professional background with education. Cornelius Fichtner: And what exactly it is that you do for that program and just you know for full disclosure it’s Golden Gate University. Marie Spark: Sure! It’s Golden Gate University. So I’m a professor of project management. I teach but I also on higher faculty. In a way, I am a project manager for the program because I get to figure out what courses we need to refresh, how we can change our program. And I do outreach. And when I come to events like PMI LIM, what I love is I get to network as part of my job to learn from others. Cornelius Fichtner: What are some of the changes that you are seeing in adult education? Marie Spark: Oh my goodness, like everyt