ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Writing a book was something I always told people I would never do. My excuse was that I was an instructor and I wouldn’t know how to put my arm flailing and other gestures on paper. I’m not quite sure who it was that caused my brain to stop listening to all my excuses.

First and foremost, I thank my students, who brought to my attention that they couldn’t find many books that taught them “how to do it.” They would say that there were plenty of books that told them what project management is, but very few that actually taught them anything they could actually use. They wanted a book that they could refer to that would help them recall how the process works and how the tools and techniques can be used in their jobs and their daily lives. Here you go. I’m taking you through all those examples we talked about in class.

I would like to give a huge acknowledgment to my good friend Toni Hodges DeTuncq, who authored Linking Learning and Performance and shared with me all the tools and techniques she used in writing her book.

I also thank Arnold Hill and Tim McConaghy, who both gave me the opportunity to try my techniques on their daunting projects and to prove to myself and to them that those techniques really did work. I want to give special thanks to Tim for helping me edit this book while he studied for his Project Management Professional (PMP) certification exam.

Above all I thank my friend and love, Fred Miller, who put up with my confidence swings and took quite a bit of his own free time to help copyedit this book. I also thank him for his encouragement throughout this process.