Who the Project Manager is
It is to decide to ruin or make to fail any effort, idea or thought that has to be executed by persons who are not trained, certified and have no experience doing so. Both as damaging and wasteful as this is, we see businessmen handle their projects themselves. A project can begin and certainly is designed to fail, if first, there wasn't a plan, timeframe and a strategy to make it stay within budget. The project manager’s first role is to make a feasible plan that achieves the goals and objectives of the project and aligning it with the organization’s overall business strategy. This involves creating a project schedule, securing the resources and defining the project goals. A skill and expertise only familiar with the project manager.
Just as is applicable in every field, a practitioner is the best bet to handle any task in his field if that task is to see the light of day. If you want to complete projects successfully without the help of a project manager, consider implementing a few project management best practices to help you and your team strategically complete projects both large and small.
Project managers are organized, goal-oriented professionals who use passion, creativity, and collaboration to design projects that are destined for success. The Project manager is responsible for delivering the project responsibility. He leads and manages the project team, with authority and responsibility from the project board to run the project on a day-to-day basis and across various industries using their project management expertise.
A Business owner / CEO isn't a Project Manager
According to a report by IAPM “The CEO holds one of, if not the most important and influential roles in an organization. The CEO is ultimately responsible for the success or failure of the organization.
But when it comes to the success or failure of the project, that burden lies squarely on the Project Manager”. It is important to note that business owners, CEOs, Heads of Organisation and Start-ups, Leaders and Aspiring leaders – at all levels – can benefit from a solid project management skill set.
What does a project manager do? Tasks and responsibilities
A project is typically divided into five different phases: initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and controlling and closure. This variety of tasks means no two days on the job or two projects would be the same. On any given day, you might be managing team meetings, realigning strategies, reallocating resources to cover an unexpected expense, or updating stakeholders on the progress of the project.
Throughout the project lifecycle, the project manager is responsible for:
- Defining the project scope
- Tracking project schedule
- Planning cost and budget
- Managing resources (including teams and workers)
- Documenting/ reporting project’s progress
- Communicating with teams and stakeholders
- Assessing risks
- Troubleshooting
- Leading quality assurance
The Project Manager’s skill set
Project managers have diverse skill sets that allow them to approach each assignment in a unique and strategic way. They understand the uniqueness of each project, how to leverage their project management skill to succeed and to lead.
We have highlighted both soft and hard skills required for an effective project completion.
Soft skills:
- Transformational Leadership: They’re responsible for setting the team’s vision and ensuring everyone is on board and motivated to bring the project through each phase. Among the project managers' prowess is keeping his/her/their team motivated and may require buy-in from executives and project team members.
- Communicating: Project managers lead by ensuring that team members and stakeholders are informed about the project plan, timeline, and budget and that they stay updated on the project’s latest happenings.
- Creative Problem solving and Adaptability: Project Managers are Creatives, vast and experienced. And as much as you’d like to think that your project will go off without a hitch, unexpected issues are bound to surface. Project managers can’t be dispirited by a problem or an unanticipated hiccup. Instead, they have backup solutions to keep the project moving forward — even when the best-laid plans fall apart.
- Organization: Deadlines, management of resources, task dependencies — it’s enough to make anybody’s head spin, but a project manager views it as a fulfilling challenge. Project managers are exceptionally organized and can keep track of all the moving pieces.
- Negotiations: While a project plan might seem relatively straightforward, there's actually a lot of back-and-forth and unpredictable happenings involved in agreeing on deliverables, timelines, and everything in between. Which is why project managers are strong negotiators. From talking about prices with different vendors to compromising on expectations between two teams, project managers will keep a level head and constantly advocate for the project's success — without ruffling too many feathers in the process.
Hard Skills
- Project planning: In order words, how do we accomplish this, what is our game plan turning an intangible idea into reality within a certain timeframe, usually with defined stages and designated resources. Planning considers all the intricacies when considering the execution of a project.
- Risk management: Project managers are responsible for not only navigating around risks but anticipating them so that they can try their best to avoid them altogether (or, at the very least, adequately prepare for them).
- Time management: Every project manager has demands placed on their time because they’re acting as the point of contact for so many departments and team members. They are able to manage their own time and the time and capacity of all of the project’s key players.
- Critical thinking: Whether a project falls behind schedule or a necessary resource is unexpectedly unavailable, project managers will undoubtedly find themselves in a variety of tricky situations. Related to problem-solving, the project manager uses critical thinking to work through the scenario, gather as much information and evidence as they can, and then make judgments about the best way forward. Put simply, they can't have a knee-jerk reaction, and their critical thinking skills enable them to respond reasonably and rationally.
How to succeed in that project
Think about it this way: As a business owner you cannot design an app for your business yourself, because if you try, you will fail. Also you cannot decide that because you want to manage funds that you want to organize your event yourself, you will end up disgracing yourself, which is why, having a creative project manager handle your project would save you, every time.
- First, they know exactly what to ask.
Supervisors don't always know what kind of information to share with a project manager to accurately determine the project's scope. Like the objective of the project's deliverables, the timeline and other specifications that will inform the team's creative decisions.
- Second, they speak the language of their team.
Creative project managers can translate the project's specifications into helpful and concise creative briefs that guide the creative production. As a result, it becomes easier to oversee progress, stay on top of the project and respect deadlines and the project assets' specifications.
- They are Proficiency in project management tools.
To facilitate their responsibilities and focus their efforts. The bigger a project or the more projects a creative project manager has taken up, the more qualified he gets because the greater the need for advanced organizational skills. This leads to effective prioritization, minimizing excessive workload and prevents the project from going over budget or getting delayed.
No matter how great a parent you feel you are, or a physician preventing your kids from school is your loss. You cannot argue that because you are great at what you do with your patients qualifies you to prevent your child from being trained by certified experts. You are not designed to handle your projects yourself, it would only cost you more. You could lose more- time, resources, funds, reputations, confidence and respect.
Won't you rather experts take that burden from you, while you focus on winning?
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