Why
Connect?
Jim De Piante of IBM
Italy sees several
major advantages for
project managers who
know how to network:
1Gain experience as a
mentor, coach and
advisor for others.
2Meet the right people
to hire or request
for a project team.
3Find the right learning opportunities for
you and your teams.
4Benefit from the
experience of others
and helping others to
benefit from their
experience.
5Improve your job
prospects. Organizations may be looking
to hire new team
members or a new
team leader. The
better connected you
are, the better
chance you will have
of hearing about such
opportunities.
But remember, it’s not all about you. Part of
mastering the fine art of networking is learning
to listen empathetically. “Be genuinely interested
in every person you meet,” says Mr. De Piante.
“Seek to know them, to understand them.”
And go in with a game plan, says Phongsak
Thongratana, PMP, assistant director for graduate admissions at Ohio University in Athens,
Ohio, USA.
“If I was going to a networking event and I
wanted to line up possible employers, I would try
to meet at least six to seven representatives from
other companies that evening and follow that up
with an e-mail or phone call the next day, even
just to thank them for chatting with me,” he says.
To take full advantage of the opportunities
that networking can bring, project managers
must invest time and thought. You’ll get back
what you put in.
“[In my experience], most project managers
don’t take the opportunity to attend local, regional
or global conferences or professional development
events, and so they are missing out entirely on
some great networking opportunities,” Mr. De
Piante says. “Others attend such events, but don’t
network enough or don’t network effectively.”
Some may be hesitant to actively engage in
networking because it seems self-involved.
“Each of us has a lot to give in terms of ideas,
knowledge and help,” Mr. De Piante says. “By participating actively in the great human network, we
create wealth, possibilities and opportunities, not
just for ourselves but for everyone else, too.”
Virtual Face Time
Face-to-face contact is preferable when networking. But with project teams spread around the
world, this can become prohibitively expensive.
The internet’s numerous professional networking sites create low-cost alternatives. Social networking sites such as Ecademy, LinkedIn and
Facebook provide possibilities to encounter,
meet and get to know people you would otherwise never see. Furthermore, the internet knows
no national boundaries, and there are plenty of
sites offering to translate communications.
Mr. Thongratana manages a Facebook group
that now has more than 4,000 members. “My
goal is to open up the discipline of project management to a younger audience,” he says. “My
hope is that they can use this group to network
with others, collaborate and share information.”
By building such connections, Mr.
Thongratana says, project managers can discuss
work-related issues to help them tackle problems
within their own workplace. Or, they can even
talk about job prospects at other organizations.
And relationships forged online can often
lead to face-to-face connections for project
managers. “I have met a lot of people through
LinkedIn who live in Rome. Since I am now
living in Rome, I have tried to meet many of
these people face-to-face,” says Mr. De Piante.
Global Community
Networking isn’t just good for individual or
team development. It can also be beneficial for
the entire project management profession,
especially in developing countries, says Larry
A. Adeyemi, Ph.D., PMP, project manager of
major capital projects and asset management
at the Department of Natural Resources, King
County, Washington, USA, and president and
CEO of the not-for-profit Africa Centre for
Excellence in Project Management.
In countries with emerging economies,
overall awareness of project management best
practices is low, making it difficult for professionals to make inroads, says Dr. Adeyemi.
“As a trainer and consultant in rapidly
growing economies of Africa, Asia, Latin
America and Eastern European nations, I can
say project management practitioners yearn for
networking opportunities,” he says. “Project
