The cure for optimism isn’t pessimism. It’s data from projects that already finished. The first three parts of this series diagnosed the disease. Whenever several estimates compete and the most extreme one wins, the winner is the one who was most wrong. Cursed bids, cursed business cases, cursed deadlines. This part is the treatment. Five […]
Category: PMP
Elite Teams Over-Train Before the Mission: How to Prepare for the New PMP® Exam
PMP® candidates who took a practice test, scored 62%, and promised yourself you’d study harder next month: the elite version of you doesn’t study harder. They rehearse the failure before it happens, so that by exam day the hard question is one they’ve already seen. This is the fourth post in our Elite Teams series, […]
Watermelon Reports: When a Green Status Hides a Red Project — and How to Audit Your Doubt
The slide says green. Your stomach says otherwise. Nothing you can point to, exactly. The demo that was supposed to anchor the review got rescheduled again. The dependencies slide has grown a little vaguer each month. The forecast still lands on the same end date it always has, no matter what happens in between. There […]
PDUs vs Contact Hours: What’s the Difference?
Contact hours are the education you complete before the PMP® exam — 35 hours of project management training required for eligibility. PDUs (Professional Development Units) are what you earn after certification to keep it — 60 every three years. One gets you into the certification; the other keeps you in it. They are not interchangeable, […]
Unrealistic Project Deadlines: The PM Who Said Yes Fastest
The assignment went to whoever promised the earliest date. That’s an auction. And you just won it. A director needs a system migration done. Three project managers are in the room. “When can you have it live?” The first PM says, “Let me come back with an estimate by Friday.” The second says, “Realistically, end […]