Ray Pait Jr. saw life-changing results in project management

May 27, 2019
conference and speaker photo

UofL’s Project Management Certificate program is helping professionals learn a new skill set that can help them build better outcomes in their personal and professional lives.

H. Ray Pait, Jr., a senior director for safety and security at Churchill Downs Racetrack, also decided to seek out additional project management training from UofL. One of the reasons he enrolled in the UofL’s project management program was to learn how to communicate better with construction vendors.

Ray Pait Student photoThe program helped me to be able to understand the formalized language I would hear when we’d bring vendors in,” Pait explained. “It made life easier for all of us to be able to talk on the same level. The program gave me a thorough understanding of the core values of what they did, from a project perspective.”

H. Ray Pait, Jr.
Senior director for safety and security at Churchill Downs Racetrack

Project management isn’t limited to one position or field because anything that requires collaboration and coordination between different resources under the umbrella of a common goal can be considered a project. The principles used in project management can be used in virtually any business, according to Chuck Millhollan, author and lead instructor for the UofL’s project management certificate.

After completing UofL’s program, Pait went on to earn his Project Management Professional Certification® (PMP) and was promoted to senior director of Churchill Downs’ Program Management Office.

“My professional life has changed immensely because of this program. After earning my certificate in 2006, I was promoted at Churchill Downs and began to teach project management for UofL.”

“The program is laid out so that when you complete your certificate, you will have tools you can use on a daily basis,” shared Pait.

“One of the greatest values was the networking that happens while you’re in the class. When you get put in groups with other people from different backgrounds who are from various environments, you begin to learn and understand how people do things. You can capture that knowledge and take it back and utilize it in projects you have in your organization,” Pait said.