The New World of Technology Understanding for PMs
Andy Jordan is President of Roffensian Consulting S.A., a Roatan, Honduras-based management consulting firm with a comprehensive project management practice. Andy always appreciates feedback and discussion on the issues raised in his articles and can be reached at andy.jordan@roffensian.com. Andy’s new book Risk Management for Project Driven Organizations is now available.
Early in my career in technology project management, the debate was raging around whether a PM needed to be an expert in the subject matter of the project. Some would argue that a PM on software projects needed to be a former developer, architect or at least systems analyst because otherwise they wouldn’t be able to understand the work that was being done or to help the team solve problems.
Others would offer the counterpoint that a project manager’s job was to manage the work being done, regardless of what that work was. The rest of the team were subject matter experts, the PM had to be a project expert. Fortunately, those conversations are pretty much behind us now as project management is better recognized as a discipline in its own right, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t an ongoing debate about project managers and technology.
The current rapid evolution of technology is having significant impacts on all aspects of organizations. Projects are clearly a big part of that, with technological advancements powering many of the new innovations that are implemented in every cycle of project delivery. Project managers don’t need to concern themselves with how the mechanical development of features or solutions is impacted by that evolution, but they do need to understand how it changes the environment their projects are being released into.
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Published at Mon, 11 Jun 2018 04:00:00 +0000
