What is a project manager anyway?

Over the past year I have moved around a lot and along the way a few things have become apparent to me.  One of these, hits close to the heart - as it turns out, a lot of organizations don't appear to understand what a project manager does for your organization, let alone, how this can further organizational objectives and/or innovation.  I once was asked in an interview, whether I thought the proposed project I would be managing would be a success.  I told the interviewer that I felt confident that he was taking the first critical step towards success in hiring a project manager.  Project managers, I said, dramatically helped to ensure a project was able to be executed and that implementation was done in an efficient manner - hopefully ensuring that the valuable funding dollars for the project were spent wisely.  I stand by this statement today.  

What is a Project Manager?
This is a surprisingly heterogeneous answer.  Some definitions involve a component of leadership and overall responsibility. Most definitions agree there is a responsibility for planning and for execution of tasks related to a given effort.  Some definitions talk about a timeline of responsibility from inception to completion of a given initiative.  Some definitions even went so far as to comment on the responsibility for success of the initiative (and this is a big stretch...projects do fail and so do project managers).

The vagueness of project manager expectations across the organizations I have worked for is understandable given the above. But before we talk about what a project manager is, let's talk about who a project manager is.  I'm a strong advocate for my professional body, the Project Management Institute (PMI), and they describe a project manager as follows:

They are organized, passionate and goal-oriented who understand what projects have in common, and their strategic role in how organizations succeed, learn and change.

They go on to describe project managers as change agents, people who work well in high pressure environments with high levels of complexity, people who are both able to see the big picture and at the same time be detail attentive, and team builders who foster trust and facilitate communication.  And, since 1969, they have been right.

The reality is, that when you hire a project manager, you hire someone who is disruptive, who has a passion for things that at times might seem unimportant to everyone else in the organization, someone who flies at a high elevation in your organization but is oddly obsessive about minutiae your executives won't care about, someone who lives and breathes risk assessment, evaluation and mitigation for breakfast, someone who thinks unlike most of the rest of your organization and ultimately specializes in delivering the activities and tasks you haven't yet fully thought out.  Project managers bring an outside perspective to the intimate inner workings of your company and this should be refreshing, but can also be threatening.  Lastly, project managers are the get things done agents in your departments, divisions, and product lines - people who inspire others to complete activities at a ferocious pace typically not seen in your organization otherwise and for many organizations, this pace will seem intimidating. 

Now that you know the cowboy you are looking for, what will they do for you?

What is Project Management?
Project management is a mix of science and art.  As mentioned above, project managers study the things projects have in common, and we build out an extensive toolkit of things that work to address these commonalities.  For the rest, we sprinkle around our secret sauce of "expert judgement" - our artistic license, and arguably, our most valuable commodity. 

The act of project management is the carrying out of various activities associated with the delivery of a unique outcome.  This outcome might be a new product, a new service, a new process, a new system, a new strategic direction and/or many other things.  However, all projects have a few fundamental things in common. 
1) They are temporary. All projects occur over a defined period of time after which they end. 
2) They are not routine. All projects involve something new or different for the organization(s) involved, hence the role of the project manager as an organizational change agent. 

Now we understand the work the cowboy will be undertaking, let's understand our return on investment.

What does Project Management do for your organization?
Besides increasing your chance of successful outcomes, and having someone to hold accountable for success or failure, project management realizes some other very important organizational benefits.

1) Clarity
A project manager is going to hone in on a good justification for the project before it is initiated.  This means the project manager is going to ask you some tough questions about what you are doing and why.  Many organizations are taken aback by these questions. Don't be.  A key to project success is clear project scope and scope is the "project what".  We ask why you are doing a project so that we can understand what metrics should be used to measure project success. This means that when you reach the end of your project you will know that you have delivered what you intended.

2) Do the Right Things
A project manager helps you define the path from A to B.  A project manager will help to take an idea and define a series of executable steps to deliver the idea.  We specialize in seeing pathways that might not be visible to others.  We practice seeing the obstacles along the way and we carry a backpack full of solutions to help us pass by these obstacles.  We will tell you what we think are the right things to do and we will help you do them in the right way.  Probably this will be different than you expected.  You will need to trust us to deliver the improbable. 

3) Learning Along the Way
Project managers are trained to examine successes and failures objectively and to document these lessons learned for future reference.  When a project is completed, project managers will spend some time conducting a post-mortem.  Don't underestimate this value towards your future projects and business. 

4) Inspire you Forward
Project managers bring passion to an organization.  This passion is infectious and can inspire your teams to be more productive than was ever thought possible.  Goal-oriented is probably a bit polite. We are relentless in our drive to improve and to deliver.  We inspire others with this attitude and overall morale, quality, and effort are improved as a result.

5) Aren't Like the Next Guy
Project managers bring their special sauce to your organization, and if we are successful in your organization, this uniqueness becomes a key competitive ingredient.  No two project managers think the same, or execute in the same manner, and if you are lucky enough to find someone who realizes the above benefits and can hang onto them, your organization will clamber over its competition with ease.  To realize this benefit as an organization you have to value the diverse thinking and unique approach that your project manager(s) bring to each project. 

So when you advertise for a project manager position, and hire someone remember this:

• You've hired a leader, a trailblazer and an expert in something your organization is not expert in. This expertise and leadership is critical to your organizational success in the long run. Don't squash it. 
• You've hired someone who is bold, passionate, and thinks differently than most people in your organization. Value this, don't be upset by it. 
• You've hired someone who will ask questions that make a room go silent.  This has purpose.  Embrace it.
• You've hired someone who will see things you do not understand and will warn you about risks you don't see.  This is not embarrassing, it is for survival. 
• You've hired someone who will make your company their family and will throw themselves down for anyone and anything you ask them to take on.  Remember to thank them for this sacrifice.

Now that you know, go forth willingly into the unknown and don't be afraid.  Success is before you, of that you are assured.