Are you A Project Manager?

When I was a project manager, someone came to me and asked "what's the most important skill for a Project Manager?" This question is very important and you have to know his answer.But before to answer this question let me explain you "What's Project Management?"According to the PMBOK Guide, project management involves applying knowledge,skills, tools, and techniques during the course of the project to accomplish the project’s objective. It is the responsibility of the project manager to ensure that project management techniques are applied and followed.

 

Great! Now who is the Project Manager? 

 

Project managers are the people responsible for managing the project processes and applying the tools and techniques used to carry out the project activities.Project managers are generalists with many skills in their repertoires. They are also problem solvers who wear many hats. Project managers might indeed possess technical skills, but technical skills are not a prerequisite for sound project management skills. If you want to have good results, you must have good project manager.

 

Good Project Manager must have these skills: 

 

Communication Skills:

 

One of the single most important characteristics of a first-rate project manager is excellent communication skills. Written and oral communications are the backbone of all successful projects. Many forms of communication will exist during the life of your project. As the creator or manager of most of the project communication (project documents, meeting updates, status reports, and so on), it’s your job to ensure that the information is explicit, clear, and complete so that your audience will have no trouble understanding what has been communicated.

 

Organizational and Planning Skills:

 

Organizational and planning skills are closely related and probably the most important skills, after communication skills, a project manager can possess. Organization takes on many forms. As a project manager, you’ll have project documentation, requirements information, memos, project reports, personnel records, vendor quotes, contracts, and much more to track and be able to locate at a moment’s notice. You will also have to organize meetings, put together teams, and perhaps manage and organize media-release schedules, depending on your project.

 

Budgeting Skills

 

Project managers establish and manage budgets and therefore need some knowledge of finance and accounting principles. The ability to perform cost estimates for project budgeting is especially important in this skill area.

 

Conflict Management Skills

 

Show me a project, and I’ll show you problems. All projects have some problems, as does, in fact, much of everyday life. Isn’t that what they say builds character? But I digress. Conflict management involves solving problems. Problem solving is really a twofold process.

 

Negotiation and Influencing Skills

 

Negotiation on projects is necessary in almost every area of the project, from scope definition to budgets, contracts, resource assignments, and more. This might involve one-on-one negotiation or with teams of people, and it can occur many times throughout the project.

 

Leadership Skills

 

Leaders and managers are not synonymous terms. Leaders impart vision, gain consensus for strategic goals, establish direction, and inspire and motivate others. Managers focus on results and are concerned with getting the job done according to the requirements.

 

Team-Building and Motivating Skills

 

Project managers will rely heavily on team-building and motivational skills. Teams are often formed with people from different parts of the organization. These people might or might not have worked together before, so some component of team-building groundwork might involve in the project manager. The project manager will set the tone for the project team and will help the team members work through the various stages of team development to become fully functional. Motivating the team, especially during long projects or when experiencing a lot of bumps along the way, is another important role the project manager fulfills during the course of the project.