I was recently involved in planning and organizing a program here at Hyderabad and this gave me a chance to interact with different individuals interested in attending the same. Innumerable phone calls, emails and meetings later, I can safely claim to know enough to dispense advice (yes, it’s free) on how one should choose a project management training program (here I restrict my thoughts to classroom courses, e-learning programs have their own set of “how to’s”).

Firstly, before you even talk to a second individual about the training, ask yourself why you wish to go for it. Think out and maybe even write down your objectives – perhaps you want to clear a certification exam, maybe you are interested in learning new concepts or possibly seeking a career change, maybe it is a culmination of more than one reason. Now when you come across a training program, look for its objectives. What does it claim to provide? Is there a match between the two? This is crucial; even the slightest mismatch means avoidable wastage of time, effort and money, not just for you but also for the other party.

Once you establish why you wish to go for the project management training, you need to employ all possible means to search for associations and organizations that can service your need. Ensure that you do your homework on the training that you wish to undergo. Read up on all the parties that are involved in the delivery of the program. There is an abundance of information on practically every topic under the sun today; make sure that you scratch more than the surface of these sources. This yields many benefits. Not only does it provide you enough information to discuss and ask the right questions, but also it increases the confidence of the training provider and makes the entire interaction easier and more productive.

When you talk to the training provider, there are some questions that you can simply NOT miss asking – faculty, audience and testimonials. Firstly who is the faculty member? Many a time, the program brochure is extremely loquacious about the institute, the program and the course material but silent about the person delivering the same. This is unacceptable in every way; even the best of training material is unhelpful, even dangerous if not interpreted rightly. It is the instructor who can transform the bookish concepts into thoughts and ideas that you can relate to and even apply. By virtue of past experience, he / she can simplify the process of learning and maybe even make it fun. The next thing to check is the target audience, your classmates in the program. This is vital since learning occurs as much from the teacher as from the collective knowledge of your fellow professional members. Evaluating the profile of the target audience helps you validate if the program can provide you the intellectual platform that you need. Lastly ask for the list of the client base of the training provider. Check their testimonials, if possible contact them directly. It may not provide a fool-proof means of evaluation, but it definitely helps in making an informed decision.

Remember the adage – “All that glitters is not gold”? This holds true even in this case. Do not be misled by freebies and perquisites. These only divert your attention from what should be your main and only point of concern – the training delivery. Ensure that you have all the information concerning this and only then look at the additional benefits. Finally remember that training is no easy job, nor is it a mere monologue. Most of us have been guilty of using training programs as a means to escape our normal routine and so obviously do not look at spending too much time or money for the same. In today’s world however, every small initiative is a project and so every individual is a project manager. A cavalier attitude or a lazed out approach to the program that attempts to educate you in this vital discipline can not only mean a lost investment but also spell bad news for your professional career.

The dawn of a new year is the time to make plans for the future. Businesses draw up strategies for future goals, governments plan for new initiatives and individuals make up their personal and professional agendas. Despite our best efforts and most well thought out plans, the future is always one up on us with its own plans and tactics. At such times, it is not unnatural to wish for some means to “see” the future, know what it holds. I know it is impossible to do so with bulls eye accuracy, but given the contemplation and design that our plans involve, one can at least attempt a calculated guesstimate. Take the discipline of Project Management itself; as practicing professionals, what do we think is the future of this line of work? Here are my thoughts.

Contrary to the science of Project Management which is still in its infancy, projects have been around for quite some time. Projects have been planned and executed by man even before recorded history. Of course, the scale and complexity of these has increased over time and it is safe to assume that this will continue to be the case even in the coming years. As human beings, we are constantly in competition with ourselves, challenging ourselves to do better, faster, higher or cheaper. I believe that this race will still hold ground in the near future.

In the past, the focus was in getting the best of that is available, keeping competitors and vendors on their toes by liaising with various parties and minimizing risk through continuous competitive bidding and building redundancy in the system. But increased costs of maintenance and focus on efficient utilization of bandwidth has now shifted the advantage to integrated solution providers. Businesses will no longer go shopping for different piece meal solutions. Companies are more and more looking at partners who can offer a complete suite of applications for their business needs. Given this fact, project managers and performing organizations will increasingly have to widen their service offering or seek out and forge partnerships with entities that can provide competencies that they are unable to develop close at hand.

Volatility in the global landscape and recent recessions will impose stricter criteria on project selection. The process will mainly be driven by two factors – the criticality of the investment and the sustainability of the value it is expected to provide. No more will short term endeavors that provide short term benefits be the way to go. The ends will more than ever justify the means; project managers will necessarily need to demonstrate that their projects provide value and provide value over a longer duration of time, over repeated use, over a wider base of users and over a more adverse situation than the current.

Project governance is an area that will assume pivotal significance. Single person sponsorships are on their way out and management by committees will take its place. Request for Proposals from clients now contain questions on Project Management Office experience as well as other areas of project control. In the light of increasing regulatory mandates, the “how” of project execution will be scrutinized to great detail. This translates to a metamorphosis in the basic idea of project execution; no longer will managers be able to get away saying “I got the job done”. They will now have to account for how they got it done as well as why they got it done the way that they did.

The changing times are slowly blurring the lines between the roles of a sales personnel, a project manager and a relationship manager. The future project managers will be expected to be equally conversant with sales techniques used in clinching a deal as well as in engagement management principles of customer retention. Gone are the days when a project manager was only concerned with the delivery of the project on time and within budget. Sales and marketing will soon become a part of project management and a project manager will need to graduate to the role of an engagement manager.