What is Project Management?

Project management is the process of supervising a team's activity to complete all project objectives within the established parameters. Project documentation that is prepared at the start of the development process typically includes descriptions of this information.

The three main restraints are budget, time, and scope. Optimizing the distribution of necessary inputs and using them to achieve pre-established goals is the secondary problem.

What do Project Management Jobs Entail?

An expert who organizes, plans, and manages projects while adhering to constraints like budgets and timetables is known as a project manager. Project managers oversee the work of entire teams, establish the objectives of a project, consult with stakeholders, and see it through to completion.

The project manager is accountable for the success or failure of the project, regardless of whether they are managing a marketing campaign, building a structure, creating a computer system, or launching a new product.

According to one study by the Project Management Institute, by 2027 businesses will need 87.7 million individuals working in project managerial roles.

It is thus evident that the project manager role is in demand in just about every industry. Let’s take a closer look at what project managers do, why you should consider hiring an all-star team in project management, and how you can get started.

Responsibilities of Project Management in an Organization

Creating a project plan and breaking the work down into smaller and more specific tasks
Gathering project requirements
Outlining and briefing deliverables for the team, overall task management, and adjusting the brief as needed
Setting and directing time frames per task, as well as the overall timeline
Proactively approaching difficult conversations with clients, executive sponsors, stakeholders, and the team
Becoming fluent and governing the usage of the organization’s project management tools
Building strong rapport with the project team, partners, and suppliers
Making all the puzzle pieces fit through strong project integration management
Maintaining composure and having a backup plan in case the project goes awry
Evaluating the team’s capabilities and optimizing team performance
Communicating and clarifying project scope, including activity, sequence, and duration
Creating and presenting comprehensive reports with analysis of expenditures and performance
Managing through influence and exercising the authority set forth in the project charter

Skills Required in Project Management Jobs

1. Communication Skills

Communication is a crucial ability in a position like a project management, whether it's clearly outlining a plan, stressing a point over email, or bringing a team together.

2. Logical Thinking

A successful project manager must have the ability to solve problems and apply logic to problems. Being able to make sensible decisions under pressure or stress might make the difference between a project going successfully or not.

3. Basic Tools

Project managers will need to set up timing schedules, deliver critical documents, organize meetings, schedule activities, and do a variety of other chores that are typically made easier by tools like Excel or Docs from the Office or Google suite.

4. Project Management Tools

It may be advantageous for a candidate to have experience with the project management software your company employs, or something comparable.

5. Presentation Skills

This position entails a lot of effective idea presentations to key stakeholders in order to get their support and confidence in the project and the project team. When choosing a project manager, it's critical to seek someone with strong presenting abilities, both on a technical and a personal level.

6. Risk Management

A project manager can use risk management as a tool to take calculated risks that will benefit the organization. Employers favor applicants who can take calculated risks by outlining how their choices will impact the team and project. This calls for a certain degree of assurance and the capacity to understand the risk connected with a project.

7. Problem-Solving

Your capacity to resolve problems that could compromise the project's deliverables is a sign of your problem-solving abilities. Prior to selecting and executing the optimal solution, it entails obtaining pertinent information, identifying potential alternatives, and analyzing the benefits and drawbacks of each solution. It aids the project manager in developing a methodical, solution-based strategy to overcome a challenge.

8. Cost Management

One of a project manager's most crucial duties is cost management or control. Through the course of the project life cycle, it entails developing workable budgets, evaluating budgets, controlling spending, and negotiating the project's cost. Employers search for applicants with knowledge of resource allocation, who can spot high-cost allocation areas and suggest improvements to keep the project within budget.

Ways of Managing Projects and Product Development

There are various frameworks, processes, and approaches to project management. Seven project management techniques have been summarized into a list for your convenience. You can also understand which are ideal for your working style.

Scrum: Scrum is used predominantly in software or product development. Small cross-functional teams work with a Product Owner responsible for the product’s direction.
Kanban: Kanban is a method that allows you to get a visual overview of your tasks. The method consists of a physical or digital board with three columns (To Do, In progress, Done). These include tasks written on cards that can be moved from one progress stage to another until they are completed.
Agile: Agile is a series of practices and principles that are best for products and initiatives that face various changes during their progress. This mindset is based on short delivery cycles (sprints) and a dynamic work culture supporting continuous team collaboration.
Waterfall: This traditional approach breaks your workload into a series of related tasks that you must execute in strict order. One has to complete each task before starting to work on another one. Similarly, one phase won’t start before you complete the previous one. Extensive planning sits at the base of this approach. It comes with clear timelines and set budgets that support success.
Six Sigma: Centered around quality control, the main focus of the Six Sigma approach is reducing defects, bugs, and errors. It is driven by data that must be analyzed to discover nonconformities from the original specifications before an issue arises.
Critical Path: This method can help you prioritize tasks and identify a project’s shortest timeline. Project managers can investigate milestones, dependencies, and deadlines easier.
PRINCE2: In PRINCE2, control over the project is divided between a higher-authority project board and a project manager. While the board is responsible for providing resources and setting business justification, the project manager takes care of daily activities and team management.

Project Management Roles in an Organization

1. Project Manager: This role profile applies to project managers operating at the entry level. At this level, a project manager can apply project management knowledge when they participate in a project in any capacity and common knowledge is not sufficient to perform at a satisfactory level of competence.

2. PMO Administrator: This role profile applies to PMO administrators. At this level, a PMO administrator will provide support to the project, program, or portfolio team through administrative and reporting activities.

3. Portfolio Manager: At this level, a portfolio manager can lead a portfolio with limited complexity or assist on a complex portfolio, following the appropriate governance applied, monitoring and reporting on the portfolio to several stakeholder groups, and bringing people together to achieve specified outcomes in line with strategic objectives.

4. Program Manager: At this level, a program manager can typically lead a program of limited complexity or assist on a complex program, following the appropriate governance applied for the determined life cycle.

5. Project Coordinator: Working with a project manager or as part of a project management office (PMO), this person brings the basic skills of project management discipline to project teams. Typically takes ownership for maintaining project risk, issue, change logs as well as project schedule and sometimes cost tracking.

6. PMO Manager: Projects and programs can start and end, whereas the PMO is a department that forms part of business-as-usual. The PMO manager will not run projects themselves. Their role is typical to ensure consistency in their approach to selecting, planning, running, and closing projects. The PMO will be the conduit for project status reporting, performance analysis, and information for senior management and is likely to have very solid project management experience.

What is the Effect on your Pocket?

According to Indeed, the average salary for a project manager is $84,038 per year in the United States.

How to Assess & Hire Project Management Professionals?

1. Use Skill Assessments

Pre-employment skill assessments have created a buzz in the market and are being used by the majority of recruiters to vet their candidates. A skill assessment fairly and accurately tests your candidate and gives you a ready-made report to analyze if the applicant can fulfill your job position.

At HireQuotient, we provide many types of project management assessments based on methodologies. Check them out!

2. Ask the Right Questions

Tell us about the most challenging projects you have managed so far? What were the steps you have taken to tackle the challenges?
Suppose the project has gone off the rails. What steps would you take to get it back on track?
Which was one of the biggest mistakes you have committed in your past projects? How has it impacted your approach to work?
Can you tell us an example of a failed project? Have you had any such experiences?
What is your strategy for prioritizing the tasks?
What is the most desired skill that is required to become a successful project manager, according to your experience? Please give us a couple of examples regarding your past projects.
Suppose the customer is not happy about the quality of the project outcomes. How do you handle the situation? What is your way of handling an unhappy stakeholder?

3. Assign a Task

Another super-dependable method to assess a project management candidate is to assign them a task. Ask them to analyze a certain project and make a plan to execute it. This way you can check both the technical skills and soft skills and give you an upper hand to judge your candidate accordingly.

Wrapping Up

The importance of project management in organizations can't be overstated. When it's done right, it helps every part of the business run more smoothly. It allows your team to focus on the work that matters, free from the distractions caused by tasks going off track or budgets spinning out of control.

Book a project management assessment with us today!

Everything You Need to Know About Project Management Hiring