This past week I was excited to revise the face to face version of a 2-day professional development module I teach for the Master Certificate in Project Management with UVic.

It had been a few years since hosting it LIVE in a classroom with professionals and it was just as great as I remembered. Did I miss Zoom? In some ways, yes, but the energy you get from a room full of people keenly interested in their own development can't quite be matched in a Zoom class.

Professional development is an essential part of a project management career. And, if you choose to become certified as a PM, it is a requirement to maintain your position and profile within the industry.

As we look ahead to the future of continuous professional development it is likely to involve a combination of online and in-person learning as well as a greater emphasis on self-directed and experiential learning. I love the idea that we need both and I think that trajectory honours what we've come to understand is possible in the last few years. Virtual learning CAN be done and IS effective. 

But what will we need to learn in the future? I think it will be all about power skills (also known as soft skills), such as communication, teamwork, problem solving, critical thinking, adaptability, time management, and conflict resolution. They are personal attributes that enable someone to interact effectively and harmoniously with other people and anything to increase our agility and flexibility in working with humans is going to be crucial in 2023 and beyond.

Many of these skills are my professional specialty but not because I’ve excelled at them. . .mostly because I have lacked them so completely in the last 30 years that my cumulative professional failures have forced me to learn new ways of working. In my voracious quest to be a success, I had to learn the hard way and now I want to shout it from the rooftops as a warning to others! DON’T MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES as I did.

Let my life and experiences be a warning to others. . .

What skills do you think are key to the future? As technology advances and the rate of change speeds up, how will you choose to train and advance your knowledge?

Amber - The Feisty PM