Balancing Hard and Soft Skills: A Day in The Life of a Project Manager

More Than Delegation—Communication

When I began my career in engineering many years ago, I thought a Project manager only told people what work needed to be done and made reports for upper management. But after working on project teams, leading project teams, and earning my PMP® certification, it is clear that a project manager has to be someone that has multiple skill sets and traits. When one thinks of a project manager, they might think that he or she only needs technical skills to be successful in a project environment.

But an effective project manager needs to be able to do much more than just the technical side. They also require soft skills (aka the people skills) as well.

Going through training many years ago, I learned the saying that a project manager spends 90 percent of their day on the people side of the project equation and only 10 percent on the technical side. After managing so many projects in my tenure, I agree that this is a completely true statement.

Breaking Down a Workday

On an average day (according to my experience and experience of my peers), a project manager spends a lot of time managing the expectations and needs of the customer, stakeholders, sponsor/champion, and the core team. Each one of these parties has different expectations, and they are constantly changing as we progress through a project. In some cases, a project manager is handling conflict among the team members in order to resolve the conflict effectively; in other cases, he or she must spend time reporting out (aka making a presentation or a project status) to the customer or project sponsor.

In each of these situations, they must rely on communication. My style and approach to communication vary per stakeholder as well as the message that I am trying to convey, but every day a project manager will need to communicate with various parties. The message could be about risks, project status or resource issues, but in order to effectively manage the day-to-day work of a project, a project manager must communicate in some capacity. It could be formal communication, such as reports or presentations or informal, such as phone calls or emails. If you look at a syllabus for project management certification training, you will almost certainly discover that communication is a heavy focus—and now you know why.

Earning certification in project management is helpful in learning different communication styles and how to effectively manage stakeholders across a project environment. Communication is an integral part of the PMBOK® Guide and the skills that any project manager must-have, so its value cannot be stressed enough.

Certification also helps to teach the critical technical skills that a project manager needs to be effective in a project environment, including the tools and methods to manage project cost, schedule, risk, and quality. 

Certification is critical since it enables a project manager to learn the needed soft skills as well as the critical technical skills, but one of the critical aspects that help a project manager to effectively manage the day-to-day work of a project is the experience. Through experience, a project manager is able to learn that one size does not fit all when it comes to communication styles and leadership styles; a project manager must be able to adjust their style based on the changing needs and status of the project.

Certification and experience are both critical pieces of the puzzle since they serve different purposes. The PMP certification provides a project manager with the tools, theories, and concepts they need to be effective in both soft and technical skills. But experience is needed to gain a chance to apply the concepts and tools, which turns theory into practice.  Of course, this often brings up the chicken-and-the-egg scenario for new students. How does one get experience without the job? That’s exactly why courses like Simplilearn’s Project Management certification training offer true-to-life projects that address issues dealing with scope, time and cost, and risk assessment.

So if you’re someone who communicates effectively, can pivot at the drop of a hat and roll with the punches, maybe you should consider a career in project management! It’s a career with promising growth and a bright future. 

PMBOK®, PMP® and PMI® are registered trademarks of the Project Management Institute, Inc.