Project Management

[catsandsprogs]

Hi,

Can anybody advise on the most sought after project management qualifications? I know back in the day it used to be Prince 2, but didn't know if times had moved on.

Also, in terms of IT project management specifically are there any courses that would be considered more valuable or is a generic PM course considered enough? This is one of the areas I'm currently considering.

My background is marketing/ business development/ outsource operations and client management, and I feel I have quite abit of practical transferable experience however feel some formalised PM accreditation would may help as considering more of a PM/ senior PM role.

Many thanks

prince2 seems to have gone by the wayside. Agile appears to be more popular now.

Thanks - will have a look at that

I think the APM PMQ is more fashionable that PRINCE 2 at the moment. I too work in bus dev but with significant PM experience. I haven’t ever completed a formal qualification because I figured I would let any employer dictate what they wanted, but most PM roles are paid less than I am...

Depending on your area of interest, scrum qualifications can be useful, eg scrum master, through that’s not quite the same as a pm role. Though from my experience with scrum, being able to demonstrate that you’ve used it is as/more important than the qualification

Job ads I've seen recently (public sector) ask for Prince 2 or equivalent. Agile maybe a good option as mentioned above and is a lot more fun. Prince 2 is a fun sponge.

AMP seems to be more in fashion than Prince and would also suggest Agile, especially if working in an IT environment.
I run a change department and am recruiting at the moment and to be honest, it’s experience rather than qualifications as with both Prince and APM they are both very theoretical and then back in the real world....

I agree that public sector tends to lean towards Prince2. In the private sector, more APM and Agile.

Thanks all, definitely given me food for thought

PRINCE2 is still a valuable asset in IT. APM is also well regarded in less technical fields like building services and health management.

I work in project / programme management and as a previous poster has already said, your experience is way more important than your qualification. Certainly in my sector (consulting and / or Financial Services).

I've come across quite a few useless wannabe PMs. They may pass the exams but that is just the theory. In practice they've been beyond useless. I gave one a chance as a junior PM on a programme I was managing for a client. I had to take him off 2 months later as I had so many complaints from client staff. Even with me coaching him, he just didn't get it. He insisted he still wanted to be a project manager but I refused to have him in my team (I was responsible for line managing all the programme and project managers in our UK organisation). So he stropped off and took a contract role as a PM elsewhere. He failed at it of course and came back to us asking for his old job (Business Analyst) back. He now markets himself as a Programme Manager on Linked In but I can assure you he can't manage his way out of a paperbag. Oh the male ego! Sad really as he was a decent BA and would be much more successful playing to his strengths/

Common sense (apparently not so common !), experience, and EQ are more important than any project management qualification. I also think pessimists make better PMs than optimists as pessimists worry everything will go wrong and plan accordingly.

But experience counts for so much! It really is the difference between success and failure.

Thankyou both - 🤣🤣 at can't manage his way out of a paper bag!

I work in the public sector and I would say Agile for IT or APM for general would likely be referenced in job ads. Experience counts for a lot.

You can do Prince2 Agile these days (did mine 18 months ago) combines both approaches and is much less box ticking than the original prince 2 qualification used to be. I’m in financial services IT and it’s relevant; my US colleagues are mainly PMP qualified which is basically where hope goes to die, whilst paying for the privilege

Echoing other posters saying that experience is key, especially when having to adapt approaches

I said upthread about experience and the poster who talked about the useless colleague made me laugh. It’s seen as a glam role, it’s anything but. You are trying to get a bunch of disparate characters who you do not manage so have no direct authority over to do stuff for you when they often don’t want to. You have to assume anything that can go wrong will do, get people to document things when “but we’ve always just done it it will be fine” and you are expected to know the answer to everything!

Thanks all -I think I'm going to go for the Prince2 Agile as looks to be the best of both worlds. I do have quite abit of transferable experience but I guess the reason why I'm keen to get some recognised accreditation is in my career I've had to "work my way up". I didn't go to university and despite lots of experience, some companies it seems won't even consider you if you don't have a degree which I could understand if the PM role was linked to a specific technical industry but they still ask for this elsewhere too.

It’s seen as a glam role, it’s anything but.

This is very true. Outsiders may think it's all very straightforward and PMs just swan about going to meetings and writing status reports. It couldn't be further from the truth.

Like most roles these days, there isn't enough time to do things "properly" and you will have to make some hard decisions about which corners to cut and which you can't - which will all need to be agreed with a disparate bunch of stakeholders who all have different priorities / interests and some of whom may well be wanting your project to fail. And that's a key point: whether things are within your control or not, the buck ultimately stops at you. You will take the hit for ANYTHING that goes wrong but most likely you won't get the glory for things that go right.

I cannot stress enough that experience is way more important than any PM qualifications. I know plenty of companies who put a PM qualification as mandatory on their job spec but if a candidate can demonstrate good PM experience, they don't care about the lack of PM qualification. The degree thing is harder - that's usually a corporate policy (or uptight management) and a PM qualification won't be seen as a replacement for a degree.

People often call themselves project managers but delve a little and the projects are often one or maybe two people - for less than a week or a simple piece of work. People refer to their work as projects now rather than tasks...and candidates just love to drop project management all over a CV. Project management is part of what we do, we don't ask anyone to have PM qualification - if you don't understand the subject and the industry you can't manage the project, so PM qualifications are the least of our needs.

I'm a project manager with over 10 years of experience in public sector and I have recruited project managers - I will take experience over qualifications any time. I do have PRINCE2 (this is very much something that a lot of public sector roles will ask for as a tick box) and Agile qualifications but to tell the truth, don't really need them to do my job especially as my organisation only pretends to adhere to any of those frameworks but that is a different matter.
You could argue this then creates the chicken and egg situation, how do you get PM experience if you have never been a project manager; in IT I have seen a lot of people start out as project coordinators or in a customer support and then work their way up. It is a very specific skillset and HundredMilesanHour is spot on, as PM you are essentially herding cats that don't particularly want to be herded and if anything goes wrong, it is your fault even though you don't really have the seniority or the power to influence the situation.

Thanks all - I feel more so much more confident now that so many of you value experience moreover a qualification. I will still do Agile but this has given me the shove I need to get cracking on updating my CV so will see where it takes me!

Please ignore the typos..,

I've been a PM for 8 years now, i manage waterfall projects and our business is set up for that, yet agile qualifications like CSM etc seem to be the desirable. I did a two day APM course years ago, remember nothing, I do think experience is so important. Not necessarily PM experience but experience in the area you want to work in so sounds like you've got a head start! Good luck!

Another recommendation for Prince2 Agile Practitioner. Best of both worlds IMO