What exactly is a "IT Project Manager" and why is it in such high demand?

[AgaBoogaBoo]

Damn, there's a bit of hate against them here. I see them as the ones delivering a finish product to the company, they oversee all aspects of it just like any manager would do. Even if there is some overhead because they have to meet with you, it's part of the process and in the end is better overall compared to not being able to deliver the project on time. They deal with a lot more of the "overhead" as you might see it involved in the process - they'll be working with people higher in the organization and making sure it's worth the company's time to even keep the project alive.

If a company's waving their checkbook around, why argue?

 

[Capt Caveman]

I'm one. Undergrad in Finance w/ MBA got bored and became an IS manager. Note, there are different kinds of pms. Mine, blends IT(technical) with the business(functional) and basically trying to develop a solution to a business issue/need. Trying to get different business groups to work together to accomplish a common goal. It can suck when people aren't/won't do their jobs but it's definitely not boring and you learn a lot about a company/learn new technologies and wear lots of different hats(roles).

 

[Zenmervolt]

Originally posted by: hanoverphist

Originally posted by: spidey07
PM job is to do project mangagement.

Essentially getting others to do all the work, PM just does all the planning, communication, scheduling and tracking. They are the KEY to success.

It's in high demand because very few IT people can be good project managers.

being a project manager myself on some projects here at my job, we are the glue that hodls you sawdust mofos together. we are also the end decision makers, the last line of responsibility and the ones who lose the bonus if the job goes into liquidated damages. saying they just sit around and schedule meetings and send emails is like saying a brain surgeon puts band aids on owies. ;]

PM's are not the "end decision makers". That would be the business sponsor. On projects, the business sponsor (sometimes called the business owner) is GOD. The PM is just the prophet.

A PM is largely a person with all of the responsibility and none of the power. It's an incredibly difficult job to do well, which is why it's in demand.

ZV

 

[vi edit]

A good PM filters out all of the behind the scenes BS that happens between deparments and/or vendors and dilutes it down to the essential information that the individual project members need to do their job.

 

[ahurtt]

Originally posted by: hanoverphist

Originally posted by: spidey07
PM job is to do project mangagement.

Essentially getting others to do all the work, PM just does all the planning, communication, scheduling and tracking. They are the KEY to success.

It's in high demand because very few IT people can be good project managers.

being a project manager myself on some projects here at my job, we are the glue that hodls you sawdust mofos together. we are also the end decision makers, the last line of responsibility and the ones who lose the bonus if the job goes into liquidated damages. saying they just sit around and schedule meetings and send emails is like saying a brain surgeon puts band aids on owies. ;]

Boohoo, if the project fails you loose the bonus that none of the guys working under your direction ever had a snowballs chance in hell of seeing regardless of whether the project succeeded or failed even though they are the ones who did all the actual work. Get over yourself already. You sound just like all the rest of them. Do you think it's any coincidence that most of the people here who know what IT Project Managers are seem to have such low opinions of them? It's because IT project managers are like hookers. . .a dime a dozen and most of them suck. The really good ones are few and far between. Problem is they all think they are the best.

 

[vi edit]

Originally posted by: ahurtt

Originally posted by: hanoverphist

Originally posted by: spidey07
PM job is to do project mangagement.

Essentially getting others to do all the work, PM just does all the planning, communication, scheduling and tracking. They are the KEY to success.

It's in high demand because very few IT people can be good project managers.

being a project manager myself on some projects here at my job, we are the glue that hodls you sawdust mofos together. we are also the end decision makers, the last line of responsibility and the ones who lose the bonus if the job goes into liquidated damages. saying they just sit around and schedule meetings and send emails is like saying a brain surgeon puts band aids on owies. ;]

Boohoo, if the project fails you loose the bonus that none of the guys working under your direction ever had a snowballs chance in hell of seeing regardless of whether the project succeeded or failed even though they are the ones who did all the actual work. Get over yourself already. You sound just like all the rest of them. Do you think it's any coincidence that most of the people here who know what IT Project Managers are seem to have such low opinions of them? It's because IT project managers are like hookers. . .a dime a dozen and most of them suck. The really good ones are few and far between. Problem is they all think they are the best.

And in their defense, a lot of the projects are set up to fail before the project ever gets off the ground. Completely unrealistic timelines set by the sponsor, underbudgets, resources getting yanked out from under them, ect. It's a completely thankless job. They have to take the responsibility for a lot of things they have no control over.

As far as the "IT" side of it, it's really just a subset of the overall PM group. They just specialize in IT related projects (Datacenter builds, WAN re-designs, enterprise application implementation, ect).

 

[hanoverphist]

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt

Originally posted by: hanoverphist

Originally posted by: spidey07
PM job is to do project mangagement.

Essentially getting others to do all the work, PM just does all the planning, communication, scheduling and tracking. They are the KEY to success.

It's in high demand because very few IT people can be good project managers.

being a project manager myself on some projects here at my job, we are the glue that hodls you sawdust mofos together. we are also the end decision makers, the last line of responsibility and the ones who lose the bonus if the job goes into liquidated damages. saying they just sit around and schedule meetings and send emails is like saying a brain surgeon puts band aids on owies. ;]

PM's are not the "end decision makers". That would be the business sponsor. On projects, the business sponsor (sometimes called the business owner) is GOD. The PM is just the prophet.

A PM is largely a person with all of the responsibility and none of the power. It's an incredibly difficult job to do well, which is why it's in demand.

ZV

in the business im in (industrial electrical contracting) the PM is the end. they are the last person that talks to the end user. if we are the general, that end user is the customer, and as a sub to another general, that end user is the general contractor. in a business that includes construction and all its aspects along with full building systems, network and communications, all the way to fixtures, there are many contractors to hire, deal with and control. we have a full construction division, a UL 508 shop, programming/ graphics services, 24 hr service as well as on-staff engineering services. a PM for us controls each and every aspect of this, and even inside this company we have people working out in the field installing conduits that dont even know there will be a fiber network installed in the next building. that PM is the glue that keeps all the different aspects of that project together, and also the one that repoerts directly to the end customer, whether that is a city/ town rep or a general contractor that is contracted by a city/ town rep. the only one here over the PMs is the VP. well, and the owner. but we dont sully his day with petty details =P

 

[slsmnaz]

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt

Originally posted by: slsmnaz

Originally posted by: ggnl
They have people skills. They talk to the end users so the programmers don't have to.

Nope, that's the BA.

Yup.

A good PM's job is to clear problems from the BA's path. The ones that I've worked with have been reasonably good; they handle escalation to upper management (VP's and above) when their BA's run into roadblocks and they deal with vendor issues when the vendors give the BA a hard time. (I had one PM who managed to get a particularly bad vendor contact fired after I'd been screwed over one too many times by the vendor.)

Mind you, this is my experience in a multi-national corporation with over 30,000 employees in the US alone, so it may very well be different in smaller environments.

Yes the status meetings and updates seem wasteful, but they are necessary to be able to give the high-level management (VP and above) confidence in the project and thereby assure that the project keeps moving. Most BA's seem to believe that project happen in a vacuum and that as long as it gets done, everything's OK. That's simply not true. There's a massive bureaucratic and political machine that a project has to navigate through and a good PM can guide that path.

ZV

<--- checks Zenmervolt's profile to make sure he isn't in the next hall (scary similarities).

 

[hanoverphist]

Originally posted by: ahurtt

Originally posted by: hanoverphist

Originally posted by: spidey07
PM job is to do project mangagement.

Essentially getting others to do all the work, PM just does all the planning, communication, scheduling and tracking. They are the KEY to success.

It's in high demand because very few IT people can be good project managers.

being a project manager myself on some projects here at my job, we are the glue that hodls you sawdust mofos together. we are also the end decision makers, the last line of responsibility and the ones who lose the bonus if the job goes into liquidated damages. saying they just sit around and schedule meetings and send emails is like saying a brain surgeon puts band aids on owies. ;]

Boohoo, if the project fails you loose the bonus that none of the guys working under your direction ever had a snowballs chance in hell of seeing regardless of whether the project succeeded or failed even though they are the ones who did all the actual work. Get over yourself already. You sound just like all the rest of them. Do you think it's any coincidence that most of the people here who know what IT Project Managers are seem to have such low opinions of them? It's because IT project managers are like hookers. . .a dime a dozen and most of them suck. The really good ones are few and far between. Problem is they all think they are the best.

actually, the bonus is a %, and it is split between the whole team that had more than 4 hours logged onto that job.

im also not one of the desk dwellers, i pull wire, terminate my own RTUs and make my own cables. i also program, design interfaces and set up custom networks. right alongside the guys im telling what to do, and asking status. i know im not the best, we have 5 other PMs here, and all but 1 have a lot more knowledge than i do. the other guy is just a paper pusher that never leaves his desk, and ends up farming out his deadlines to others to finish up anyway. still wonder how he manages to keep his job.

 

[ColdFusion718]

Originally posted by: nakedfrog
They take the specs to the programmers.
Well, their secretary does it, or sometimes the fax machine.
But they have people skills, dammit, can't you see that? What the hell is wrong with you people?!?!?

Hahah nice reference.

 

[hanoverphist]

i guess im not fully an IT pm, so that may be why my situation is different. mine covers IT as well as construction, including controls and integration work.

 

[mooglekit]

Originally posted by: hanoverphist
i guess im not fully an IT pm, so that may be why my situation is different. mine covers IT as well as construction, including controls and integration work.

:thumbsup: to you if you are as proactive as you describe.

Unfortunately, most the the IT PMs I've worked with have not been of your caliber.

 

[yllus]

Originally posted by: MichaelD

Originally posted by: Phokus
anyone here a project manager?

I wore that hat for roughly a year at my last job. In charge of the SysAdmin shop, 9 people under me. It was rough b/c I wasn't considered "the project manager." I was the department manager, so I took crap from the people under me AND the people over me. I was a toilet...everyone pooped on me. BUT, I did a darn good job and got the projects done on time...that's the bottom line.

I'm you right now. :Q Stressful, but invaluable for experience.

 

[hanoverphist]

Originally posted by: mooglekit

Originally posted by: hanoverphist
i guess im not fully an IT pm, so that may be why my situation is different. mine covers IT as well as construction, including controls and integration work.

:thumbsup: to you if you are as proactive as you describe.

Unfortunately, most the the IT PMs I've worked with have not been of your caliber.

wow, had i known it was different in the real world, i may have considered some of the other offers i had gotten hehe. seriously, i love the actual work, the PM part came about because i was the only one in house that knew anything about it. the other PMs are all construction or all electrical. and if stuff needs done and i can help, ill be right there with em helping to finish it.

 

[rh71]

Well, the word manager is in it... and they are more tasks-specific. Sure it's easy to rail on them for their duties.

Of course, it's not hard to become one.

 

[Chadder007]

Originally posted by: slsmnaz
Sit on your rear, send lots of email and schedule time-wasting meetings. I have yet to find real skills in many of our PM's besides those.

QFT. Time Wasting meeting make me go nuts.

 

[Saulbadguy]

They are worthless retards who play around with Visio and Microsoft Project all day.

 

[Phokus]

Originally posted by: Saulbadguy
They are worthless retards who play around with Visio and Microsoft Project all day.

LMAO, talk about direct

 

[Mday]

Idealy, it is a person with IT and business knowledge that can bridge the gap between those doing the work (IT), and those who need the work done (corporate, business).

In reality, a lot of them are ppl who don't know much about either.

 

[AgaBoogaBoo]

What kind of degrees do they look for in an IT management position? Technical background or at least overview of technical things with some management experience?

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: Saulbadguy
They are worthless retards who play around with Visio and Microsoft Project all day.

True for most of them.
Once in a while, you'll run into a good one, and you'll be really glad he's there, because a good one can make your job oh so much nicer.
The vast majority are just plain horrible leeches who screw things up, brown nose their way around with every boss they can find, send tons of emails with attached power point slides(most worthless program EVER by the way, it and bad PM's are a match made in hell), and schedule you for meetings about things that are in no way relevant to what you're supposed to do.

Luckily I actually have one of those few good PM's sitting in the office next to me these days, he's actually a good guy, helps me keep my sanity in the very strange climate of a big US corporation(first time I've worked for a US corp).

 

[sdifox]

I am a project coordinator. Started off with me doing everything. I know the business and I know the tech side. I hate the idiots that just spew crap as opposed to rolling up the sleeves and do the work.

I act as an insulator now to get the things done while satisfying the upper crust's need to micromanage. So I deal with the upper-crust, tell them don't worry, it will be done in 4-6 weeks. Hurry back and tell the grunt what has to be done yesterday. Under Promise, Over Deliver is the mantra.

 

[EKKC]

Originally posted by: slsmnaz
Sit on your rear, send lots of email and schedule time-wasting meetings. I have yet to find real skills in many of our PM's besides those.

QFT
I am one although that is not my official title, I did grow my skillset from the tech side and now going to the business side
I also go for long coffee breaks and ask everyone if they want any. my treat. no one ever takes me up on the offers. i guess they think i want something in return for free starbucks

 

[SampSon]

It's a glorified manager position.

Sure some of them actually have skills, but most don't.

 

[PingSpike]

Some you can fire when the offshoring project fails?