January 3, 2024 • 20 mins
Embark on a voyage from the heart of Houston to the ancient streets of Mesopotamia with your guide, a seasoned project management maven with three decades of experience. As we traverse time and space, I'll reveal how the innovative spirit of the Sumerians influences our contemporary quests for value delivery in project management. Houston's energy, medical, and space sectors serve as a modern-day Uruk, propelling us to foster growth and innovation. By unveiling SOOG Project Portfolio Management, the force behind our business moniker, Uruk Project Management, I set the stage for a series of enlightening conversations that marry the past with the present.
Imagine a place where continuous learning shapes the very fabric of project leadership. That's the world we'll explore together, touching on the 4pm framework that's at the core of our discussions—project, program, product, and portfolio management. As an advisor and executive consultant, my passion for education has been the compass guiding me from my engineering days in Houston to my consultancy in Dubai. Every episode promises insights, with guest speakers, case studies, and answers to those questions that keep you up at night. So, are you ready to question the status quo of project management and uncover strategies for success? Tune in and let's embark on this knowledge-rich journey together.
Explore more project management insights at www.urukpm.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Good day, howdy, and welcome to the 4pm podcast.
Who we are, who I am, where dowe come from and what will be
the purpose of this podcast isall about.
What are we trying to do withthis podcast?
First, where do we come from?
What do you think?
How are we doing as a projectmanagement domain?
(00:29):
Is the project managementdomain in good health or
something else?
And welcome to the 4pm podcast.
In this first episode we willbe talking about money topics
(00:49):
and, just to make anintroduction, so at least we
introduced you to who we are,who I am, where do we come from
and what will be the purpose ofthis podcast is all about.
You must take some notesbecause, who knows, we might be
quizzing you on this later.
Anyway, let's get going andtalk about what are we trying to
do with this podcast.
(01:10):
First, where do we come from?
We are recording this from thecity of Houston, in the state of
Texas and the United States ofAmerica.
Now I want to introduce Houstonas a city and why Houston?
(01:30):
Maybe was the choice for us tobe here.
Houston is globally famous,probably for three sectors and
one.
By the term sectors we meanindustries domain everybody
might use different terminologyfor this.
So Houston is one of the thingsknown for is like what I like
to call EMS, which means energy,medical and space.
(01:53):
In the energy sector, houstonis famous for many of the major
oil and gas operating companies,such as my ex-employers Exxon
Chemical, exxon.
Houston is quite famous for theenergy industry, primarily in
(02:31):
the petroleum industry.
However, nowadays it's startingto see a lot of what they call
the characterization ofrenewable energy, and a lot of
that is happening.
Recently, houston was engagedin the hiccups and the expansion
of 2011 to 2011, a harvest plus.
(03:00):
That's the first area thatHouston is famous for.
The second area that Houston isfamous for is medical, and I
(03:21):
think it's a well-known factthat the Houston Medical Center,
if not the largest, is one ofthe largest medical centers in
the world, where's a lot ofuniversity teaching, university
medical school research centers,cancer research and a lot of
leading hospital that attractpeople from all over the world.
So basically, obviously yousend it also famous for its
(03:44):
medical center.
The third one, and I think alot of people might know this
space, nasa and clear, like theyhave one of their I'm not sure
if it is their core headquarter,but is one of the major center,
where it used to be, thatinclude the control system and
the control Room that handlesall the different space program.
(04:06):
Obviously it's Houston is notthe only center for nasa, but
it's well known for thisindustry.
Now, in the coming days andfeet in the month and years and
future, there's a lot of techstart up happening in all these
industries.
So health tech, space tech,energy technology and technology
(04:26):
in general with a lot of techstart up, and this is one reason
we at the company are based inHouston.
So this is part one of myintroduction today.
Let me zoom into part two.
So we started to talk aboutHouston, which mean where we are
(04:47):
in history.
Today we are here.
In 2023 we are in Houston.
I want to jump back only a fewthousand years ago, about 4500
years before a common era, andto go back to Mesopotamia and
the Sumerian civilization.
Now, why do I want to go back?
(05:08):
Well, I'll tell you in a second, but first I need to tell you
what's so important about theSumerian civilization and it's
role and impact on history.
There is an interesting bookthat I like at called history
begins at Sumer, and this is abook written by Professor Sam.
(05:28):
You will know grammar and aKramer and in that book he
talked about 39 first.
That started.
That we know about, we stillpractice today that actually
originated in Sumeriancivilization.
For example, systems of laws,system of education first, love
songs, I believe, beer, thefirst wheel, and there are many,
(05:51):
many other things that therewere.
We have documentation Throughthe language they were writing,
through the uniform that waswritten thousands of years ago
and actually being carried overto today.
Now what's important about theSumerian civilization is that
one of the cities that became itwas considered probably the
(06:13):
most prominent city in that era,which is called Orook, and
obviously Orook is the name ofour company.
Now, orook was famous inhistory because in civilization
as well, for many reasons it wasconsidered quite innovative in
terms of architecture.
You know there's one famous forZiggurat.
(06:33):
There today we find a lot ofactually institution and company
carries that name, potentiallybecause of that, the history of
innovation that Orook has.
But probably some who intoliterature, they might know
Orook for something else whichis called the epic of Gilgamesh
At the famous epic.
(06:53):
Obviously I'm not an expert onthis topic so I'm not going to
go into it but, however, just togive you an introduction about
Orook as a major center ofinnovation and advancement, 4500
before BC, so basically beforecommon air.
Was that in mind?
(07:14):
And then, basically, obviously,we at the company and my late
partner never got held.
He actually chose this name forour platform that we are
building and, as a result ofthat, we end up basically
adopting that name as the doingbusiness.
As for our company, our companyname is actually so bad project
(07:35):
portfolio management Whereas aroot PM or a root project
management is the name of doingbusiness as so in the state of
Texas.
But you know, legally our nameis so good project portfolio
management.
However, we are doing businessas a root project management.
So here what we're trying to doto link history with, basically
(07:57):
, the name of our company.
Now, if you've noticed, andmaybe you didn't notice, I
haven't introduced myself and Iwanted to leave it in this
moment.
I wanted to start talking aboutthe Houston and history a
little bit before I introducemyself.
I'll try to keep theintroduction, my personal
(08:20):
introduction, short.
I'm sure you know on ourwebsite and if you Google me in
my name, you probably find quitea bit of information about me.
Well, as, keep it short andkeep it a bit fun or light.
I have been known or I have somenicknames that over the years
some of my professional studentsor others have labeled me or
(08:41):
called me, or they prefer tocall me, including the Iceman.
I don't know why, because I'mnot typically a cold person, but
that's sure what the reasonbehind that may be somebody, if
that person or the group ofpeople who actually labeled me
like this, if they are hearingthis podcast, we would welcome
their comment to say why I wascalled the Iceman.
(09:03):
If you see me with a full beard, a lot of people call me Santa
Claus and sometimes they startasking, said I, if I'm nice,
what kind of gift will I get?
Well, unfortunately I'm notSanta Claus, but I would be
happy to accommodate whenever Ican.
I've also been called PM coachbecause I do a lot of coaching
(09:24):
and mentoring over the yearsthrough our training program and
through informal training orinformal coaching and mentoring,
and recently, probably the mostcommon nickname I've used as
the Aruq coach, and obviouslythat's 10 because I'm the one
who designed and came up with anidea for the Aruq platform and
(09:47):
the one who are designing theprimary functionalities and
module within the Aruq platform,and I'm the one who's guiding
our newcomers through how to usethe Aruq platform.
So Aruq coach, probably themost current and most
appropriate.
Now, what's my name?
My name is Munir Azham.
I am a Lebanese immigrant.
(10:07):
I came to the US after highschool to study in the US.
While I was growing up, mycountry suffered through a civil
war.
I became a refugee for a whilewith my family.
I've lost a lot of friends andfamily.
There's the closest person frommy family that we lost as a
brother-in-law, so that's closeenough.
(10:29):
Unfortunately, we were again.
We were refugees for a while.
The house I grew up in wasburned down.
The villa we were building wasdemolished, so that part of the
horror of war that I grew upwith is, in a way, when I
reflect back on those years.
I look back with a positive,optimistic attitude.
(10:49):
That probably is that period.
At 14 years of age I became anadult very quickly and I start
to understand life maybe betterat a younger age and I'm very
sure a lot of what's happeningin that period is what formed
the person who I am today and myeagerness to share knowledge
(11:11):
and to mentor and coach all agesand groups and be there and to
try to do something and create alegacy where we can help
organization transform the waythey manage project to a higher
level.
Future topic we will talk aboutthese topics, for today I'm not
going to go there.
However, I want to emphasizethat probably growing up in a
(11:33):
civil war, seeing a lot ofdestruction around me, becoming
a refugee for a while, seeingpeople I care about lost, it
helped me shape the way I thinkand the way I have become.
Obviously, there are a lot ofother factors and you know that
things does not a single eventwill shape a person.
However, it's definitely was amajor part of my life and who I
(11:57):
am today.
Now, moving from serious to abit of joke, if I look at what
animal represent manure, well, Icould be a sheep, I am a tiger,
I'm a cougar or I'm a bear.
What does that mean?
Obviously, if some of those who, like you, know the zodiac sign
, I'm an aries.
If you like the Chinese zodiacs, I'm a tiger.
(12:18):
If you look at my firstuniversity, university of
Houston, I'm a cougar.
And if you look at where I didmy master's, university of
California at Berkeley, I'm abear.
So each one of these animalsactually have interesting
characteristics.
So which one have adopted.
Well, depend on the day I couldbe, my character or my reaction
(12:40):
to things could be different,obviously, often enough that,
basically, how can I say thatI'm mostly in aries?
But if you think about an aries, you know aries could be very
calm and good.
But don't mess with us, I guess, right.
Anyway, I'm not an expert onthis, what animals mean, but I
(13:02):
just wanted to have some somefun and a little bit of a
lighter mood and, you know,moving out from some sad part of
my life.
Now, who am I today?
I'm a project managementlearner.
I like to always learn.
I continue to learn.
Although I am more than 60years old, I believe learning
never stopped and I'll probablynever, never stop learning
(13:25):
learning about life, learningabout leadership, about business
, and obviously my core passionis project management in
community.
So I'm a learner by default,first and foremost as a result
of being a learner, obviously Ihave quite a bit of skills where
I can be an advisor and aneffective advisor, executive
(13:46):
advisor.
I can help executive and seniormanagement and even board of
director.
When it comes to my area ofpassion, project management, I
do have a lot of expertise thatI can share in a very open,
honest and transparent way andobviously in my career I had for
(14:06):
many, many years I led aconsultancy and training company
, so I've done a lot ofconsultancy and training in
project management.
As a result of that history andthat work, I am basically also a
writer.
I have about 17 ebookspublished with bookbunecom.
If you go to bookbunecom andyou can search on my name, you
(14:29):
will find many of my ebooks andthey are relatively cheap to
download if you want to learnabout some of the work I've done
.
In addition to this, I'vepublished many books.
Initially I self-publishedthree books and then CRC Press,
which is part of the Taylor andFrancis group, accepted some of
my work and then they publishedtwo books for me, one of them
(14:51):
called Project Management BeyondWaterfall and Agile, and the
other one is Leading MegaProject, a Tailored Approach.
Both of them are related to themethodology and the project
management work I have donesince 2007 and you know they are
actually the project managementbeyond waterfall and agile has
become the knowledge foundationfor the project management piece
(15:13):
of our Arup platform and I'msure in the future we might
touch on that.
I don't want to make it into acommercial today, so I'll stop
there.
History, my experience.
I've worked for oil and gas forabout 15 years after my
master's degree Exxon Chemical,basf, saudi Aramco.
Then I decided to launch my ownbusiness in Dubai, united Arab
(15:36):
Emirates, where I've launched aproject management consultants
in training business under thename of Sukad and that company
started in 2004.
I led it from 2005 to 2019 andthen in 2019 we took a few
friends and I have took the workthat I've done while I was with
(15:56):
Sukad at that period of timesaid we need to convert that
into a digital solution to helporganization transform the way
they manage project.
And that was when we shifted tothe US and started Sukad in the
US and now doing business as aRook project management, as I
mentioned earlier.
So basically I come to you withat least close to 35 years, 36
(16:20):
years of experience.
I started working in 1984 whileI was studying at University of
Houston, working in engineeringenvironment, and then I
graduated in 87 where I did two,three years of work in the
environmental, geotechnicalconsultancy engineering world
before I went back to Universityof California at Berkeley and I
(16:41):
did a master's in engineeringand construction management and
that was 1990 and with thatsince 1990, 33 years now, plus
as 100%, into project management, initially working for
corporation, as I mentionedExxon Chemical, basf, saudi
Aramco and then leading my ownbusiness in Sukad, and which is
(17:03):
continuing into today.
I'm going to close very quicklywith a few things about.
What is this 4pm podcast?
Well, obviously, the idea of4pm that's not necessarily 4 in
the afternoon, because you mightbe watching this at night or
anytime.
4pm's tent in this case it'sshortened for us for what we
(17:27):
call value delivery, which istranslated into the 4pm, which
means project program, productand portfolios.
So our focus in these podcastsin the future to talk about
project program, product,portfolio management, how we
deliver value to organization.
Why do we need to transform,how do we transform project
(17:49):
management, what do we offerthat is different than everybody
else and what is our missionand purpose in these areas.
So a lot of our topics will bearound these 4pm.
We might sideline sometime, getinto project leadership,
technology, ai, startup,entrepreneurship.
However, the core focus ofthese podcasts will be about the
(18:11):
4pm and value delivery.
With that, the topic we willdiscuss will include a general,
open topic, like I'm talkingtoday.
It could include some havingsome guests and interviews,
include discussion, some casestudies and anything else that
we believe will add value to you.
Of course, we are always opento hear your feedback and
(18:33):
opinion and asking questions,and maybe your question could
become the topic of a podcast inthe future.
I want to close here bymentioning what we talked about
today.
I introduced you that talked alittle bit about Houston, about
(18:53):
Rook and history.
We talk about the company, whoI am and what is this 4pm
podcast is all about.
Now, don't take these podcastsin isolation.
In the future, some of thesepodcasts would be helpful if you
see some graphics associatedwith the topic we talk about.
So we advise you to visit ourwebsite.
We have a tab called knowledgewhere we include there all the
(19:16):
knowledge resources, includingmaybe some paper.
We will publish our podcast, alink, video links, blog, article
.
So sometime when the topic thatmight require some you know
heavy visualization, maybe avideo.
If you go to that section, youwill be able to find a video or
an article with some graphicsthat can help you better
(19:37):
understand our view on the topic.
Before I close, I want to leaveyou with a thought, something to
think about, point to ponder,to consider and to let me meet
again, and this will be thetopic for the next episode,
which is the question is I posefor you today.
Is the project managementdomain in good health?
(19:57):
We, as people who work in thisdomain, do we think we have a
healthy environment?
Our work environment is good.
The field, the domain by itselfis healthy, or what else is it
not?
Is it in a great shape?
Is it in a bad shape?
Is it in a good shape but cantake improvement?
Whatever, feel free to to chatwith us online, to post on our
(20:22):
link in or on these podcastsyour view on the topic, and with
this I close by saying we wishyou success today, tomorrow and
always.
Good day, howdy, and welcome to the 4pm podcast.
Who we are, who I am, where dowe come from and what will be
the purpose of this podcast isall about.
What are we trying to do withthis podcast?
First, where do we come from?
What do you think?
How are we doing as a projectmanagement domain?
(00:29):
Is the project managementdomain in good health or
something else?
And welcome to the 4pm podcast.
In this first episode we willbe talking about money topics
(00:49):
and, just to make anintroduction, so at least we
introduced you to who we are,who I am, where do we come from
and what will be the purpose ofthis podcast is all about.
You must take some notesbecause, who knows, we might be
quizzing you on this later.
Anyway, let's get going andtalk about what are we trying to
do with this podcast.
(01:10):
First, where do we come from?
We are recording this from thecity of Houston, in the state of
Texas and the United States ofAmerica.
Now I want to introduce Houstonas a city and why Houston?
(01:30):
Maybe was the choice for us tobe here.
Houston is globally famous,probably for three sectors and
one.
By the term sectors we meanindustries domain everybody
might use different terminologyfor this.
So Houston is one of the thingsknown for is like what I like
to call EMS, which means energy,medical and space.
(01:53):
In the energy sector, houstonis famous for many of the major
oil and gas operating companies,such as my ex-employers Exxon
Chemical, exxon.
Houston is quite famous for theenergy industry, primarily in
(02:31):
the petroleum industry.
However, nowadays it's startingto see a lot of what they call
the characterization ofrenewable energy, and a lot of
that is happening.
Recently, houston was engagedin the hiccups and the expansion
of 2011 to 2011, a harvest plus.
(03:00):
That's the first area thatHouston is famous for.
The second area that Houston isfamous for is medical, and I
(03:21):
think it's a well-known factthat the Houston Medical Center,
if not the largest, is one ofthe largest medical centers in
the world, where's a lot ofuniversity teaching, university
medical school research centers,cancer research and a lot of
leading hospital that attractpeople from all over the world.
So basically, obviously yousend it also famous for its
(03:44):
medical center.
The third one, and I think alot of people might know this
space, nasa and clear, like theyhave one of their I'm not sure
if it is their core headquarter,but is one of the major center,
where it used to be, thatinclude the control system and
the control Room that handlesall the different space program.
(04:06):
Obviously it's Houston is notthe only center for nasa, but
it's well known for thisindustry.
Now, in the coming days andfeet in the month and years and
future, there's a lot of techstart up happening in all these
industries.
So health tech, space tech,energy technology and technology
(04:26):
in general with a lot of techstart up, and this is one reason
we at the company are based inHouston.
So this is part one of myintroduction today.
Let me zoom into part two.
So we started to talk aboutHouston, which mean where we are
(04:47):
in history.
Today we are here.
In 2023 we are in Houston.
I want to jump back only a fewthousand years ago, about 4500
years before a common era, andto go back to Mesopotamia and
the Sumerian civilization.
Now, why do I want to go back?
(05:08):
Well, I'll tell you in a second, but first I need to tell you
what's so important about theSumerian civilization and it's
role and impact on history.
There is an interesting bookthat I like at called history
begins at Sumer, and this is abook written by Professor Sam.
(05:28):
You will know grammar and aKramer and in that book he
talked about 39 first.
That started.
That we know about, we stillpractice today that actually
originated in Sumeriancivilization.
For example, systems of laws,system of education first, love
songs, I believe, beer, thefirst wheel, and there are many,
(05:51):
many other things that therewere.
We have documentation Throughthe language they were writing,
through the uniform that waswritten thousands of years ago
and actually being carried overto today.
Now what's important about theSumerian civilization is that
one of the cities that became itwas considered probably the
(06:13):
most prominent city in that era,which is called Orook, and
obviously Orook is the name ofour company.
Now, orook was famous inhistory because in civilization
as well, for many reasons it wasconsidered quite innovative in
terms of architecture.
You know there's one famous forZiggurat.
(06:33):
There today we find a lot ofactually institution and company
carries that name, potentiallybecause of that, the history of
innovation that Orook has.
But probably some who intoliterature, they might know
Orook for something else whichis called the epic of Gilgamesh
At the famous epic.
(06:53):
Obviously I'm not an expert onthis topic so I'm not going to
go into it but, however, just togive you an introduction about
Orook as a major center ofinnovation and advancement, 4500
before BC, so basically beforecommon air.
Was that in mind?
(07:14):
And then, basically, obviously,we at the company and my late
partner never got held.
He actually chose this name forour platform that we are
building and, as a result ofthat, we end up basically
adopting that name as the doingbusiness.
As for our company, our companyname is actually so bad project
(07:35):
portfolio management Whereas aroot PM or a root project
management is the name of doingbusiness as so in the state of
Texas.
But you know, legally our nameis so good project portfolio
management.
However, we are doing businessas a root project management.
So here what we're trying to doto link history with, basically
(07:57):
, the name of our company.
Now, if you've noticed, andmaybe you didn't notice, I
haven't introduced myself and Iwanted to leave it in this
moment.
I wanted to start talking aboutthe Houston and history a
little bit before I introducemyself.
I'll try to keep theintroduction, my personal
(08:20):
introduction, short.
I'm sure you know on ourwebsite and if you Google me in
my name, you probably find quitea bit of information about me.
Well, as, keep it short andkeep it a bit fun or light.
I have been known or I have somenicknames that over the years
some of my professional studentsor others have labeled me or
(08:41):
called me, or they prefer tocall me, including the Iceman.
I don't know why, because I'mnot typically a cold person, but
that's sure what the reasonbehind that may be somebody, if
that person or the group ofpeople who actually labeled me
like this, if they are hearingthis podcast, we would welcome
their comment to say why I wascalled the Iceman.
(09:03):
If you see me with a full beard, a lot of people call me Santa
Claus and sometimes they startasking, said I, if I'm nice,
what kind of gift will I get?
Well, unfortunately I'm notSanta Claus, but I would be
happy to accommodate whenever Ican.
I've also been called PM coachbecause I do a lot of coaching
(09:24):
and mentoring over the yearsthrough our training program and
through informal training orinformal coaching and mentoring,
and recently, probably the mostcommon nickname I've used as
the Aruq coach, and obviouslythat's 10 because I'm the one
who designed and came up with anidea for the Aruq platform and
(09:47):
the one who are designing theprimary functionalities and
module within the Aruq platform,and I'm the one who's guiding
our newcomers through how to usethe Aruq platform.
So Aruq coach, probably themost current and most
appropriate.
Now, what's my name?
My name is Munir Azham.
I am a Lebanese immigrant.
(10:07):
I came to the US after highschool to study in the US.
While I was growing up, mycountry suffered through a civil
war.
I became a refugee for a whilewith my family.
I've lost a lot of friends andfamily.
There's the closest person frommy family that we lost as a
brother-in-law, so that's closeenough.
(10:29):
Unfortunately, we were again.
We were refugees for a while.
The house I grew up in wasburned down.
The villa we were building wasdemolished, so that part of the
horror of war that I grew upwith is, in a way, when I
reflect back on those years.
I look back with a positive,optimistic attitude.
(10:49):
That probably is that period.
At 14 years of age I became anadult very quickly and I start
to understand life maybe betterat a younger age and I'm very
sure a lot of what's happeningin that period is what formed
the person who I am today and myeagerness to share knowledge
(11:11):
and to mentor and coach all agesand groups and be there and to
try to do something and create alegacy where we can help
organization transform the waythey manage project to a higher
level.
Future topic we will talk aboutthese topics, for today I'm not
going to go there.
However, I want to emphasizethat probably growing up in a
(11:33):
civil war, seeing a lot ofdestruction around me, becoming
a refugee for a while, seeingpeople I care about lost, it
helped me shape the way I thinkand the way I have become.
Obviously, there are a lot ofother factors and you know that
things does not a single eventwill shape a person.
However, it's definitely was amajor part of my life and who I
(11:57):
am today.
Now, moving from serious to abit of joke, if I look at what
animal represent manure, well, Icould be a sheep, I am a tiger,
I'm a cougar or I'm a bear.
What does that mean?
Obviously, if some of those who, like you, know the zodiac sign
, I'm an aries.
If you like the Chinese zodiacs, I'm a tiger.
(12:18):
If you look at my firstuniversity, university of
Houston, I'm a cougar.
And if you look at where I didmy master's, university of
California at Berkeley, I'm abear.
So each one of these animalsactually have interesting
characteristics.
So which one have adopted.
Well, depend on the day I couldbe, my character or my reaction
(12:40):
to things could be different,obviously, often enough that,
basically, how can I say thatI'm mostly in aries?
But if you think about an aries, you know aries could be very
calm and good.
But don't mess with us, I guess, right.
Anyway, I'm not an expert onthis, what animals mean, but I
(13:02):
just wanted to have some somefun and a little bit of a
lighter mood and, you know,moving out from some sad part of
my life.
Now, who am I today?
I'm a project managementlearner.
I like to always learn.
I continue to learn.
Although I am more than 60years old, I believe learning
never stopped and I'll probablynever, never stop learning
(13:25):
learning about life, learningabout leadership, about business
, and obviously my core passionis project management in
community.
So I'm a learner by default,first and foremost as a result
of being a learner, obviously Ihave quite a bit of skills where
I can be an advisor and aneffective advisor, executive
(13:46):
advisor.
I can help executive and seniormanagement and even board of
director.
When it comes to my area ofpassion, project management, I
do have a lot of expertise thatI can share in a very open,
honest and transparent way andobviously in my career I had for
(14:06):
many, many years I led aconsultancy and training company
, so I've done a lot ofconsultancy and training in
project management.
As a result of that history andthat work, I am basically also a
writer.
I have about 17 ebookspublished with bookbunecom.
If you go to bookbunecom andyou can search on my name, you
(14:29):
will find many of my ebooks andthey are relatively cheap to
download if you want to learnabout some of the work I've done
.
In addition to this, I'vepublished many books.
Initially I self-publishedthree books and then CRC Press,
which is part of the Taylor andFrancis group, accepted some of
my work and then they publishedtwo books for me, one of them
(14:51):
called Project Management BeyondWaterfall and Agile, and the
other one is Leading MegaProject, a Tailored Approach.
Both of them are related to themethodology and the project
management work I have donesince 2007 and you know they are
actually the project managementbeyond waterfall and agile has
become the knowledge foundationfor the project management piece
(15:13):
of our Arup platform and I'msure in the future we might
touch on that.
I don't want to make it into acommercial today, so I'll stop
there.
History, my experience.
I've worked for oil and gas forabout 15 years after my
master's degree Exxon Chemical,basf, saudi Aramco.
Then I decided to launch my ownbusiness in Dubai, united Arab
(15:36):
Emirates, where I've launched aproject management consultants
in training business under thename of Sukad and that company
started in 2004.
I led it from 2005 to 2019 andthen in 2019 we took a few
friends and I have took the workthat I've done while I was with
(15:56):
Sukad at that period of timesaid we need to convert that
into a digital solution to helporganization transform the way
they manage project.
And that was when we shifted tothe US and started Sukad in the
US and now doing business as aRook project management, as I
mentioned earlier.
So basically I come to you withat least close to 35 years, 36
(16:20):
years of experience.
I started working in 1984 whileI was studying at University of
Houston, working in engineeringenvironment, and then I
graduated in 87 where I did two,three years of work in the
environmental, geotechnicalconsultancy engineering world
before I went back to Universityof California at Berkeley and I
(16:41):
did a master's in engineeringand construction management and
that was 1990 and with thatsince 1990, 33 years now, plus
as 100%, into project management, initially working for
corporation, as I mentionedExxon Chemical, basf, saudi
Aramco and then leading my ownbusiness in Sukad, and which is
(17:03):
continuing into today.
I'm going to close very quicklywith a few things about.
What is this 4pm podcast?
Well, obviously, the idea of4pm that's not necessarily 4 in
the afternoon, because you mightbe watching this at night or
anytime.
4pm's tent in this case it'sshortened for us for what we
(17:27):
call value delivery, which istranslated into the 4pm, which
means project program, productand portfolios.
So our focus in these podcastsin the future to talk about
project program, product,portfolio management, how we
deliver value to organization.
Why do we need to transform,how do we transform project
(17:49):
management, what do we offerthat is different than everybody
else and what is our missionand purpose in these areas.
So a lot of our topics will bearound these 4pm.
We might sideline sometime, getinto project leadership,
technology, ai, startup,entrepreneurship.
However, the core focus ofthese podcasts will be about the
(18:11):
4pm and value delivery.
With that, the topic we willdiscuss will include a general,
open topic, like I'm talkingtoday.
It could include some havingsome guests and interviews,
include discussion, some casestudies and anything else that
we believe will add value to you.
Of course, we are always opento hear your feedback and
(18:33):
opinion and asking questions,and maybe your question could
become the topic of a podcast inthe future.
I want to close here bymentioning what we talked about
today.
I introduced you that talked alittle bit about Houston, about
(18:53):
Rook and history.
We talk about the company, whoI am and what is this 4pm
podcast is all about.
Now, don't take these podcastsin isolation.
In the future, some of thesepodcasts would be helpful if you
see some graphics associatedwith the topic we talk about.
So we advise you to visit ourwebsite.
We have a tab called knowledgewhere we include there all the
(19:16):
knowledge resources, includingmaybe some paper.
We will publish our podcast, alink, video links, blog, article
.
So sometime when the topic thatmight require some you know
heavy visualization, maybe avideo.
If you go to that section, youwill be able to find a video or
an article with some graphicsthat can help you better
(19:37):
understand our view on the topic.
Before I close, I want to leaveyou with a thought, something to
think about, point to ponder,to consider and to let me meet
again, and this will be thetopic for the next episode,
which is the question is I posefor you today.
Is the project managementdomain in good health?
(19:57):
We, as people who work in thisdomain, do we think we have a
healthy environment?
Our work environment is good.
The field, the domain by itselfis healthy, or what else is it
not?
Is it in a great shape?
Is it in a bad shape?
Is it in a good shape but cantake improvement?
Whatever, feel free to to chatwith us online, to post on our
(20:22):
link in or on these podcastsyour view on the topic, and with
this I close by saying we wishyou success today, tomorrow and
always.
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