|
Oh boy, so glad to see this thread. I lead a PMO in a company you've definitely heard of. I'm poo poo at managing projects because I have no attention span or attention to detail and hate working with people. However, I've made a career of building a framework where anal retentive, OCD Type-A project managers can actually contribute to an organization's success. A few fundamental truths I've learned: 90% of your job is fighting against human nature. People instinctively do things that are counterproductive, and even when they understand that, they still do them. If you work in a technical field, you will get very little respect or appreciation from the people who need you most. If they were good at managing work within their own function or communicating with people in other areas, your job wouldn't exist. When you hear people bitch about you, just know that their shortcomings keep you employed. Want to be loved? Go be a nurse or a teacher. Most enterprise project management software is utter poo poo, good only for creating job security for a bloated PMO. The lightweight boutique packages that cater to a particular methodology are way better. 80% of project managers are trash at their job, hiding in those bloated PMOs where they can't be easily evaluated based on their own performance. The dirty secret of this job is that it's hard for management to tell when someone does it badly because it's so easy to blame things beyond your control. Every duration estimate you've ever heard is hugely padded, and people's only incentive is to keep you from finding that out. If you lock them in a room and make an intern watch them work, that two-week task will be done before lunch. Everyone knows that multitasking is hugely counterproductive, but our organizations are typically set up to encourage it. If you've got someone pivotal on your project being pulled in six directions, you can be their personal savior by giving them clear task priorities and letting them focus on banging one out at a time. The PMP certification doesn't say much for your ability, but you should probably go ahead and do it (then let it expire) if this is a field you want to make a career of and you're actively seeking lower level PM jobs. Once you have proven experience, no one will care anymore. If you really learn MS Project, Excel, and VBA , you can drastically simplify your job by automating everything tedious. I'm not familiar with the "collaboration" bells and whistles in MSP2013 and beyond, but I'm an absolute ace at writing VBA macros for MS Project (and Excel) or just general configuration stuff - happy to answer questions about that in this thread or by PM, because I'm an absolute nerd and I love it.
|
#
¿
Jun 4, 2019 02:29
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 12, 2024 22:42 |
|
|
Dik Hz posted:Yup. If people were good at their jobs, you wouldn't need project managers. Correction: If people who are good at their jobs were good at aligning with people in other jobs and people weren’t inherently lazy without transparency and accountability, you wouldn’t need project managers. But people are people, so overhead increases.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 2, 2019 17:22
|
|
|
First thing, you turn your chair backwards and sit down Slater-style so they know it’s a jam session. Then you say “Look, it’s 2019 and everyone is going to use the work internet for personal use sometimes, but jerking off to porn in your cubicle or playing FarmVille for eight hours won’t fly. What are some common sense guidelines we can all agree to that let us get our jobs done without feeling like we’re in prison?” If your boss gets mad you definitely work in a prison.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 9, 2019 13:39
|
|
|
Definitely go more casual - focus on how they help people, not that “entered into a contract” jazz. Otherwise, yeah just say that.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 9, 2019 16:12
|
|
|
In interviews and resumes, I look for how they did what they did. It’s easy to hide in a PM role and contribute nothing. It’s also easy to spew unprovable results or claim others’ success as your own, but if you’d really saved your previous company five billion over four years you’d be hiring me, not the other way around. “Drove project execution by aligning with a cross-functional team on a credible schedule with proactive communication and regular updates to ensure focus on critical path tasks” makes me interested. “Managed twelve superwidgwt projects and improved cycle times by 80% while reducing costs by fifty golden rutabagas” does not.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 10, 2019 16:51
|
|