Eric Verzuh

The Fast Forward MBA in Project Management

4 stars (An active project manager ..) - Well - the book is good, provided you're an active project manager doing stuff day-in, day-out and wanna improve on few things here and there, looking for new processes or a way to understand what I am not doing correct here. Basically - I would recommend this book to such a person as more or less a hands-on restrospective guide to understanding what can be done better. Why 4 stars: I found quite a few chapters to be pretty useless. The good chapters - are really, really good. Concise, precise information - good. But you can safely skip through a large portion of quite a few chapters. Finally - (not me) but any readers thinking of a PMI and wants to purchase this book - stay away. This is NOT certificate oriented; this is a pure practical pratitioning people's guide and reference. 5 stars (Teams Matter) - As a communication trainer, I found this book to have the best written section on communication, leadership and teams that I've seen in all the project management books I've read. I especially appreciate the over-arching framework of the way Mr. Verzuh ties the need to build an effective team into project management success, pointing out that managers are unlikely to be evaluated on their teambuilding talents (or rewarded for them), but that their success depends on it. Great stuff. 3 stars (Okay--but overrated because ignores its source.) - Really, the first and better introductory PM book was The Complete Idiot's Guide to Project Management by Dr. Sunny Baker and contains better humor and more real world experience, especially the second edition, available for download. The third edition has more information for those interested in PMI certificates (which I think are not as important as some think--but it was added to the third edition which I admire.) Really. Try the Complete Idiot's Guide to PM, in spite of the title. I know, you don't want it on your desk. But Baker's earlier works (On Time On Budget and then the late...
John Wiley - Sons :: Reference - General :: Project Management :: Business & Economics & Finance :: Eric Verzuh :: :: The Fast Forward MBA in Project Management