NASA and astronomers around the world are perplexed by the most mysterious star in the universe. Something massive and unpredictable is blocking the light coming from a distant star known as KIC 8462852, which is also known as Tabby’s Star

Talking about the two-and-a-half-year-long construction of the new home for the Atlanta Braves baseball team, SunTrust Park.

What should a project manager do with this latest edition of the PMBOK Guide? In this podcast, join the Manage This crew for practical, strategic advice regarding this latest update to the industry standard.

ANDY CROWE ● BILL YATES ● NICK WALKER ● ROGER DUKE NICK WALKER:  Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers.  Every other week we get together to discuss the topics that matter to you, whether you’re in charge of a large team in an international company or leading a small group in a local business.  The guiding principles are the same, and we want to share them with you through the eyes of others who are doing the stuff of project management. I’m your host, Nick Walker, and with me are the resident experts, Andy Crowe and Bill Yates.  And Andy, talk about experts, we have someone in the studio today who is not only in the thick of managing projects himself, but he teaches others and is involved in numerous community projects. ANDY CROWE:  And a really smart guest, as well.  This is going to be a good one.  And I think his passion is going to connect with a lot of our listeners’ passions. NICK WALKER:  Well, let’s meet him.  Roger Duke is the engineering project manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River site, where he has been for the past 40 years.  He’s also currently assigned as the Agile coach for the first Agile project there.  He holds mechanical engineering degrees from Auburn University and the University of South Carolina.  He is an adjunct professor at Augusta University Hull School of Business, teaching project management.  He is a newspaper columnist, a conference speaker, and has served as director and officer of more than 10 nonprofit organizations.  Roger, welcome to Manage This. ROGER DUKE:  Thank you, Nick.  Glad to be here. NICK WALKER:  Now, I know one thing that you are involved in is the community.  It’s important to be involved in the community.  How can project managers be involved, and why is that important to you? ROGER DUKE:  Well, one thing that I discovered in some of my organizations I worked in is that, when you build a board for a nonprofit, they typically look at things like legal, marketing, businesses that can be sponsors.  And when I got in there, I found out that these organizations are great at coming up with ideas and dreams, but they don’t know how to implement them.  And there was a niche for somebody on the board to actually follow through and do something; okay?  And that’s where the project management approach or significance came in is that they can come up with the ideas, but you need somebody on the board to actually execute them. ANDY CROWE:  And you know, Roger, I’ve experienced that, as well.  I’ve been on fewer than you have, but quite a few boards.  And what you have is a lot of passion, and then sometimes they struggle with process.  And sometimes they downright resist process, I’ve found, because it gets in the way of the passion.  You know, there’s all this energy, all this passion, and project managers can maybe help channel that. ROGER DUKE:  There were a couple of big projects that were sitting out there, ready to do, but the sponsors that were supporting them were going to take their money away because nothing was happening, you know.  And so I just stepped up for one in particular to put a marquee on an historic theater, and it was just a great project, very exciting, big difference, big impact on the community because of its visibility. And that’s when I realized project managers need to be on the boards.  You’ve got to have somebody with that perspective on how you’re going to actually execute and make something happen.  And it just grew from there.  And so as I got more involved in the community and different organizations, I would just take on projects at each of those and really could make a difference. BILL YATES:  One of the things that we talk about in the role of project manager is project managers get things done.  You know, we’ve had PMs sit in here and talk about, well, my CEO had a vision, but I had to come alongside and get that vision and break it down and then recruit a team...

Jesse Fewell joins the cast of Manage This to discuss Agile in the 6th Edition PMBOK® Guide. He explains how Agile got in the PMBOK® Guide and describes how PMI and the Agile Alliance came together to author the Agile Practice Guide.

This podcast is filled with wisdom from Mike Plant, former Olympian and President of Development with the Atlanta Braves. He joins the cast of Manage This to share his outlook on leadership and perseverance as well as his role in the SunTrust Park project.

Chuck Casto joins the cast to continue the discussion of the Fukushima disaster. We take a deeper dive into lessons learned, working with another culture in a crisis and the commendable leadership that he witnessed.

One of the largest earthquakes generated a major tsunami, causing nearly 20,000 deaths. These catastrophes caused a release of radioactive materials from the Fukushima nuclear power plant. Tune in to hear Chuck Casto’s role in the recovery process.

This episode is packed with interesting content on the rebuilding of the I-85 Bridge that collapsed after a massive fire in Atlanta, GA. Tune in now to hear GDOT's Director of Construction, Marc Mastronardi discuss all aspects of the project.

Picking up where we left off with Steve Nedvidek, he continues to share the importance of innovation and change management. He dives deeper into the culture of Chick-fil-A and innovation process – Understand, Imagine, Prototype, Validate and Launch.