In episode 62 of The Project Management Podcast, Cornelius interviews Thomas Cutting on the subject of breaking into the project management profession. This episode was helpful for me and reinforced some of my ideas on the subject.
One obstacle I’ve run into is that many of the project managers I work with now have a history where they worked in operations for 5+ years in a specific area, and worked up to be a team manager, etc. until their where either promoted or fell into a project management role within that specific department. Many don’t have project management specific education or started with a goal to be a project manager.
My situation is completely different.
While I have many years of industry experience with information systems and technology in general, I’ve never been in a specific department for any longer than 2 years. I’ve approached my career more from a focus of developing my PM skill set rather than industry expertise.
So, the formal education and PM focus is very helpful, but how do you actually get into a job this way?
One of the recommendations Thomas made was to go in as a Project Assistant of some sort. This could be a controller, scheduler, coordinator, etc. Sometimes the title would actually be Project Management Assistant. The only problem is that PM is still a newborn thing in most companies and many do not have specific project management administrative roles like this. The project manager does everything.
If you are interested in getting into the project management profession, check out this episode.
Links: The PM Podcast – Episode 062: How can I become a Project Manager? http://www.project-management-podcast.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=109&Itemid=9
Cutting’s Edge – Thomas Cutting’s blog which has a series of posts on this topic as well http://cuttingsedgepm.blogspot.com/index.html
PMP Prepcast – For those wanting to get PMP certified.
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I actually only met 2 project managers who worked before becoming PMs.
All of the rest finished a project manager school, and that was their first job – project manager.
So it does not seem too hard around here. You go to university or some other kind of institution, got the paper and start to work as a project manager.
Roland, thanks for the comment! Glad to see you love Kiva too!
It must be waaayyy different in your part of the world….I am one of the few people with a degree in project management that I know of, and even I had years of work experience managing projects before I decided to go back to school.
Also, I would see someone with just a degree in project management and no other experience having a really hard time getting a job as a project manager. They would have to get in with a company in a different position and work their way up, usually.
Thanks for the insight into how this works differently in other parts of the world!
Josh