Stuck in a rut? How to get into project managment
Discussion
My current background is since i was 18, completed a apprenticeship and have progressed up to commissioning engineer in fire and life safety systems. It has come to the point where i feel stuck in a rut, not going anywhere, not knowing what i want to do next.
I have always had a interest in project management, or as i have always liked cars and logistics and fancy fleet management.
my question is how, how do i go about getting into project management? I currently work for a large company where the only natural progression seems to be engineer to salesman and that is not what i want to do.
Although i dont have direct project management skills, i do have plenty of experience in running my own jobs, meeting customers and sorting problems etc, so i assume these could be transferable.
Im happy to change fields, but do enjoy the electronic side of things. My dream job would be LED lighting design and installation but again this seems to be very few and far between.
I have always had a interest in project management, or as i have always liked cars and logistics and fancy fleet management.
my question is how, how do i go about getting into project management? I currently work for a large company where the only natural progression seems to be engineer to salesman and that is not what i want to do.
Although i dont have direct project management skills, i do have plenty of experience in running my own jobs, meeting customers and sorting problems etc, so i assume these could be transferable.
Im happy to change fields, but do enjoy the electronic side of things. My dream job would be LED lighting design and installation but again this seems to be very few and far between.
You can do Prince2 yourself, it's not terribly expensive. It will at least give you something for the CV.
I did a foundation online course and exam through an Amazon/Groupon deal last year. It wasn't terribly hard, though it did require quite a bit of study.
You can do practitioner online too, though I have decided I'll probably wait to do a classroom course.
I did a foundation online course and exam through an Amazon/Groupon deal last year. It wasn't terribly hard, though it did require quite a bit of study.
You can do practitioner online too, though I have decided I'll probably wait to do a classroom course.
bigunit00 said:
BoRED S2upid said:
What do you think is so special about project management?
This......it's trumped up, glorified secretarial / administrative type work once you peel back all the bs. Usually people that can talk a good job but don't deliver the goods.....
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
LJTS said:
bigunit00 said:
BoRED S2upid said:
What do you think is so special about project management?
This......it's trumped up, glorified secretarial / administrative type work once you peel back all the bs. Usually people that can talk a good job but don't deliver the goods.....
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
There are PMs & there are PMs....
GT03ROB said:
LJTS said:
Usually people that can talk a good job but don't deliver the goods.....
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
There are PMs & there are PMs....
The main difference is that a poor PM is very visible, and also makes everybody's life much harder (when their job is specifically to make other people's jobs easier), and it's also very hard to be really good PM all of the time. If one of your devs is a bit crap then you can usually cover it up easily enough. If the PM is crap then the project is generally doomed from day 1.
deckster said:
That's very true and I doubt that there are statistically a greater number of poor PMs than there are poor developers, or poor engineers, or poor anything else.
The main difference is that a poor PM is very visible, and also makes everybody's life much harder (when their job is specifically to make other people's jobs easier), and it's also very hard to be really good PM all of the time. If one of your devs is a bit crap then you can usually cover it up easily enough. If the PM is crap then the project is generally doomed from day 1.
My view is that in a corporate environment when you have to navigate the organisation to get things done and its lots of matrix mgt (getting people to do sThe main difference is that a poor PM is very visible, and also makes everybody's life much harder (when their job is specifically to make other people's jobs easier), and it's also very hard to be really good PM all of the time. If one of your devs is a bit crap then you can usually cover it up easily enough. If the PM is crap then the project is generally doomed from day 1.
t when they don't directly report to you) and competing priorities a project is only as good as the sponsor. Crap sponsor and your project is doomed. Doesn't matter how good the PM is. Edited by bigunit00 on Friday 9th October 22:18
deckster said:
GT03ROB said:
LJTS said:
Usually people that can talk a good job but don't deliver the goods.....
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
There are PMs & there are PMs....
The main difference is that a poor PM is very visible, and also makes everybody's life much harder (when their job is specifically to make other people's jobs easier), and it's also very hard to be really good PM all of the time. If one of your devs is a bit crap then you can usually cover it up easily enough. If the PM is crap then the project is generally doomed from day 1.
As an example I work as a PM (well manager of PMs at present) & have 6 PMs working for me. We have 7 projects under management worth around £5-6bn total. We don;t have a single Prince qualification between us. My client would laugh at me if I offered up a PM for a project with Prince, it's simply not a recognised qualification in my sector. Project management is NOT administration or a process. Yes there is some administration, some processes. What many industries describe as project managers would be admin assistants in others.
GT03ROB said:
deckster said:
GT03ROB said:
LJTS said:
Usually people that can talk a good job but don't deliver the goods.....
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
In my profession PM's are usually failed engineers that latch on to the political ladder in a company!
There are PMs & there are PMs....
The main difference is that a poor PM is very visible, and also makes everybody's life much harder (when their job is specifically to make other people's jobs easier), and it's also very hard to be really good PM all of the time. If one of your devs is a bit crap then you can usually cover it up easily enough. If the PM is crap then the project is generally doomed from day 1.
As an example I work as a PM (well manager of PMs at present) & have 6 PMs working for me. We have 7 projects under management worth around £5-6bn total. We don;t have a single Prince qualification between us. My client would laugh at me if I offered up a PM for a project with Prince, it's simply not a recognised qualification in my sector. Project management is NOT administration or a process. Yes there is some administration, some processes. What many industries describe as project managers would be admin assistants in others.
Well said GTRob - I'm not sure what sector you work in, I am a PM in Rail Construction/Engineering. The PM is role the person who ties all the different teams together, drives progress, cajoles, pesters, chases, overcomes all in the name of forward progress - in our case building, commissioning and handing over a physical, working asset.
I've seen great PM's and terrible PM's - in the same way I have seen great/poor Engineers, Commercial Managers, Planners, Designers etc.
People often think that completing a PRINCE2 or APMP qualification makes them ready to be PM - it doesn't, experience and attitude does. That said, sifting through CV's I would expect to see one of those qualifications on there just to get past the recruitment filter, even if in real life the P2 methodology is never used (in our sector at least, perhaps still in Government or IT..?). Completing the course is good way to understand the principles on project management and sets out a formal structured way of approaching a project that initially just appears to be 'common sense.'
Methodologies for delivery often have to be pared back - a lot of the luxuries within them cost money, need time and use resources, none of which is in ready supply in our environment.
Think of any methodology as a 200 piece tool kit. You won't use all the tools, some you will never touch, a handful you might use all the time. Some are for specialist jobs, some can be used for all kinds of different jobs.
Project Management means different things to different people. For me it's moving through a structured/staged plan with measures in place designed to allow a good level of control. The key responsibilities are driving progress, and working to break down blockers/barriers - to do this effectively you need to be motivated, organized and a good people person.
It's a satisfying job though - you're involved in a wide range of elements rather than sticking to a single role, there's plenty of challenges, you're ultimately accountable and when the job is done you can say that you were responsible for bringing it together.
Finally I would say, PM skills can be transferable between sectors (I started in highways, then construction, moved to master/transport planning and have ended up in rail engineering/construction). But it helps an awful lot to understand what it is your staff are delivering, be it code, engineering design, build assets, services etc.
Doing the PRINCE2 Foundation course will do no harm to give you a better idea of the concepts and will only cost a few hundred quid - there's not much to lose. Unless anyone else can suggest the APMP equivalent, I've not done this.
Have you looked at Junior PM roles or roles that mean you can learn PM on the job. Im a Project Manager at a large Global IT company and dont have any exact qualifications but plenty of years of experience.
Prince is a good starting point and something you can do on your own back. Plus its industry recognized so good for CV's. You can then go into doing PMP which is expensive and i would try and get a company to pay for.
For those who think PM is basically a jumped up PA then your are very wrong. A good PM is critical at times in complex projects that have multiple elements that need to be brought together to meet schedules and goals.
Another area which might be interesting could be Lean Six Sigma and the Greenbelt/Black belt methodology.
Prince is a good starting point and something you can do on your own back. Plus its industry recognized so good for CV's. You can then go into doing PMP which is expensive and i would try and get a company to pay for.
For those who think PM is basically a jumped up PA then your are very wrong. A good PM is critical at times in complex projects that have multiple elements that need to be brought together to meet schedules and goals.
Another area which might be interesting could be Lean Six Sigma and the Greenbelt/Black belt methodology.
sparks85 said:
Well said GTRob - I'm not sure what sector you work in, I am a PM in Rail Construction/Engineering. The PM is role the person who ties all the different teams together, drives progress, cajoles, pesters, chases, overcomes all in the name of forward progress - in our case building, commissioning and handing over a physical, working asset.
I'm in oil & gas. We do everything from conceptual design through commissioning of oil & gas facilities and petrochem facilities. I'd agree with all of the above but we also carry P&L & full HSE responsibility.The role to me is set the baseline parameters in terms of cost, schedule, quality, execution, contract. Then control against it. You then are responsible for managing the client, giving leadership to the team, giving the team the resources they need to succeed. You ensure the good ideas come to the surface, the bad ones are buried quickly. You don;t need to be able to do the job of your team members, but you need to know what influences their ability to do it, you need to know when they are BSing you. You need to be able to communicate clearly & concisely. You need to be able to sell. You need to be comfortable & credible dealing with CEOs of major companies in the morning, while in the afternoon you need to be bawling out your hairy arsed construction supervisors where every other word is f
k. You look for obstacles before anyone else does then find ways to remove them. You need to be an informed pessimist, not an uninformed optimist. In your spare time you do whatever you need to do to deliver that project within cost/schedule/spec, without hurting anybody.Now do that when you have design teams on 3 continents, materials coming from 50+ countries, a client that is a merger of 2 different cultures & a construction contractor from a third culture.
Is it fun? Heck yes. Is it just admin? heck no.
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