Popular speaker and best-selling PM author Neal Whitten is a frequent speaker at conferences, seminars, workshops and special events—serving private companies, institutions and public organizations. His motivational messages include subjects on personal performance, soft skills, leadership and all aspects of project management. There is no limitation to audience size. Presentations typically span from an hour to a day, but can be longer.
Listed here are many of the more popular speaking topics; however, topics can cover a much broader area than shown here, as well as be tailored to your organization/gathering.
Note: Once the “hard” skills of project management are reasonably in play on your project or in your organization, it’s time to bring Neal in to teach the leadership and soft skills that are required for consistent success… and to be the best.
Behaviors that Lead to Exceptional Performance
Success does not just happen—it is made to happen. Success is born of behaviors and choices that lead to exceptional performance. Neal Whitten reveals leading edge best-practice behaviors that will promote your professional and personal success. Some of these behaviors—intentionally or not—are often avoided. As you strive to achieve your dreams, these behaviors can lay the foundation for your journey. Be prepared to rethink what constitutes effective behavior. You won’t want to miss this! The presentation is largely based on Neal’s best-selling PM book, Neal Whitten’s Let’s Talk! More No-Nonsense Project Advice—Over 700 Q&As!
Are You Too Soft?
Most project managers—most leaders—are not consistently willing to make the tough and unpopular project-related decisions, even though their instincts warn them that they are not taking the most effective action. Witness examples of project manager actions (or inactions) that are indicative of too-soft behavior. Will you recognize familiar behavior? You don’t have to be rude, insensitive, arrogant or a bully to avoid being too soft. None of these attributes is acceptable—ever! Be prepared to rethink what constitutes effective project management and leadership behavior.
Effective Time Management to Getting More Done Every Day
Success at work and in your life overall is largely not about how much time you have but how you invest the time you have. Would you like to hone your time management skills? Are you looking for that edge that allows you to complete work in less time, get more done each day, waste less time, find more free time, take control of your day, improve your reputation and lower your stress? This presentation is loaded with ideas to help you make the best use of your time. Effective time management can significantly and positively affect the rest of your life; it’s truly a game changer.
Behaviors to Master When Dealing with Your Leaders
Your leaders want you to know—need you to know—the behaviors they consistently expect from you. Just because you have a leadership role doesn’t mean you are living up to their expectations. Not only will Neal Whitten identify what your boss expects from you, he will articulate what you expect from those under your direction. Topics include: don’t take it personally, don’t dump and run, make it brief, offer professional criticism, bring solutions with problems, wear one face, and many more. Learn how you can enhance your image, effectiveness, and career—while making your leaders’ jobs easier.
Client Satisfaction Surveys: Gauging Project Success
Client Satisfaction Surveys are surprisingly not commonly utilized on most projects. Based on their value in influencing the success of a project and increasing the likelihood of the success of the resulting product or service being created, these surveys are clearly a missed opportunity. Neal demystifies Client Satisfaction Surveys and shows you how to create and implement surveys during a project and at the completion of a project. As a project manager, if you do not routinely survey your clients for feedback, then you cannot really know what they think about your performance, the project’s progress and whether or not you are meeting their expectations.
Achieving the Elusive Work-Life Balance
If you have difficulty in juggling the demands of your job and your non-work life, you’re not alone. Many people feel like their lives are overcommitted and see no relief in sight. Nowadays work-life balance can seem like an unrealistic objective and can seem more elusive than ever. Join me as I reveal tips that can help you achieve the harmony and integration that is most important to you. Included is a questionnaire to self-assess your work-life balance. This session could change your life!
What Makes a Team Member Valuable
If you were building a team and could hand pick its members, what are the key attributes that you would look for? What? You say that the team has already been assembled and you must deal with the cards that you have been dealt? Okay, this is likely the case for most project managers. But that doesn’t absolve you of your duty to lay out a vision for the members and teach them what you expect from them: the behaviors and actions necessary for both them and the team to perform at its best and collaborate with one another. Come listen in as Neal reveals the key behaviors and actions that every leader would like to see in each of their team members… and then promote this shared vision with your team.
Dealing with Difficult People: 15 Tips to Stay in Control
We all encounter difficult people in the workplace. We may be that way ourselves from time to time. How effective you are at dealing with difficult people has a direct impact on how successful you become and can affect your job advancement, your relationships, your overall confidence and even your health. This presentation defines 15 actions that you can employ to stay in control. By demonstrating self-control, you are better prepared for dealing with almost any situation and any individual. Stuff’s going to happen but you don’t have to accept being the victim. You have choices.
15 Actions to Build Your Self-Confidence
Almost everyone suffers from low self-confidence at some time; while many people struggle with self-confidence issues regularly. Low self-confidence will hold you back from achieving your potential. It can cause you to miss out on many opportunities and leave you with a less happy, satisfying and fulfilling life. The good news? Self-confidence can be learned, practiced and become a core part of who you choose to be. This session will show you how and presents 15 actions that can build your self-confidence. Mastering self-confidence can change the rest of your life.
Reality Check of Leadership Myths
There are tell-tale signs of a strong leader—as well as a weak one. As disheartening as it might be to admit, weak leadership is far more pervasive than strong leadership. In this presentation, Neal Whitten will reveal examples of common myths about what it takes to be an effective leader as well as the reality check related to each myth. We need to look at ineffective behaviors and thinking patterns to better understand our own performance, because ultimately you’re the one who makes success happen. Success is not acquired through luck, accident or lots of hope. It’s the direct result of deliberate choices and actions.
Eight Dumb Project Management Beliefs
There is much more to learn within the project management profession than meets the eye of the casual practitioner/observer. Many of the lessons are not obvious but become clearer once we have been exposed to them. In this seminar Neal Whitten reveals eight commonly held beliefs that are thought to be true, but all are false. Examples include: If you don’t lead project members, they will lead themselves and Committed dates are fixed. Be prepared for some “Aha!” moments.
Eight Life/Work Lessons to Help You Be Your Best
As leaders, we can benefit from listening to the wisdom gained from those who have gone before us. While working on my new book, The Gift of Wisdom: Lessons for a Lifetime, I interviewed 25 US citizens aged 67 to 87 who roughly represent the ethnic, religious, economic and social groups that make up the country. I found that many of their hard-earned lessons correlate well with the needs of becoming more effective project leaders. This presentation reveals eight key life/work lessons. The best leaders take deliberate actions, demonstrate discipline, learn from the past (but live in the present), listen to their instincts, make tough decisions, make time to have fun, put things in perspective and evaluate themselves daily. Is this you? If not, it can be!
Life Lessons
Are you living the life you most imagined? Veteran author Neal Whitten interviewed 25 elder Americans, roughly representing the country’s diversity, to capture the wisdom that they have acquired over their lives. Neal then recorded over 1000 unique passages of their life lessons into the book, The Gift of Wisdom: Lessons for a Lifetime. Neal has selected some of those lessons to share with you—lessons that may challenge you to reflect on your own philosophies and beliefs on living life. These lessons can help you be more on-point and deliberate with your life so you experience a more effective, balanced and full life—both at work and personally. This thought-provoking presentation reveals choices to make and behaviors to adopt that are essential in attaining the life you most imagine.
Samples of More Presentation Topics
Here are more topics. You can find additional topics under Neal Whitten Professional Development Day.
- Change the Culture in Your Organization—Project by Project
- Escalate Is Not a Dirty Word
- Is Your Professional Behavior Respected?
- Recognize and Deal with Professional Immaturity
- Top Ten Mistakes in Conducting Lessons Learned
- What Good Is a Mentor?
- How to Say “No” Professionally
- How to Manage Your Workday Time
- 10 Duties that Define the Difference Between a Senior Project Manager and a Project Manager
- Actions to Help You Successfully Work from Home
- Top Ten Reasons Why Projects Fail – and What You Can Do to Avoid Failure
- Turn Criticism into an Asset
- The Roles & Responsibilities of a Project Manager
- The Roles & Responsibilities of a Resource Manager
- The Roles & Responsibilities of a Project Sponsor
- The Roles and Responsibilities of a Business Analyst
- Promote the Advancement of Project Management in Your Organization