Establishment of PMI Hong Kong Chapter
The Project Management institute of Hong Kong (PMI HK) was established in 1997 as a local chapter of The Project Management Institute (PMI), the world’s leading not-for-profit project management professional association, headquartered in the United States. After being conceived in the late 1960s, by 1990, PMI had started to promote its PM framework internationally. With a vision of promoting professional project management to contribute to the prosperous development of Hong Kong, five forward thinking founding members, namely Ms. Patty Wong – Interim President, Mr. Graham Goodman – Vice President, Ms. Annette Schleiss – Secretary / Treasurer, Mr. Clement Yeung – VP Education & Certification and Mr. Raymond Wong – VP Membership & Recruitment initiated the formation of PMI Hong Kong Chapter in 1997, one of the first few chapters in Asia.
Although it began life as a small chapter, PMI Hong Kong Chapter received overwhelming responses from the business community. Top business executives from various large corporations, especially those from the information technology sector, gave a great deal of encouragement and support by participating in the PMI executive council and sponsoring their staff to join as members.
In early 1997, there were only six Project Management Professionals (PMP)® in Hong Kong. With countless time and effort of the founding members which were also the executive council member of PMI HK, tremendous number of networking activities was organized to promote PMI HK membership and PMP certification. The executive council vigorously paid visits to large corporations like HP, HID, etc., to advocate membership benefits and the value of PMP certification. A number of company visits and related events were organized for PMI HK members to learn from the successful experiences of companies in deploying project management to achieve substantial business results.
The overt promotion of the PMP credential was also a key goal of PMI HK. In 1998, we received the first sponsored venues at SPL (HK) to organize paper-based Project Management Professional Certification Examination, which was one the first few examination centers in Asia Pacific region. The council members with PMP credential volunteered as examination proctors. The center attracted candidates from several countries throughout the region. Starting from 1999 and with the support of executive council members volunteered as trainers, PMI HK first introduced the PMP Examination Preparation course at several sponsored venues like the offices of CiF Solutions, HP, etc., to facilitate the members’ preparation for the PMP examination.
With continuous hard work of the council members and enthusiastic volunteers, PMI HK continued to expand in membership, programs and activities with tremendous momentum. A strong foundation was laid for PMI HK to grow with quantum leap in the following ten years, achieving what has truly been a decade of successes from 1997 to 2007. In first two years alone, the number of members had grown over ten folds to more than 100. By third quarter of 2007, the number of PMP rocketed to over 2000 while the membership exceeded 1250.
PMI HK Advisory & Executive Committee
In 1997, the Executive Committee (EC) consisted of the 5 Founding Members with Patty Wong as President. In 2004, the PMI HK Advisory Council was formed.
By 2006, under the leadership of President Patty Wong, the EC team had expanded to 12 with increasing focus on Programs, Certification and Corporate Sponsorship.
During 2007 – 2013, under the leadership of President Raymond Wong, the EC team was further expanded to 15 vice presidents with increasing focus on promotion of volunteering and engagement with other industries such as Engineering and Finance.
During 2013 – 2019, under the leadership of President Rossana Ho, the EC team was expanded to 16 vice presidents.
In 2019, under the leadership of President Christine Yau, an EC team of 16 members will serve the Chapter for the new 2019 – 2021 term.
The 4 presidents who have served and is serving as president of PMI HK Chapter for the past 22 years:
Ms Patty Wong (1997 – 2007)
Mr Raymond Wong (2007 – 2013)
Mrs Rossana Ho (2013 – 2019)
Ms Christine Yau (2019 – present)
Project Management Professional (PMP)® is a registered mark of the Project Management Institute, Inc.
PMI® is a registered mark of the Project Management Institute, Inc.