Q&A with Amy of PPM Community: Social Media is a Must
We recently profiled the new PPM Community site as a great resource for finding new favorite blogs and bloggers for ideas and inspiration about all aspects of project management, from leadership to risk management. We caught up with Amy, the co-editor of PPM Community, to get the story behind their project and their perspective on the field of project management. Follow Enjoy!
So, you and Lawrence are co-founders and editors of PPM Community. From where do you and Lawrence hail? Curious from your spelling of “programme.”
We’re both based in London, Lawrence originates from the States (New Jersey) but has been in the UK since he was a young boy and I’m London born and bred.
How do you and Lawrence know each other? Colleagues, friends? Also, what type of industries and projects do you and Lawrence work in and on?
Lawrence and I met (we’re ex-work colleagues who became friends) when working for a marketing & media organisation four years ago. We both worked within various departments as part of a grad scheme. After the scheme, we both moved into special projects. For example, Lawrence has project managed brand development projects for media organisations and public sector organisations and my experiences were in web development projects – I’ve managed new and refreshed website projects for charities, public sector organisations and the automotive industry. We’re both still fairly new to project management; a couple of years experience and the experience we have gained has been very focused on media based projects. We both left our roles six months ago and have been doing some freelance project management for contacts in the industry, media based projects again!
Where do you go when you are on holiday?
Lawrence loves to travel and has been all over the world (typical gap year student!) and still regularly visits family back in New Jersey. I guess I’m more of a home girl who doesn’t like to travel too far – I love travelling throughout Great Britain and adore Scotland especially. We’re both fans of travel throughout Europe though and have spent time in many of the major cities.
I guess I’m more of a home girl
Any favorite social media tools or tips you’d recommend, outside of PPM Community?
I think because of our backgrounds in media we’ve always been interested in the different methods and tools that are available – it really depends on what you’re trying to achieve. In our previous roles we used Basecamp as the tool for helping us in managing projects (I kind of class this as social media for projects, it’s great for connecting, sharing and collaboration), but some of the clients we worked with weren’t necessarily the most savvy when it comes to using tools like this so it’s back to good old fashioned communications!
We’ve also seen an increase in social media within projects too, for example, many of the web development projects I managed included social media as a strand – how was social media going to be incorporated into the new web design, what function was it going to serve, what tools and services worked best for a particular client. Lawrence has also focused a lot on social media too because of the part it plays in developing brands. The biggest and most popular has got to be the blog – we both think the blog has got to the be the most powerful social media tool an organisation (and an individual) can use and if done correctly can really make an organisation come alive and be less faceless. I guess this is part of the reason why we decided to put ppmcommunity together – we’re both avid readers of blogs, interested in project management and, as blogs become more popular, there is definitely room for a directory or catalogue of the best ones available for a given subject. I must admit it took us a while to find some of the best PM blogs because there is a lack of a directory type facility to take readers straight there.
Any specific reason why you think PMs should care about blogging and social media? (MTWblog agrees, but would be great to get your personal take).
As I said, both Lawrence and I are still fairly new to project management and neither of us have formal project management training, everything we know has been learnt on specific projects. We both started looking at PM blogs about a year ago and we’ve both learnt so much just by reading blogs alone! There are some really knowledgeable PMs out there who seem to have a gift of imparting knowledge in a real way – they’re sharing war stories, personal experiences and sharing how they managed certain situations. There are also great PM blogs out there that share the technical aspects of PM too – how to manage risk, how to put together a schedule, how to plan etc, again these are all delivered in the manner of a blog which is less formal and in some ways a much easier way for readers to learn.
Any PM, regardless of experience and years in the job, should be reading what’s out there and if they have a view on how things should be done, they should be contributing or indeed setting up their own blog and sharing their world view.
I guess when I’m feeling like I have more experience under my belt I’ll be taking the leap to creating original blog posts rather than just profiling other Project Managers!
What spurred you to take the leap and go from PM to website editor?
Neither of us have taken that much of a leap – anyone can be a web editor with Wordpress, it’s so easy! We’re still learning the craft of project management and still working as project managers, the ppmcommunity.com is much more of a pet project or hobby. It’s been great so far, we’re discovering the stories behind the blogs and something about the people who write them which has been a great insight – especially interesting to see just how different people’s career paths have actually been and how people have started working as project managers. That’s encouraging for Lawrence and I as we continue growing and learning within project management and the fact that there doesn’t seem to be a set career path for project management.
Top 2 things you see changing in the role of a PM, from your personal perspective?
We’re interested in the current debate about professionalism in project management. The APM is currently pursuing the Chartered Status for Project Management which will certainly impact the profession of project management here in the UK. From a personal perspective, and because of our backgrounds and how we both got into project management, I think there will be more and more specialised project managers – what I mean by that is, for example: I class myself as a project manager first but I have a good deal of specialism within the marketing field – I think organisations who are looking for specific project management skills for a specific project will be more inclined to hire someone who brings a certain sector or function specialism as well as the project management skills, they’re getting more bang for their buck.
Top thing you WISH would change for the PM role?
That we become more recognised as a profession in its own right – like a lawyer, doctor or teacher. It’s still a fairly young profession when compared to age old professions like that but having common best practices, codes of conduct, career paths, qualifications, etc., would certainly set us on the right path.
