Audio Transcription
Ben Aston:
Thank you for tuning in. This is Ben Aston. It’s the Digital Project Manager podcast. Today, Natalie Semczuk joins me. Natalie, thank you for joining us today. This is the first digital project management podcast to ever be recorded. Natalie is also the first guest to return to the show. Today we will be discussing project failure. We’ll be discussing Lessons Learned and Natalie’s DPMish newsletter. And anything else that comes to mind. Let me tell you about Natalie. This is something that I find embarrassing. This is what someone wrote about Natalie. “Natalie works remotely as a digital consultant PM. She lives in the southwest US and works mostly with small- to medium-sized agencies that have in-house web departments. She also manages digital projects and implements processes that aid design and development teams. She is also an expert in remote project management. She also runs the PM Reactions Blog. She loves dystopian fiction, yoga and too much coffee. She just returned from vacation and it’s very special to have her here today.
Natalie:
No. I am in Arizona. I have moved around quite a bit over the past few years. It got tiring updating bios and telling people “Oh, I’m not in that state anymore.” I moved like last Wednesday.” So I have been trying to be a little more broad in my geographic location.
Ben Aston:
That will save you the trouble of updating it, so that’s cool. And how is Arizona at this time of year?
Natalie:
It’s beautiful. This week we reached a significant milestone. We are officially in fall because we have not had more than 100 degrees weather.
Ben Aston:
It was icy, cold. I was in Atlanta this week. In Vancouver, where you are now, it’s about 40. I am trying to use American temperature. It’s around 8 degrees. It was 80 degrees in Atlanta, which is around 30 degrees. It was so hot and sweaty. It was insane. It was crazy. I came back to Vancouver and am now freezing. But, I am interested as an Arizonian. Is that what someone from Arizona calls it?
Natalie:
I think.
Ben Aston:
So where are you going on holiday? That sounds like you’re in a beautiful part of the globe. Where can someone from Arizona go on vacations?
Natalie:
I’m in a beautiful area. I mean, I’m only 3 hours from the Grand Canyon. That’s pretty cool. We all find our way out of this place in the summer because it gets so hot. I don’t recall the conversion, but it’s 120F in summer and 115 in winter. People leave the state to go to the mountains or leave completely, which I can agree with.
Ben Aston:
For all those who use Celsius, that’s 46 degrees C. 46 is halfway to boiling. I know that you are a remote project manager and have been doing so for some time. But what is the deal with that? Why did you choose remote management? Or did it choose?
Natalie:
It was a bit of both. It’s a great job. I was employed full-time in the same office where I lived for a while. I then started freelancing, which I found to be the best way to make money. I freelanced with remote companies. For the most part, my first few contracts were remote-based. I found that I enjoyed this kind of lifestyle. I can choose my work hours and what I do.
