Announcing the first interactive community for project managers

The APM Group, the examination body for PRINCE2, has launched a website and Interactive Community of Practice (ICP) for Project Managers: www.apmg-icp.com. Nothing like it exists within the project management community at present.



APMGís ICP is specifically designed as a user-driven community, allowing participants to collaborate directly, with members using one another as sounding boards, imparting knowledge and learning from each other. It brings people together with a variety of backgrounds and experience from across all sectors of the economy so that they can find common cause in building best practice, solving problems, learning and developing new ideas.

The ICP has three levels. The first is an information area that provides useful information and is accessible to everyone. At the second level there is a community of interest designed for information gatherers who want to know more and start to become more involved. At the third stage there is a true community of practice, where the sharing of knowledge, ideas and experience between participants will develop ever improving personal and organisational best practice, with a wide variety of tools and resources to facilitate this process. Of the three levels, the first is free of charge, and the second and third layers require subscription.

Explaining the rationale behind the launch, Richard Pharro, managing director, APMG, comments, ìAPMG has a unique Opinion Formersí Club which meets three times a year. During the small gatherings, we discuss with working programme and project managers what they really need in order to improve their skills. We discovered they wanted more networking opportunities and the ability to share knowledge. Often Project Mangers are somewhat isolated in their organisations, with a huge amount of responsibility placed on their shoulders. A community where they can really share their knowledge but donít have to leave their working environments seemed the obvious way to help them.î

Pharro explains that ICP participants will recognise that knowledge can be shared without being lost and that in the process of sharing it, knowledge actually multiplies. ìInnovation is, after all, no more and no less than the recombination of existing knowledge ñ but in new, better and different ways,î Pharro says.

ìBecause communities of practice are voluntary and informal,î he continues, ìthey benefit from cultivation but not from control. However,î he says, ìcommunities like this need support and a wide variety of tools to enable the easy exchange and sharing of tips, ideas, knowledge and experience. As an independent Accreditation, Certification and Examination Body, APMG is ideally suited to offer this support and enable the community to develop.î

Organisations that join the ICP will have a new arena for solving problems and gain access to a much wider range of perspectives on issues they confront. They will also have a quick source of answers to questions, all of which reduce time and costs and improve the quality of decisions made. In the longer term, they will increase their ability to build and retain talent and find they have newfound capacity for starting or participating in knowledge-development projects. Over time they will have a means to benchmark how their own processes and skills base compare with others, will be able to tap into new capabilities and also ensure that they stay at the forefront of relevant developments.

Individuals who join or participate will find that they have help with new or unfamiliar challenges, access to expertise, and the reassurance that comes from finding that others have wrestled with the same or similar problems. They will also find they have a new and meaningful way to participate, as well as a sense of belonging to a field of growing expertise. In the long term they will have a forum in which they can go on developing their skills and knowledge, benefit from othersí experience, network to stay abreast of new ideas and enhance their own professional reputation.

ìAPMGís ICP offers ways to manage and create knowledge that surpass static document databases and opens the door to many of the ideals of becoming a learning organisation,î Pharro says. ìParticipation fosters an environment that is conducive to learning, opens up organisational boundaries and provides a stimulus for the exchange of ideas.î