ON THE EDGE
Of PMPs, Milestones, and Makeovers
by David Kohrell and Cinda Voegtli
The last three years have been challenging for our profession. When I say our profession, I mean those who are given the task of shepherding projects, people and products toward a common end. Let's call them project managers - whether or not they have that title, that's what they are!
The many forms of project management careers
I have a particular interest in project management careers. I have been involved in project management since 1988; serving as a front line project manager, program manager and manager of project managers. Along the way coaching became a bigger and bigger part of my role. Eventually I took an unexpected PM career path, branching out to coach new and seasoned project managers full-time. My passion is the people behind the role. The details of project management jobs and roles change. The need for talented and competent people is constant. The skills and energy we know how to apply to our projects can take us many places - project management careers spring from many places and take some interesting twists these days:
- A mechanical designer gets asked to take over an effort to develop and release a new cost-reduced version of a networking product - his first project management job and he doesn't even know it!
- A software development manager at a computer company demonstrates her talent for "selling" to executives and over time becomes the acknowledged go-to person for leading or coaching critical projects that require multi-division project cooperation and buy-in to business process changes.
- A project manager who has had to travel every week for 2 years decides it's time to stay closer to home, and leaves the corporate world for contract work. The first contract job? Not project management, but technical writing to meet the first client's most pressing need for a manual on their product. First job well done, then project management contracts at that client, and recommendations to other firms, follow.
- A software engineer takes the lead in getting some "standard operating procedures" in place within their growing software department to help them produce high quality software and meet challenging schedules. Two years later he is selected to head a new "project management support group" to coach the 25 people who run the company's product development projects. Only four of those people are full-time, titled project managers.
- A marketing manager moves from managing internal marketing efforts to running her own marketing firm - and finds herself adapting her PM skills to managing client projects in the non-profit world.
- An IT director teaches PM courses at local university continuing education programs, and wonders if there's a way to make a living at this great new application of his PM experience.
Thanks.
David Kohrell, MA, PMP®, MSFP®
President
Technology As Promised, LLC * http://www.aspromised.com
Cinda Voegtli
President
ProjectConnections.com
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