Home page

Text size

E-mail this page

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
If road construction is hampered by community opposition, or if employees are anxious about a new technology being introduced in the workplace, a missing ingredient for success may be a project manager.

Project management consultant Roxane Fast of Edmonton reaches out to the world's largest land-dwelling carnivore to demonstrate her point that those in her profession should never be afraid to open a dialogue with people opposed to a project's goals. Fast spoke on the subject of stakeholder management in Yellowknife on Sept. 10 as part of a regular gathering of area project managers. - Daron Letts/NNSL photo

These professional logistians and trained communicators dedicate themselves to bringing public and private projects to completion on time and on budget with as little stress as possible for all concerned.

To help achieve these goals, certified and practising project managers in the city are exchanging insights and business cards as part of the NWT Project Management Group, a new organization designed to bring industry professionals together.

The group was founded earlier this year by Bob Horton, manager of information systems and technology in the shared service centre for the departments of Environment and Natural Resources and Industry, Tourism and Investment.

"Project management is a way to ensure that projects goals are achieved," Horton explained. "Any project manager is always encouraged to get together with other project managers to help continue to sharpen and enhance their skills. "

To help project managers converge, the group plans to found the NWT branch of the Northern Alberta chapter of the Project Management Institute, an international not-for-profit association representing industry professionals throughout North America, Europe and Asia.

The Edmonton-based chapter, which has 1,650 members, is preparing to rejig its constitution this fall to permit the Yellowknife-based branch to form next spring under its umbrella.

Professional development

Every three years, certified project managers are required to accumulate a certain number of professional development units – by doing coursework, volunteering, or undertaking independent study, for example. Failing to do requires the individual to retake a rigourous, four-hour exam to re-certify A formal organization would create professional development opportunities to help project managers maintain their certification and keep abreast of industry trends and best practices, Horton said.

About 60 per cent of the NWT group's members are certified, he added.

"We're not requiring people to be certified to come out," he said. "Part of what we're hoping to do, for those who aren't yet certified, is to encourage them, help them, work on their skills and prep for writing the exam."

A professional organization would also signal to southern investors that the NWT is home to trained and experienced Northern-based project managers who follow industry standard best practices, saving businesses the expense and uncertainty of having to import project managers from southern locales, said Kristen Cook, a change management leader with the Finance Department.

"Definitely the influence of the different cultures and the different communities in the North, that's a challenge if you're dealing with an NWT-wide project -- to be be able to manage your stakeholders up in the Beaufort Delta or down in the Deh Cho area when the hub tends to be in Yellowknife," she said.

The group hosts visiting and local speakers every two months or so. On Sept. 10, Edmonton-based consultant Rozane Fast delivered a talk titled The Art of BS: Balancing Stakeholders.

"When you're doing a project and you're going out and you're impacting people, what you want to do is you want to engage with them, not just engage with people who are positively affected by your project, but also negatively affected by your project," Fast said, citing the need for project managers to open dialogue with communities. "At the end of the day, if you don't do that you end up spending a lot more money to get your project done or you don't get your project done at all because you've got those roadblocks in the way."

The group’s next gathering is being planned for late October.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.