Continuing to “connect the world of project management”
An editorial by Hugh Woodward
This issue of PM World Today begins a new era. For the first time since PM World Today was first published in 1999, it has a new editor. I am honored to be assuming the role of Managing Editor from David Curling who founded PMFORUM and served as the editor of PM World Today and its predecessor, PMFORUM Digest.
Changes are inevitable when a new editor assumes control, and that applies to this publication. But before I turn my attention to the future, it is appropriate to recognize the pioneering achievements of David Curling.
The founder of PMFORUM clearly deserves the high recognition his peers have afforded him: Fellow of the Association for Project Management, Fellow of the Project Management Institute, and recipient of the Outstanding Performance Award of the Performance Management Association of Canada. He has had a distinguished career as a professional soldier, systems engineer, test and validation engineer, logistics engineer, project manager and senior public servant.
However, David Curling is perhaps best known for the creation of PMFORUM. Realizing the value of his personal library early in 1995, he made it publicly available through a fledgling technology known as the internet. Today, pmforum.org is one of the largest and most popular sites in project management, and PM World Today boasts a subscriber list representing every part of the world.
In this edition of PM World Today, we honor David Curling as our “PM Pioneer of the Month” (see Faces and Places).
Now turning to the future, I am excited to announce a number of developments to make pmforum.org an even more useful and convenient resource for project managers. You may have already noticed the first improvement. The PM World Today Heads-up Newsletter is now being issued as a text document, rather than html. While text does not have the visual appeal provided by html, an increasing number of organizations are blocking html e-mail to protect against viruses and other malicious content. Therefore, to continue to make PM World Today available to all our subscribers, we have reluctantly decided to issue the Heads-up Newsletter as a text-only document.
We will soon be introducing a new home page designed to provide improved navigation. Our visitors have repeatedly told us that the content of pmforum.org is outstanding, again thanks to long-time editor, David Curling, but it is sometimes difficult to find. We are therefore reorganizing the site to simplify the navigation and search functions. This upgrade will also include an improved Calendar to make it easier to find upcoming conferences and other events, and a simpler way to locate “Expert Resources”.
Later in the year we will be introducing some other exciting features: continuously updated news reports featuring key events in project management from around the world, project “stories” featuring common and not-so-common problems written by the project managers who solved them (see Alex Laufer’s article in Case Studies), and a new subscription process allowing subscribers to specify the particular content of interest to them.
Importantly, there are many aspects of pmforum.org that will not change. We are committed to continue providing high-quality content written by the world’s leading thinkers on project management. We are committed to continue providing information about key events and activities in project management around the world. We are committed to continue providing a forum to facilitate debate and discussion about the future of project management. And we are committed to continue providing easy access to these services from anywhere in the world.
In short, we are committed to achieving the vision established by David Curling when he created pmforum.org: to “connect the world of project management”.
Hugh
Woodward is the President and Managing Editor of pmforum.org, and an internationally
recognized leader of the project management profession. He served two terms
as Chair of the Project Management Institute and almost six years as a member
of PMI's Board of Directors. His professional experience includes projects
and programs in manufacturing, construction and IT, and involving both the
public and private sectors. He continues to promote the profession as a frequent
conference speaker, having addressed audiences in Argentina, Australia, Canada,
China, France, Hungary, Israel, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Russia, Singapore,
the United Kingdom, and the United States.
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Editorial Policy: The PMFORUM® has no connection to any national or international project management organization nor does it reflect the policy of any project management professional or commercial organization. The PMFORUM® maintains an objective and impartial view of project management affairs. In the interests of advancing professional project management the PMFORUM® will publish contending and objective views on issues that reflect collegial differences and perspectives