The Cobbler’s Children Have No Shoes

Back in January when I was studying for the PMP Exam, I volunteered to help on the PMI’s Program and Portfolio Management Standards project. The goal was to construct a body of knowledge in program and portfolio management similar to the one PMI already has for project management (for those wondering what the difference is, programs and portfolios are a collection of related projects). I had no illusions that I would be running anything but I thought I might be able to offer some help.

The process to become accepted as a volunteer is mostly a PITA. You have to fill out forms, submit qualifications, sign over your intellectual property rights to anything you contribute, etc. I did all of that and faxed and emailed all the appropriate forms. Shortly after I was told I was accepted onto the team and I was given a login/password for the team website.

And then nothing.

I looked around the site but it was mostly a message board dominated by people actively working on the new standard and project documents. I read all of the project documents and waited to be told what the next step was. I waited and waited and then I waited some more. Don’t get me wrong though, I read the site updates, tried to follow a few message board threads, and generally tried to see if there wasn’t something I was missing in terms of how to be noticed. Finally, three months after joining the team I was sent an email telling me that if I wanted to be considered for a role I had to fill out a questionnaire. I had already filled out a questionnaire when I first submitted myself as a volunteer and emailed the sender back asking them just what was the process.

Several weeks later I received a reply basically telling me that they get a lot of volunteers and that there’s just not enough jobs to go around. Must be a nice problem to have :-) I then decided that this was really unprofessional, especially coming from the Project Management Institute. If they can’t run a project effectively and communicate information to stakeholders in a timely manner they really had no place, as an organization, telling others how to do it. So, I copied a few of the higher ups at the PMI on my response which was, especially for me, very diplomatic but strongly stated my position that I had been totally left out of the loop and there was no direction or communication coming from the leaders of this team. I asked to be removed as a volunteer and wished them the best of luck.

True to form, the person who had originally emailed me asking me to fill out the questionnaire asked if I would complete an exit survey so they could improve the process but it was never sent. Of course that wasn’t the only insult added to injury because she also suggested that there were two team member openings that she couldn’t promise me but that I could apply for. One was taking meeting minutes. I forget what the other was but I was so insulted at the offer (which wasn’t even really an offer) that I wasn’t even about to consider the second.

Today I received a phone call from PMI asking me about the incident. The woman I spoke to was very nice and I told her exactly what happened. She seemed somewhat shocked and concerned and we exchanged some ideas on why things may be the way they are within that group. She said she would follow up with them and said she hoped that I might reconsider volunteering with another group in the future.

I’m really glad I got that phone call today. I think PMI is a great organization and I was happy to see that CC’ing someone on an email would generate a phone call to investigate the issue. It leads me to believe that despite all of the confusion on one particular team, the organization is committed to providing a quality experience.

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