When our kids turned 16 and it was time to learn how to drive, my wife and I researched which driving school offered the best and most comprehensive training. Our criteria focused on reputation for teaching not only the basics, but for driving in inclement weather, and emergency situations, and performance of basic maintenance. We also considered which school had the best instructors – ones that required the instructors themselves to go through rigorous testing and to have a good rapport with their students. For added measure, we asked our insurance company for a recommendation. Cost was by far the lowest factor on our list of selection criteria – we knew that the cost of even the most expensive driving school would pale in comparison to the heavy price that would be paid if they did not receive the proper driving education.
In my current role as the Project Management Institute (PMI)® Registered Education Provider (R.E.P)® Advisory Group Member representing North America Region, I was recently asked by yet another person if I could recommend a project management course that offered the greatest number of Professional Development Units (PDUs)® for the least cost.
This request came just a few weeks after I took a call from another person who said that, in order to receive the 35 hours of project management training required to qualify for writing the PMP exam, he had taken a free on-line project management course that he had access to through his company’s on-line training subscription service. He was calling me because he “did the 35 hours of training quickly and did not really learn anything”. He was now looking for a “cheap” instructor led class to prepare him for the PMP exam.
This morning I read in the paper about yet another publicly funded project that went horribly wrong. The refrain was all too typical — grossly overrun budget, expected delivery years behind schedule, and serious quality issues.I am constantly amazed at the disconnect that many organizations demonstrate, between their expectations of project teams to successfully deliver projects and their treatment of project management training.
My wife and I knew we could not afford anything but the best driver training for our two kids. What can we do to help organizations realize that they cannot afford anything but the best project management training for their staff?
Great topic and you picked a wonderful graphic!
Question: How do we generally know ‘X’ is a constraint? Perhaps we really are constrained to only the best…but a requirement like that seems as though it should come with some supporting explanation.
Another potential risk trigger that could get some readers attention might be the appearance of scope creep.
While obviously related, driving and maintenance are very different skills, and often picking the best of both requires not picking the best of either. Such a compromise seems like it might make sense for our goals of providing our daughter what we think most important, or it might not. This strikes me as similar for PM training.
What do you think?
Thanks Buck! You have raised some interesting thoughts and questions.
To further the driving analogy, is the requirement to receive just enough training to facilitate our passing the driving exam, or to become a safe driver? If the latter, the scope and quality of the training will have to be much different and will likely cost more — initially. If there is an added requirement to also know how to properly maintain the car, more than one course and perhaps more than one course provider may be necessary.
Likewise, back in the project management world, there is often too much focus on simply “passing the credential exam”, or earning PDUs to maintain credentials. While these things are important, they should be viewed merely as the means to the end, not the end itself.
This article is spot on Paul. The difficulty is the constant confusion between true value add and lowest cost. The two are often seen to be the same whereas, in reality they are very different and drive different levels of outcomes and satisfaction levels.
You are so right.
Good article.
Many organizations and individuals tend to look at ‘lowest price’- as it is more tangible for them 🙁 Value typically gets realized after delivery.
I have noted that many individuals go in for ‘cheapest online courses’ to get PDUs and later come back to us – when they realize they did not get value. Many organizations also fall into the trap of going for the lowest price quote 🙁 Then they are to look for other vendors.
The saying that ‘price is forgotten after the value is obtained’ is apt in this context.
Agreed! So the question is, how can we help individuals and organizations avoid such mistakes in the first place?
Fully agree with your article. I am from Switzerland where we measure quality as a part of value. I am also a researcher, consultant, author and a trainer of PM courses. One interesting empirically proven finding is that being PMP certified does not increase your chances of project success over non certified PMs except for the more senior PMs in complex projects. Too many people are getting PMP certified for the sake of certification and have no interest or understanding how to be a proficient PM. I like the IPMA approach of competency based certification where the candidate is interviewed as well as taking the exams. I teach a lot in the Middle East both PMI related courses for PMP and PgMP as well as customized courses for the Senior International Project Manager SIPM. This customized course is a lot more interesting to teach and allows more of a discussion of experiences and views of how project management works in different regions. Not a cheap course but a value course from the feedback of participants. The participants have also told me about the ‘cheap courses’ they attended before, where the instructor flips slides, has no experience and no relevant stories. They now understand ‘value’ and the dangers of going cheap…