PM1 – WEEK 1 – Do I want a career in Project Management?

I started my career six years ago as a project team member. At that time I did not think about becoming a project manager but ever since then, I was inspired from this role. After the first project management class, now I am seriously thinking for the career in this field.

In my first job I worked on an internal project of the company of designing, developing and implementing a cost accounting system. My role in that project was to design a cost accounting system and to coordinate with the team of software developers for its development and implementation. During that I got an opportunity to closely look at the work of our project manager. It really inspired me because it was very challenging and was similar to my ideal role.

It’s my nature that I love working with challenges and role of project manager is full of challenges e.g. to deliver the project within the specified time and budget. It’s also very dynamic because it requires variety of knowledge and skills e.g. time management, human resource management, financial management, analytical, interpersonal and communication skills along with update knowledge of information technology.

Today because of the revolution in information technology and hyper-competitive business world it is more important for the professionals to possess additional IT knowledge and skills than ever before. Like IT is now extensively used in every filed of life such as medical sciences, engineering, accounting etc. which made it necessary for the professionals whether they are medical doctors, engineers or accountants to possess sufficient knowledge of it to take the benefit of new technology. With the rapid changes in technology and emergence of new business concepts and strategies it is very important for the organizations to keep themselves update to remain in competition. It increases the demand for project managers.

A project is deemed to be successful only if it achieves all of its objectives within the specified time and specified budget. It means budgeting is one of the important areas in project management and an individual like me with accounting and information technology background can become more successful project manager. Today accounting has become more systematic because of the use of new technologies and concepts like ERP, CRM, SCM, and BI etc. Now organizations are rapidly switching towards these concepts and continuing updating their systems. For accountants now it is more important to have good knowledge of IT and project management skills to deal with these issues. It enables them to design and implement new systems in the organization to make it competitive. Also it diversifies their scope and provides them more areas of opportunities like they can work as consultants to provide ERP solutions etc. By looking at these features and future demand for this role I have no doubt in my mind to start my career as project manager.

Now project management has become more sophisticated and for project managers it is necessary to have following abilities.

Define and manage all the work required to complete the project successfully.
Estimate the time required to complete the work, develop project schedule (Gantt charts) and to ensure timely completion of the project.
Prepare and manage the budget for the project.
Ensure that the project will satisfy the stated or implied needs for which it was undertaken.
Make effective use of people involved with the project.
Generate, collect, and sort project information.
Identify, analyze, and respond to risk related to the project.
Acquire goods and services for the project from outside the performing organization.

Although all of the above mentioned abilities and skills are important for the project manager to successfully complete the projects but the most vital of these are his relevant education and work experience. Education improves his technical knowledge and skills while experience improves his ability to make good decision based on a similar situation existed in past. As the success or failure of the project depends on project manager therefore no one can take a risk to hire incompetent person on such a crucial position.

When I searched the following job titles from the website www.monster.ca to see the importance of education and experience, every position requires at least bachelor degree or diploma in relevant field and at least 3 to 5 years relevant work experience. It also shows the importance of education and experience for project manager.

Senior project manager
Project manager
Assistant project manager
Project coordinator
Project scheduler
Project management consultant
Business analyst