Reply to: Becoming a Project Manager...

[GhostofTarbera]

Over the last couple of years, I've been informally coaching and mentoring people seeking help with IT career development. Data science/analytics is one of the areas I suggest some of them look at and the other is product management. Two novice BAs who worked for me transitioned successfully into product management and with the OP's business degree, that might be an option.

There are also quite a number of organisations who will put people through a boot camp of anywhere from 10-18 weeks to train them to be able to start entry level jobs in product management, data science or coding. Some of these are paid for by the student, some are free. They go on to typically work on 2 year placements with clients and get charged out a relatively low day rate. There are also schemes like this for BA and PM type roles but they have been struggling to place people into roles this year. Schemes vary on the intake criteria for age/previous experience. I've used such a scheme before for BAs and the quality of people has been very good.

Ahhh the good old days when there was plenty of roles for project managers

Let’s talk about 8 track audio in cars - that was good also

But like above post not relevant these days


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[SimonMac]

Project Management is dead thanks to agile you now want to be looking at Product Owner/Delivery Manager roles, no real skills needed (perfect for a pimp) but plenty of options out there for basecamp type events to get your foot in the door as a very junior role

[The Bona Fide]

^^ This is why everyone now has "Scrum Master" on their CV. It is essentially meaningless in the current market. Completely pointless some would say.

Even "Test Management" is in the bin as now developers, and their management, think that they can simply run a test automation suite and chuck their code into Production.

Yes, but it gives you licence to say thing like a morning scrum that is expected to extend beyond the normal alloted time will be called a rolling mall

[edison]

Are you sure you want to be a project manager? Why? Because you saw their day rates?

It's going to be really difficult to get that first job without any subject matter expertise. You either need experience as a PM or you need to be a subject matter expert in whatever the project is related to.

Don't do another generic degree. You already have a business degree. If you do a masters it should be something technical but I would think long and hard about whether or not you really want to do that. If you do then you can get a government postgraduate student loan.

If I was in your position and considering retraining into a new area I wouldn't pick PM. There are some other great areas that are growing and pay well. You can work on a MSc in Data Science online from a reputable university. If you move into data science you can sell your business degree as being relevant since you're most likely going to be analysing commercial data.

Imperial college is a very good university and has a new data science/machine learning MSc that is fully online (Just checked and it looks like it was suspended, also looks like they want a quantitative undergraduate degree)

MSc Machine Learning and Data Science (Online) | Study | Imperial College London

University of London has a couple MSc data sciences that are flexible that you should be able to do while working.

Birkbeck - Evening Study I believe
Data Science (MSc) — Birkbeck, University of London
Goldsmith's - Fully Online
Data Science | University of London

Another option would be to go down accounting/finance route. You have a business degree already you can start right away on an accounting qualification, 3 years till your qualified. Sounds like a long time but it'll go by quickly.

There are some other paths to take but I just don't think trying to retrain into a PM when you have no subject matter expertise is the easiest thing to do, not impossible but challenging.

Over the last couple of years, I've been informally coaching and mentoring people seeking help with IT career development. Data science/analytics is one of the areas I suggest some of them look at and the other is product management. Two novice BAs who worked for me transitioned successfully into product management and with the OP's business degree, that might be an option.

There are also quite a number of organisations who will put people through a boot camp of anywhere from 10-18 weeks to train them to be able to start entry level jobs in product management, data science or coding. Some of these are paid for by the student, some are free. They go on to typically work on 2 year placements with clients and get charged out a relatively low day rate. There are also schemes like this for BA and PM type roles but they have been struggling to place people into roles this year. Schemes vary on the intake criteria for age/previous experience. I've used such a scheme before for BAs and the quality of people has been very good.

[jayn200]

*Double Post*

[jayn200]

Are you sure you want to be a project manager? Why? Because you saw their day rates?

It's going to be really difficult to get that first job without any subject matter expertise. You either need experience as a PM or you need to be a subject matter expert in whatever the project is related to.

Don't do another generic degree. You already have a business degree. If you do a masters it should be something technical but I would think long and hard about whether or not you really want to do that. If you do then you can get a government postgraduate student loan.

If I was in your position and considering retraining into a new area I wouldn't pick PM. There are some other great areas that are growing and pay well. You can work on a MSc in Data Science online from a reputable university. If you move into data science you can sell your business degree as being relevant since you're most likely going to be analysing commercial data.

Imperial college is a very good university and has a new data science/machine learning MSc that is fully online (Just checked and it looks like it was suspended, also looks like they want a quantitative undergraduate degree)

MSc Machine Learning and Data Science (Online) | Study | Imperial College London

University of London has a couple MSc data sciences that are flexible that you should be able to do while working.

Birkbeck - Evening Study I believe
Data Science (MSc) — Birkbeck, University of London
Goldsmith's - Fully Online
Data Science | University of London

Another option would be to go down accounting/finance route. You have a business degree already you can start right away on an accounting qualification, 3 years till your qualified. Sounds like a long time but it'll go by quickly.

There are some other paths to take but I just don't think trying to retrain into a PM when you have no subject matter expertise is the easiest thing to do, not impossible but challenging.

[TestMangler]

Almost

Blame the c**ts when you mess up

Get new project and repeat


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he's an agent. I thought he'd already know that

[GhostofTarbera]

No training needed. It's a piece of piss. Make a list of tulip that needs done, tell the c**ts that need to do it, what they have to do and when, make a colour coded chart of all the tulip and all the c**ts, make it look to the stakeholders like you did it all yourself. Job Done.

Almost

Blame the c**ts when you mess up

Get new project and repeat


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[TestMangler]

No training needed. It's a piece of piss. Make a list of tulip that needs done, tell the c**ts that need to do it, what they have to do and when, make a colour coded chart of all the tulip and all the c**ts, make it look to the stakeholders like you did it all yourself. Job Done.

[wattaj]

I completely agree. At least these are the roles OP can try immediately with his/her known contacts without investing time, money and effort in PM courses that is probably going to give the same outcome.

All OP needs is a week to prepare for these roles and test the waters.

True, but the market is jam-packed with so many other trying to do the same thing. This is a dreadful time to be looking if one doesn't have a strong CV.

[BigDataPro]

^^ This is why everyone now has "Scrum Master" on their CV. It is essentially meaningless in the current market. Completely pointless some would say.

Even "Test Management" is in the bin as now developers, and their management, think that they can simply run a test automation suite and chuck their code into Production.

I completely agree. At least these are the roles OP can try immediately with his/her known contacts without investing time, money and effort in PM courses that is probably going to give the same outcome.

All OP needs is a week to prepare for these roles and test the waters.

[wattaj]

If I were you, I would choose Scrum Master and/or Test Manager route. They are achievable with your experience as both doesn't require much technical knowledge. They are purely managing people and the expectation of stakeholders.

^^ This is why everyone now has "Scrum Master" on their CV. It is essentially meaningless in the current market. Completely pointless some would say.

Even "Test Management" is in the bin as now developers, and their management, think that they can simply run a test automation suite and chuck their code into Production.

[BigDataPro]

If I were you, I would choose Scrum Master and/or Test Manager route. They are achievable with your experience as both doesn't require much technical knowledge. They are purely managing people and the expectation of stakeholders.

[northernladuk]

There's no age limit to apprenticeships AFAIK, although the government funding is skewed to under 25s. Apprenticeships can go up to Masters degree level and even beyond.

For a limited time you can get up to £18,000 funding towards some Masters degree level apprenticeships I believe.

Absolutely correct but companies offering apprenticeships to all ages tend to look internally for their candidates. They've got people with a good idea of the business and are dedicated so why take a chance on external randoms. It's not common for an advertised apprenticeship role to be open to adults.

[oracleslave]

I've amazed at how many people have done or are doing diplomas, first degrees and even masters in subjects like Project Management. A terrible waste of time and money in my opinion.

I'm doing an MBA at the moment. I started it partly out of boredom and partly from a thirst for knowledge. I need the structure of the course as I don't have the discipline to read all the academic guff on my own without some direction. It's early days but am thoroughly enjoying it and it's already done what I hoped it would - which is open my eyes to areas, topics etc that I would never normally encounter.