Top Attributes of a Successful Project Manager

Applying Education

You have joined an IT firm recently as a software developer after completing your graduation in computer science, engineering or any other similar degree; and now dreaming to become a project manager in IT. Just try to understand how your project manager is initiating the project, how s/he is addressing the issues in front, how they are kicking off the project. The most important part is that you need to understand your roles and responsibilities in this project and how you are getting feedback on your work delivered. Based on that you can see a big picture of the project and you could dream your role as a sole project manager of that project. You need to refine your skills by utilizing your education. This is the right time to understand the basic concepts of project management and analyze your skills.

Learning Management:

 To become a project manager, you need to learn basic management styles initially. Without a knowhow of management you can’t be a project manager at all. You need to know what the basic concepts of management are. You need to understand how you will initiate the project, how you will manage the project, how you will manage the team, how you will speak with different stakeholders. Most significantly, you need to enhance your inter-personal and leadership skills, so that you could manage the project team who are with different cultural backgrounds.

Historical Records:

For the new comers, it is very important to understand the basic requirement of the project. Cultures with old project managers who have managed the projects in the past and at present also they are managing the projects effectively and successfully. Talk with them and imagine the same with your case as well. If possible, talking with a senior member of PMO will help a lot, though it could be next to impossible to reach to any senior member of PMO. Try it, if viable. They could be very helpful for your learning. You could read and learn the past project files for your understanding and in real life you could implement those if you are getting a similar nature of project to execute.

Role of Templates:

As a new comer in the organization, you need to understand the basic meanings of the different templates. Mind you, these templates could be used to draw and design so many important things pertaining to project planning. Templates could be used in the execution and monitoring stages to show the project status such as trend report, progress report earned value report and so on. By understanding the nature of templates you can realize and excel your knowledge on the project management. For understanding the basic concepts of templates you could seek an advice of senior management people.

Training:

In most of the organizations, there are provisions for training junior employees. You should show your interest in such trainings so that management can take an action to provide you this opportunity. Furthermore, there are screening processes in place in most of the organizations  for promoting and enhancing junior employees who are talented. You should concentrate on such trainings as they could open a new door for your career. Remember, in this type of training, there could be a provision you are hearing a lecture of an experienced project manager who had showed his/her caliber by performing on the project overwhelmingly for the organization in the past. You could take a lot from this training and can think of becoming a good project manager.

Job Shadowing:

One thing that you can observe organizations is the way in which different people work in their project. By watching them you can analyze your understanding and determine whether this filed can fair enough to make your bread and butter. How others are working, how they are taking decisions, how they are interacting with everyone – all these can give you a lot of input in understanding the basic concepts of project management. Increase your networking, talk to the concerned people who are taking care of various projects in your organizations and try to implement those in your work as well. At least you can excel your skill through it. And it would automatically open a new path in your career which starts with project management.

Credential/Certification:

There are so many institutions such as PMI®, USA, who provides various trainings such as CAPM®and PMP®. Note that, CAPM® is a junior-level project management credential and after completing your college degrees (MBA, MCA, B. Tech etc) you can join any organization and after gaining some experience you can go for a CAPM® credential. This credential will give you a separate recognition that you know the entire processes and methodologies used in modern days in project execution. Furthermore, you could proceed for PMP® certification.

Preparing for PMP® Certification? Take this test to know where you stand!

Conclusion

Successful project managers are those who are able to consistently deliver the projects in time, within the budget and meet or exceed the expectations of the stakeholders. People management and leadership skills are extremely essential for a project manager apart from having project methodology or project-tracking tools in place.

PMP and CAPM are registered trademarks of the Project Management Institute, Inc.