Author: Ethel Mendocilla Sato, PMP

Thanks to research on Human Microbiome, we know that our “microbial self” has a profound influence in human physiology, immunity, and metabolism. For example, extensive study of the gut microbiome has shown its most significant importance on our short- and long-term overall health. However, other parts of the human body are largely unexplored, including the vagina. Although the vagina is the second place most populated by microorganisms, which have a critical role in women’s health, it is under-researched. Surprisingly, the vaginal microbiome field only represents 3% of scientific publications related to the Human Microbiome field. This knowledge gap prevents the development of effective and practical clinical therapeutics that could protect and improve women’s health and well-being.

However, since the start of the pandemic, it has become harder to get funding for continuing research in topics unrelated to SARS-CoV-2 virus. Furthermore, the COVID pandemic has revealed how challenging it is to communicate science effectively and timely to the public. What we have learned and still learning from this pandemic is that now it is more important than ever to pay attention to our other self – that is, the trillions of microorganisms that populate our bodies, our microbiome. For this reason, our*goal is to implement the Marie project in Switzerland, a citizen science study with scientific and societal objectives. First, we want to raise public awareness about the importance of vaginal microbes in women’s sexual and reproductive health. Second, we want to engage citizens and work together to increase our understanding of the vaginal microbiome and its role in health and disease. 

In addition, we believe that the promotion of vaginal health knowledge within the women’s community in Switzerland is a crucial strategy for entrusting women to participate in self-care, and ultimately, enjoy healthier and happier lives. With that in mind, we decided to launch the Marie project in the well-known crowdfunding platform, Wemakeit. For this scientific campaign, we organised the project into four phases: 1) Planning, 2) Pre-launch, 3) Launch, 4) Follow-up of the campaign in Wemakeit. 

When we started the adventure of moving forward with the campaign for Wemakeit, we had never imagined facing various challenges that we had to overcome. We provide below a few of them:

1. Obtaining the support from key collaborators in the project

Making an alliance with Prof. Sarah Lebeer and her team based at the University of Antwerp (Belgium) was the most important milestone we could have achieved. Prof. Lebeer led the citizen science project called Isala and had the objective to study the vaginal microbiome of almost 6'000 participants from Flanders. Even though we managed to get their support, we had to find a host lab and local collaborators to support us with expertise in Public Health, Citizen Science, cutting-edge technology for the microbial DNA analysis, etc. We were fortunate enough to raise the interest of PD Dr. Sonja Merten, project leader and head of the Society, Gender and Health Unit at the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (our host lab) in Basel, the Citizen Science Center and the Functional Genomics Center, both located in Zürich.

2. Understanding our stakeholder’s engagement needs

In July 2021, due to nationwide COVID measures from the Swiss government such as: quarantine rules and work-from-home order, most of our interactions with eventual collaborators happened via virtual meetings. What we learned is that from the very beginning, we ushould take time to understand each stakeholders’ motivation, concerns, preferred communication, and engagement frequency to determine the best way to work together. If the stakeholder analysis is done later in time, then it will be much more difficult to build their trust and future engagement.

3. Maintaining virtual team members engagement

A daunting challenge since the start of the project until now was to coordinate recurrent video meetings with our stakeholders, build effective and clear agenda with objectives and discussion points. Since most of our stakeholders are geographically distributed, we could not meet face-to-face and therefore, had to rely on various forms of technology and videoconferencing tools for communication and information sharing needs. By maintaining effective, meaningful and timely communication, we reinforced mutual commitments and achievements.

4. Searching for ambassadors and sponsors

It was surprising and discouraging to not receive any replies from the thirty small, medium and large companies we contacted. This showed once more how disregarded is the topic of vaginal health. On the contrary, we were lucky enough to find enthusiastic and supportive ambassadors, such as: Petra Volpe (movie director), Dagmar Bocakova (visual artist) and Fanny Georgi (science communicator).

The scientific campaign was launched on February 23rd and will run until April 8th, 2022. As of today, we have managed to raise 7% of our first financial goal of 70'000 CHF. 

If you support our mission of engaging citizens in vaginal microbiome research to advance discovery in this field and break taboos and misconceptions about vaginal health in Switzerland, please, help us with your donations on the following website: https://wemakeit.com/projects/unveil-vagina-s-microworld

Also, we would be very grateful if you could share the project link with your family, friends and networks.

- And…let’s work together today to make the future of women’s health look brighter! -

*Initiators of the scientific campaign called “Unveil vagina’s microworld”: PD Dr. Sonja Merten, Monica Ticlla Ccenhua and Ethel Mendocilla Sato.

Author: Gessami Sanchez Olle, PMP

Before closing 2021, we had the opportunity to learn about innovation in the second face-to-face (F2F) event in Basel, after the start of the pandemic. 

 

Author: Daniel von Niederhaeusern, PMP

Date: Saturday, 26 March 2022
Location: Zurich
Trainer: Monika Keller, PMP

Dear members and friends of the PMI Switzerland Chapter,

Even though we don’t know how the covid situation will be in March, we again invite you for a 1-day classroom training. We really hope that we are allowed to execute the training after we had to cancel this event last autumn. 

Our trainer Monika Keller is an experienced coach and trainer, Lecturer, Federal Professional Adult Educator, PMP, and collected a lot of experience as a project manager for international companies for many years.
Monika runs her coaching and training company 3C Keller which focuses on leadership and topics related to work-life balance and the reconciliation of work and family life.
You will find more information about Monika and her blogs in her profile on LinkedIn.

The learning goals are:

• Reflect and improve your communication- and time management skills
• Strengthen your self-confidence and take responsibility for yourself
• Influence your own situation in a positive way
• Practice your presentation and argumentation skills

Training content:

• How to improve your self-management skills to achieve a better work-life balance
• Learn a method to better reflect yourself, communicate your needs, and set boundaries
• Learn from your peers by discussing real PM challenges in small groups

What is your benefit /added value?

• You will learn how to deal with stress to prevent a burnout
• Learn, how to improve and influence your time management  
• Reflect your priorities for a healthy work-life balance
• Discuss your experience with your PM peers
• Finally earn 7 PDU’s

If you are interested to learn: How to become your own chairperson and set boundaries - don’t hesitate and register yourself to secure your seat. You will find more information and registration form on PMI Webpage.

Hope to see you there.

Author: Valérie Pierre, PMP

When was the last time you attended a professional event in which you enjoyed every single bit of it? On 25 November 2021, Rodrigue R.R. Brugger, Head Global HR Case Management and Core Member Task Force Corona SIX, alias “Senior project manager” of the Taskforce, captivated the full attention of his audience in Six’s convention center while telling his report from 1 ½ years of Six’s Taskforce Corona. 

First, let’s review what was the starting position: in January 2020, an infectious disease outbreak evolved into an epidemic in China and the World Health Organization (WHO) proposed the name COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) for it. It is interesting to note that Six, as Switzerland’s systemically important financial market infrastructure responsible for the uninterrupted access to mission-critical financial systems, had the first consultation of SIX Pandemic Advisory Group as early as the end of January 2020, to discuss the current situation and immediate measures for COVID-19. 

The taskforce which was constituted faced several challenges. None of the members knew what was approaching and what tasks they’d have to do. However they all expected the volume would be demanding and were committed to the mission. There was no end in sight for the planning and the project work.

What’s probably one of the most important pieces of the strategy was the organizational chart of the taskforce, who’s responsible for what, who’s the back-up person, etc. Here are a few elements of that diagram that stuck in my mind. An intelligence/situation cell was created to extract from the news what was relevant to Six. A contingency planning group was in charge of thinking about the future. The role of logistics was of course so essential, creating new building security measures, delivering masks, etc. Information and communication was also key, just to name a few of the teams. And none of this would have worked without the support of the CFO. 

The method and tools were clarified beforehand, so that in case of a crisis quick action can be taken as well as a lot can be worked off. REDCON levels and risk heat maps were used. REDCON is short for Readiness Condition and is used to refer to a unit's readiness to respond to and engage in combat operations. The level was continuously assessed and re-evaluated as the situation changed. The level 5 was reached during 2 periods, and as of November 25th 2021, level is back at REDCON 3.

While this approach corresponds to a waterfall type of project management, Agile methods were also used, and above all “Agile thinking”. In the times of a pandemic, you can’t plan, nor be really prepared. Tthe key competence is the ability to react to changes at any time and to adapt your approach in a flexible manner.

It was very interesting to review the “Golden leadership rules in challenging times”. Most of those are probably applied in other companies, but possibly without being formalized. If there’s one that naturally stands out and that probably resonates for each one of us:  “Accept the new situation. You cannot change it.” To read more on those, check out Rodrigue’s slides.

Overall, we learned from this insightful retrospective overview not only how the Taskforce operated, but also how much almost two years of intense collaboration strengthened the bonds between the Taskforce members. 

The power of human connection is what you could feel when joining the #Apero after the presentation. On this #Thanksgiving2021 day, stories were buzzing around. My thanks go to the PMI organizing team, Prasanth Nair, Ethel Mendocilla Sato, Christopher Ziemba, Six team, Rodrigue R.R. Brugger, Martin Härri and everyone else who was there or helped make this in-person event happen.