Reply to: Project Managers - I need your input please

[rurffy]

I just stumbled on the below and thought i should ask the house . Any one done this course at OXford university? any good?

Advanced Project Management for Engineers and Scientists | Oxford University Department for Continuing Education

Thanks

[Boo]

Your CV will then get binned if you haven't been a PM before. Suggest you either:

Take on some PM / workstream lead responsibilities in a non-PM role - perhaps cover for a PM on leave.
Try to land a PM role in a small project which demands some actual work as well in your field, preferably in a niche where you have expertise and/or with a client who respects your skills, or
Get a permie PM role.

You missed one

Boo

[DirtyDog]

Developers need to work for Infosys or Wipro.

Is that known as "License to cock up an implementation"?

[tomtomagain]

I can't see any credible organisation valuing it as a "license to work".

It's part of a set of requirements that project manager need to fulfil such as completing the internal training courses on change management.

The division I am in runs around 300 IT projects per year and so there is a large body of PM's ( permie and contractor ) with people joining and leaving all the time and it's just one method to ensure standards.

So if you were looking for a PM role in the large FTSE 100 then having PMI or Prince2 is a big plus on other candidates who may not have a formal PM accreditation.

[craig1]

Actually at the FTSE100 that I work all project managers must have PMI or Prince 2. It's called "Licensed to Work". PMI is preferred as it's an international company.

Architects need TOGAF.

Developers need to work for Infosys or Wipro.

Nobody knows what the BA's need.

I can understand PMI PMP as there is a quality bar in there but PRINCE2 is a pointless qualification and I can't see any credible organisation valuing it as a "license to work".

[tomtomagain]

That is the reality of it. The qualification really just get's you past the agent IMO.

Actually at the FTSE100 that I work all project managers must have PMI or Prince 2. It's called "Licensed to Work". PMI is preferred as it's an international company.

Architects need TOGAF.

Developers need to work for Infosys or Wipro.

Nobody knows what the BA's need.

[tomtomagain]

If I was choosing between 2 PMs who had consistently delivered $5M projects I'd be looking at personality fit, I don't think certification would get much of a look-in. It'd be like asking a taxi driver stopping distances before getting in a cab, you either think s/he can get you to your destination or not.

Note: I've never hired project managers, just my tuppence.

I partially agree with you ... but what I am saying is that if you have a pile of CV's and you need to select a few to interview then certification is going to be a plus point. And that may be a big, or small plus depending on your unique situation.

Once you interview them though it doesn't count for much. But if you interview two equally good candidates, find them both qualified, but only need one then you need to find something to select between them. A certification might just swing it.

Selecting by "Personality Fit" is risky. At worst it is nepotism, at best it can blind you to the best candidate.

[eek]

successfully verified standard of project progress.

There's the first flaw. Most consultancies don't want real progress, just enough to keep the money coming in....

[craig1]

That is the reality of it. The qualification really just get's you past the agent IMO.

Unfortunately that's too true. I've had know-nothing 18 year old agents tell me about how seriously they treat the PRINCE2 Practitioner qualification and how it's the benchmark qualification of a proper project manager.

In reality, it's a cash cow money making tool for the training providers and APM Group and was an utter waste of time and money as a course when I did it. The whole project management accreditation market is snake oil sales at its very worst. The only course that I've done that was worse than PRINCE2 was ITIL Foundation, have the book read to you for 3 days, take the book into the exam and tick a few boxes.

I'd like to see a proper certification come in for project management, don't care who runs it but it should be methodology neutral, you should be able to take in any methodology you want, even your own made-up one. An independent assessment that proves that you know how to start a project, how to manage through business case, requirements, scoping, design, build, test, deploy, handover and close as well as risk and issue management, matrix staff time management, stakeholder management, communications, documentation, accuracy of communication, diagnosing common problems and so on. I'd then have a senior grade where you have to register and every project you do for two years is externally verified for size and complexity, you'd only get your senior grade after the two years and a successfully verified standard of project progress.

[northernladuk]

If I was choosing between 2 PMs who had consistently delivered $5M projects I'd be looking at personality fit, I don't think certification would get much of a look-in. It'd be like asking a taxi driver stopping distances before getting in a cab, you either think s/he can get you to your destination or not.

Note: I've never hired project managers, just my tuppence.

That is the reality of it. The qualification really just get's you past the agent IMO.

[Antman]

If I was choosing between 2 PMs who had consistently delivered $5M projects I'd be looking at personality fit, I don't think certification would get much of a look-in. It'd be like asking a taxi driver stopping distances before getting in a cab, you either think s/he can get you to your destination or not.

Note: I've never hired project managers, just my tuppence.

[tomtomagain]

This is something that gets me annoyed. PRINCE2 is about as credible in certifying a project manager as Iain Duncan Smith is to good political leadership.

If you have PRINCE2 Foundation or Practitioner but haven't formally run a project then you're not a project manager. PRINCE2 is a methodology, as is PMI PMP. It's the equivalent of reading the Highway Code and thinking you can drive a car.

Conversely, the OU course actually requires you to put your training into a workplace situation, you may not be a project manager but the course will show you how to apply sound project management principles to a project. As someone who has had to hire PMs, I know which I'd respect more...

This is true ... but any accreditation allows the hiring manager to differentiate between similar candidates.

Imagine you are looking to hire a project manager to run a $5M project. You put out a job advert that describes the role and states the core skills. How many CV's do you think you will receive? 10? 20? 30?

Last time I hired a PM I had at least 20 CV's to sort ( and that was after the contractor desk had pre-filtered ).

You only want to interview maybe 3 -4. So how do you pick the best candidates? Well systematically you go through each CV saying

Has he worked on a project of a similar size? In the same industry? Same technology? Are they PMI ( or Prince2 ) certified?

And after that you might have a few likely candidates .... the accreditation helps the interviewer select ... it shows that the candidate takes Project Management seriously and they are not just some ASP.NET programmer who thinks project management is the easy option.

[craig1]

In my experience, a PRINCE2 certification makes the difference. I jumped in PM after a Foundation certification and additional learning about PMP principles and calculations (EV, SVP, etc..).
These 2 courses helped me landing important interviews, than is to you to excel during it!

This is something that gets me annoyed. PRINCE2 is about as credible in certifying a project manager as Iain Duncan Smith is to good political leadership.

If you have PRINCE2 Foundation or Practitioner but haven't formally run a project then you're not a project manager. PRINCE2 is a methodology, as is PMI PMP. It's the equivalent of reading the Highway Code and thinking you can drive a car.

Conversely, the OU course actually requires you to put your training into a workplace situation, you may not be a project manager but the course will show you how to apply sound project management principles to a project. As someone who has had to hire PMs, I know which I'd respect more...

[zerointeractive]

Prince2 course is much more credible than OU courses

In my experience, a PRINCE2 certification makes the difference. I jumped in PM after a Foundation certification and additional learning about PMP principles and calculations (EV, SVP, etc..).
These 2 courses helped me landing important interviews, than is to you to excel during it!

[Old Greg]

Yes. That was the same page I got my data from. If you add up the number of tax payers you get to figure that 97.3% earn less than 55k.

Although the 95th centile is £68,500.