WebConnect

The IPM Day conference this year was held at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in Stevenage, Hertfordshire. The large conference room was filled with 200 delegates – all PMI UK Chapter members or GSK staff, attending free of charge to learn from some of the greatest experts in this subject.  The quality of messages and standard of presentation was of a very high standard.  All this was set in the landscaped grounds - amongst Koi carp and lotus lilies - of this extensive GSK Research facility . 

 

To speak on the theme of the conference were an exceptional mix of speakers – a blend of writers and academics, but mainly professionals sharing their practical experience of managing projects.  Each one of them had something particular to contribute; offering us different perspectives on the theme.  The conference was chaired by Patrick Bird, Project Director and executive coach and delegates were welcomed by Peter Wilks of GSK.  Peter is the Quality and Compliance Manager for IT projects at GSK.

 

Mark Kozak-Holland, the opening keynote speaker and originally a Manchunian, travelled over from California.  He has researched the actual causes of the Titanic Disaster as a project and gave us a fascinating insight into the true causes of this project failure. We were able to see how the disaster could be attributed to ‘non-functional’ features of the liner to enhance passenger luxury, to relationships among the project team and to the original business case.

 

Professor Terry Williams of Southampton University talked about project runaway and how complex projects get into trouble. He has been able to analyse the complex interactions that accelerate and drive projects into failure.  He confessed that he had not been able to measure ‘fed-upness’ in a project organisation; this and other quips, earning him the title of "the entertaining academic!” from Patrick.  Peter Taylor gave a short speech based on his book "The Lazy Project Manager". He gave us tips on how to achieve more by doing less - very useful and practical advice for project managers who can sometimes be more busy than effective.  Dr. David Hancock shared his "Reflections on lessons learned from failed projects" and we were treated to another fascinating story, this time about the Copenhagen Metro; an award winning project but now in litigation.  Again a presentation delivered with a great humour.

 

The President of PMI’s UK Chapter, Chris Field, brought us up-to-date on how the Chapter is working to bring further benefit to members.  He called for more members to get involved as volunteers and infused us with his enthusiasm for injecting passion into the project management profession. This was followed by a buffet lunch giving all the opportunity to mingle and visit the sponsor stands.  Post lunch, Howard Lees entertained everyone, with us all using radio frequency handsets to respond to a light hearted but meaningful presentation on "How behavioural science rescued the CTRL project".

 

Geoff Vincent of CITI spoke on the ‘project post mortem’ and showed us a tailor-made model for getting projects right! The closing keynote speaker was Brian Munroe, VP Information Technology at PMI’s Troubled Projects SIG who travelled from Ottawa to speak about how "Trouble finds even the best teams".  Brian illustrated how project failure is very often attributable to human and organisational failure.  The conference ended with a Panel Q & A session with all the speakers and chaired by Martin Price, the Chapter’s Director of Professional Development.

 

Despite a busy schedule, time keeping was observed allowing us to end on time.  The feedback from delegates was very positive: many writing that it had been the best conference that they had ever attended.  They had found the quality of the presentations to be outstanding and said and how much they had enjoyed the event.  A hand-crafted mural was produced by Poster Artist Vanessa Randle during the conference and was greatly admired.  This fabulous graphic of the conference can now be downloaded from the PMI UK web site.