PMI Region 8 event, November 2018
Written by Henrik Feld
The PMI Region 8 meeting are held to enable knowledge sharing and cooperation between PMI chapters in the European countries (region 8). The different chapters in Europe takes turns in arranging the event, and in 2018 the Serbia chapter hosted the event in Belgrade.
PMI Denmark chapter was represented by 7 board members and volunteers, notably 3 of our Young Professionals.
The event is two days packed with presentations from the different chapters as well as some sessions arranged by the PMI staff and elected management. In between the sessions there are several opportunities to network with fellow volunteers, getting to know new people from other chapters and connecting up with those you have met before at similar events.
In PMI Denmark Chapter we have made it a best practise to offer the option to participate to all of our volunteering members, either directly elected to the board, or such who have taken up a volunteering opportunity in the chapter. The event thus fuels the motivation and energy with the team supporting our chapter in creation of events and other services to our chapter members.
The topics of the sessions this year were a lot about looking into the future. The opening session by Brantlee Underhill & Lysan Drabon from the PMI global team was adressing what has been labelled PMI 2.0, a vision of an updated PMI organisation that puts the services and support to each individual member of the organisation at the forefront. It is a journey that has only started, so we would expect to see a lot more action regarding this in the future.
There were several sessions on the use of new technologies like podcasts, live video and Events App’s, while others were focused on the collaboration with companies and sponsors.
It was also evident, though, that there is a growing understanding of the need to be an organisation that also attracts younger and emerging proffessionals to the chapters.
And here our two representatives from PMI Young Professionals, Miglena, Ilektra (supported by Marco) put on an impressive presentation explaining how they have managed to succesfully grow this initiative to an attractive organisation for young project managers in Denmark.
On top of other presentations building up the theories on how to be interesting to this target group, our YP’s were able to share knowledge of how it can actually be done. We were a few very proud ”grumpy old PM’s” sitting in the audience, sharing a bit of their fame.
The event finishes on a Sunday afternoon, followed by travel back to DK, so we all were probably a bit worn out when we started on work Monday morning. However, also loaded with good energy and new ideas that we can try to apply in the daily chapter work.
