In a recently published book called "The Fifth Risk" written by Michael Lewis, he covers the transition of the Federal Government from Barack Obama to Donald Trump. Early in the book there is a focus on the Department of Energy and the Chief Risk Officer, John MacWilliams. MacWilliams' charter was to "go beyond financial risks to all other risks that weren't being properly evaluated." He subsequently identified the top 5 risks, and they are:
1. An accident with nuclear weapons
2. An attack by North Korea
3. Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon
4. Shut down of the country's energy grid
5. Project management
Who would have ever thought that one of the top five risks within the Department of Energy would include project management? This list highlights the importance of project management simply by comparison to these other catastrophic events. Project management, with its 16.5 million project managers, is the influence that drives the economy through product development, construction, medical advancements, emerging technology, mitigating critical risks and simply keeping organizations like the Department of Energy moving forward.
This book was written because the topic of project management has become stale, repetitive and has reached somewhat of a plateau. Over the past 20 to 30 years, the focus on project management as a career has grown tremendously. Training materials and books are available everywhere, but significant and continuous evolution of project management has been limited. Project management has been around forever but for most of that time the improvements to the art and/or science of it has been stuck in neutral.
Contrary to the current two-dimensional description of project management, which includes hard and soft skills, this book defines and explores the 3rd dimension of project management which includes cognitive skills. Cognitive skills are basic mental abilities that we use to think, study and learn. This book focuses on thinking skills which are the mental processes we use to do things like solving problems, making decisions, asking questions, making plans, organizing information and creating new ideas.
As part of exploring cognitive skills, this book also defines the journey toward becoming the best project manager that you can be and hopefully to achieve what your peers and leadership might refer to as a great project manager. The focus on cognitive skills and the journey from good to great defines a new and refreshing view of project management.
Vaughan, John: - After graduating from college, I spent eight years as a software engineer working on flight simulators and training equipment for the U.S. military. I then became a functional manager of an aerospace engineering group where I managed software, electrical, mechanical and systems engineers. Periodically I would step in and manage small projects. I had some company sponsored project management training as part of supporting Department of Defense (DOD) programs and attended courses through the Defense Systems Management College (DSMC). I had a mentor that really understood the basics and mechanics of project management and he sparked my interest. I then worked as a project manager in several industries including satellite communications, semiconductor capital equipment and digital education products. I began the process of building my knowledge base by obtaining my Project Management Professional (PMP) certification followed by completing a Master's Degree in Project Management. I then completed a certification in project management from the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) and subsequently became a Certified Scrum Master and Certified Scrum Product Owner. My journey led me to high profile, strategic company projects. I led new development projects, new product introductions and programs that were high risk and hadn't been previously executed within the company. My successes led me to creating and building project management organizations where I had 10 to 15 project managers reporting into me. This experience finally led me to becoming the VP of Program Management for the company. As I grew in my career, I was always focused on becoming more consistent, providing more value and becoming the best project manager that I could be. My curiosity and competitive spirit drove me to read books, attend courses and study other project managers because I wanted to be the best. I wasn't satisfied with people telling me that project management was an "art and a science" because that left too much undefined and it wasn't enough to define a plan for getting from where I was to where I wanted to be. As I worked through this journey, I began the process of writing this book. I wanted to be a better project manager, but I also wanted to be able to hire the best project managers. I needed to satisfy my curiosity and try to create a more predictable plan or model for my career path. I wanted to strip away the layers of complexity and fluff that seemed to surround existing project management literature.
