Putting People In Their Place

October 26, 2023 | by Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin

I'm blogging from the #PMIGlobalSummit in Atlanta for the next few days and so far, although I have about 24 years of PMI conferences under my belt, I have to say this is the best one ever. Last night, roving around the exhibit hall, just feeling the vibe I was struck by the reality that, as I have gotten older, PMI has gotten younger--and far more diverse. It's a thrill to know that the project management field is thronged with young folks of all stripes from everywhere, especially since the organization itself now stresses a strong theme of making the world a better place. Whew. I sure hope they succeed!

Case in point: This morning's keynote by change management guru Cassandra Worthy ... or I should call her "change enthusiast" because that's what her model of dealing with change is based on. As she took the stage, I wrote a little poem about her in the margin of my notebook:

SIlver shoes

Sleeves of tattoos

That mop of dreds

Is turning heads.

This is definitely a different PMI speaker than what we've seen in the past, and I am here for it! But more important, she went on to blow everyone's minds in a couple of ways. I'll be talking more about this in my presentation on Friday, October 27, but basically what I heard from her--and have heard repeated in many conversations here--is that the human skills, which my late friend Paul Dinsmore wrote about so eloquently decades ago, are not just a "nice to have" for project managers, but the key to everything. "Emotion is our carryon," Worthy said. It's not something to avoid, but something you can't leave home without. To the extent that we try to discount the very real gifts and burdens of how people feel about work, about change, about each other, we enter into error.

And by "people" I mean everyobody. Not just the ones who look and talk like you. Not just our teams. Not just our stakeholders. We might even have to begin to accept ourselves ... which is what EQ is all about. Check out your PMBOK 7 for why that's important for value delivery. Or you could read this.

More tomorrow!

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