Book Reviews x 2, and an important reminder!

I got some time during a recent vacation to finish a couple of project management books (yes, he said exasperatedly, he sometimes reads project management books during vacation). And, rather than boring you with long reviews, I'm going to take the lazy approach - I'll give a very short review and then refer you to reviews with which I agree!

The first book I'd like to cover (excuse the pun) is "Emotional Intelligence for Project Managers", by Anthony Mersino. Of the two books, this one is by far the longer. It's a great read, and I've already referred to it on my blog. I'm actually planning to switch over to this book in the Project Management HR course that I teach. It's much more significant, recent, and personal of a book than the ones I've used in the past.

What I liked about the book:

-Frank discussion
-Practical tools (see the appendices)
-Specific references to how to use email, IM and other communications tools

Again, I don't want to write a whole review, mainly due to laziness, but also because the work has already been done.

So, go have a look at the review on this AllPM.com page.

Bottom line: if I feel strongly enough about the book to use it in one of my courses, you know that it's a strong recommend! Also, visit Anthony's excellent blog, EQ4PM.

The second book I'd like to reference to you is "The One-Page Project Manager", by Clark A. Campbell. This is a book based almost entirely on the use of a tool developed at Clark's company. I applaud Clark and his company for sharing this tool with the "project management public". The book explains the history and development of the tool and goes into the detail of how to populate it.

My reaction is that this tool applies some of the same prinicples that are used in the "Quality Function Deployment (QFD)" or "House of Quality" model, in that it relates attributes graphically to give a summary picture in a very easy-to-understand format. In the case of QFD this is about developing a product or service to satisfy customer requirements. In the case of The One-Pange Project Manager, it's about seeing a view of a project on one A4 or 8.5 inch by 11 inch sheet of paper.

Bottom line: I think Cambpell does a very good job of explaining how the tool works, and more importantly, I think the tool would work. I want to test drive it a bit first. He's had great results with it at his (and other) companies, but I still want to see how the project managers at my company react to it.

Click right here for a nice short review of the book.

And now, an important reminder.

I notice that the Fiddler on the Project surveys responses have slowed to a trickle. My co-author and I are anxious to include your ideas! If you've subscribed to this blog, that means you must have some interest and probably expereince in Project Management. That means we are interested in having you participate in our collaborative writing experiment. Please visit our wiki site, or if you want to jump right to our survey, with which you can also particpate immediately, go to the survey site now. We need your help!

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