Ideas from PMI Leadership Institute Meeting 2008

Below are a selection of some of the strategic ideas from the PMIWDC Board members who attend the annual PMI Leadership Institute Meeting in Denver, CO in October 2008.

Have additional ideas of your own? Please let us know. We're glad to get your input.

Shirley Buchanan (VP Membership)

Recognize members at 5-year anniversary, 10-year anniversary, 20-year anniversary
Continue to work with PMI GOC VP Technology, PMIWDC VP Technology, and VP Membership to establish automated member data transfer
Outsource sponsor acquisition (e.g., Hire a fund raiser with sales or sponsor relations experience)
Invite PMIWDC sponsors to a summit to better understand their PMIWDC sponsorship experiences, to identify new programs, and to eliminate those that are not working
In addition to Board members, make sure ALL volunteers (esp. Committee Chairs and Event Managers) receive a copy of or have access to the Board Handbook
Revise Board handbook presentation to include the sponsorship topic. The current presentation addresses advertising but not the Chapter sponsorship policy, procedures, and link to event management. The Membership Committee has detailed this information for the benefit of Board members and event managers. (Note: The sponsorship information on the PMIWDC webpage describes the programs. The policy and procedures offer governance and "how to" guidelines.)

Roy Burton (Director at Large)

Remind Board members that the PMIWDC slideshow and script are available for Board members to take on the road. Members also need to know this exists. This will open up potential venues for future luncheons, etc.
Encourage Board members to join the local Chambers of Commerce. This will help identify potential outreach opportunities and companies.
Give guest passes to companies that the Chapter is targeting as potential sponsors.
Leverage PMI webinar for luncheons and other outreach opportunities, including the dinner meetings. Nichole Ritz is POC.
Hold Strategic Board meetings right after the LIM to make sure we align with PMI.
Continue to make our information available to other Chapters. Roy's personal commentary - especially the small chapters, not chapters in our size category that we compete against for Chapter of the year :)
Encourage Corporate Outreach Coordinators to use the PMIWDC stand for their company PM related conferences, even if we buy a newer model for the dinner and formal chapter meetings.
Inventory and track all PMIWDC equipment and assets. Great volunteer opportunity.
Increase Chapter sponsored social events for networking, not necessarily a PDU opportunity.

Linda Cantey (President Elect)

Include other global congress travel in our C2C budget

Diana Castaldo (VP Volunteer Coordination)

Send postcards to members with upcoming events
Establish a free library of PM materials for chapter members (ex. can check out the books at the monthly dinner meeting)
Establish budget for training, books, and tools that assist in performing board member duties
Offer monthly dinner discount to longstanding PMIWDC members that do not attend dinner/luncheon/other meetings and/or call these members to determine why they do not attend/participate
Establish new member and/or volunteer monthly orientation which includes all chapter activities and ways to volunteer
Establish book club where author/publisher donates PM books in return for readers posting reviews on the chapter website
Send email to new PMI members in the chapter's geographic area that have not joined the chapter
Establish family day events
Post PMI GOC's volunteering video online
Post Board member organizational chart and meeting agendas/minutes on the chapter website
Establish Board member transition checklist (generic or operation specific)
Establish process checklists in concert with established (and new) procedures
Raffle away free books to members at each dinner meeting
Host a recruiter panel/roundtable meeting to provide career advice
Hold a "Bring your boss to dinner" event

Jay Demas (VP Records Management)

Add webinars as a service we provide to our members. Potental to partner with SIG(s) (i.e. Consulting SIG).

Chris Fristad (Director at Large)

One chapter has on-line evaluations of the speaker programs - caveat: Chapter must be careful to not have any public display of speaker's rating because of liability issues.
A chapter needs to determine what marketing value is provided for sponsorship, i.e, number of companies represented by members; the number of dollars generated by the companies represented by members -- for example "Our members represent over XXXX companies in the Washington DC metropolitan area with a combined gross revenue of XXXX Billion dollars"
Work with Sharon Robbins of the PMICVC chapter in obtaining/updating their PMP placemats.
One chapter obtained hotel points for the events held at the hotels. These points were then used to obtain lodging for their board members when they travel on chapter business.
Our chapter is large enough that it is quite possible our President and President Elect will be called upon to give interviews to the press, or on television, or other public forums. Most large organizations provide media training for the executives. The PMI WDC should consider this before these individuals are called upon for public interviews.
There are a number of awards that the chapter and membership could use to advantage for the recognition of its members. I have brought back a pamphlet showing the various awards which I will bring to the strategic planning session in January.

Chris Karanski (AVP Chapter-to-Chapter Outreach)

Outreach: contact local and state Chamber of Commerce for opportunities to expose the business sector leadership to PMI and PMIWDC
Ensure tight internal PMIWDC management control such that no company is contacted more than once inadvertently.
Under Chapter to Chapter, prior to sending out any chapter sponsored travelers, research the principle industies and companies in that city and see if there are any offices on WDC. Also seek out any complimentary companies.
Appoint "Chapter Amabassdors" to sit and stay with first-time company attendees at our chapter meetings to provide information on PMIWDC and PMI.
Send out complementary guest passes to local companies who have not previously attended PMIWDC meetings.
Under Chapter to Chapter, foster networking opportunities between rank-and-file members.
Under Chapter to Chapter, foster exchanges to World Congresses.

Kendall Lott (AVP Communications Technology)

Volunteer Drive: Establishing a mission for volunteers and an approach to focus on the active recruitment of volunteers

Aaron Hall (VP Communications)

Use Skype and Call Burner (or other tools) to complete a 3-5 min. pre-meeting interview of each speaker so potential meeting attendees can get a feel for the speaker before registering.
Leverage PMI's AdobeConnect license to offer webinars (ccordiante through Nicole Ritz at GOC).
Engage with PMI Technology MAG - have requested engagement from Lisa on Frank's team (GOC).
Single Sign-On (SSO) between PMI website and component websites will be available in the Jan. - Apr. 09 timeframe.
PMI has only begun talking about mobile versions/use of its site(s) and true social networking (outside of their current authenticated Virtual Community/SharePoint framework) - they are interested in PMIWDC's thoughts in this area.
Inquire with the PMI EF about a stronger bond/liaison between PMIWDC and the EF; share the EF's Philly school project with PMIWDC; potentially sponsor the PM 4 NGOs initiative that the PMIEF has partnered with LINGOS on.
Do a near-term site survey of all professional/social networking sites to ensure we don't have another Facebook situation; get a placeholder presence (at a minimum) out there.
Share PMI's Guide to Internal PM Communities with the Board/Chapter - have contacted componentoutreach@pmi.org for a copy.
Consider offering PMIWDC Board Handbook presentation at other LIMs (EMEA, LA, APAC).
Integrate Twitter into PMIWDC events such that real time questions/comments can be submitted via mobile devices and either relayed to speakers or even displayed on a large screen in parallel to speaker.

Dave Offenkrantz (Director at Large)

Host a "Seminar at Sea", either for PDUs or for a PMP Prep Class. Houston chapter does these successfully!

Glen Scheirer (AVP Volunteer Coordination)

As an AVP I need to assist Project Managers (members of PMIWDC) to contextualize the standards they hold their employees and their projects to
As an AVP I need to advise member that they must determine the right level of investment and implementation in their projects (i.e. do not let your personal interests cause you to overestimate the amount of time and energy placed on an activity)
As an AVP I need to educate members with the facts that you cannot necessarily apply Project
Management to building of revenue in the short-term
As AVP I learned the value of a Region 5 symposium and the value that it can provide to the chapter
As AVP I learned about the value and the changing process of in the transformation of SIG’s and LIG’s and how we can educate our members as to the value of the transformation
As AVP for the Volunteers Committee need to work on better communication with multiple operational areas:
Communication
Membership
Records Management
As AVP for the Volunteer Committee I learned that Records Management can potentially be used as an integral part of the volunteer management process.
As AVP for the Volunteers Committee I learned that we must investigate how other chapters organize and coordinate their volunteers. (We have followed up with 2 other chapters and have received information from 1 of them thus far)
As AVP for Volunteers I learned to value of hosting appreciation forum’s in recognition of our volunteers

Ron Taylor (President)

Explore ways to share our policies, practices, forms and templates with other chapters -- perhaps through a public portion of our SP and/or a link from the www.pmi.org page
Give Chapter coffee mugs, etc., to new members and newly certified (PMP, etc.) people at dinner meetings.
Consider offering a presentation on the restructured Board at the 2009 North America LIM
Align with at least two US chapters as part of our Chapter to Chapter program