The Growing Project Management Profession in the Indian IT services industry

Ajay Parasrampuria, Managing Director i2m Management and Services IT’S A HOT SUMMER EVENING AND RAMESH HAS JUST WALKED OUT OF HARESH’S OFFICE, THE DELIVERY HEAD OF THE ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS PRACTICE AT GLOBALSYSTEMS. HE WAS JUST BRIEFED ABOUT HIS NEW ROLE REQUIREMENT.  NOW IT TURNS OUT RAMESH HAS A MAJOR CAREER DECISION TO MAKE…

As his mentor and reporting manager, Haresh took notice of the latter’s ability in defining solutions and leading a team of developers and testers in delivering to the clients requirements.  The account manager is also sufficiently impressed with the way Haresh and his team delivered on the client account. Although the client did mention a few things about delays in deliveries, they were extremely pleased about the overall quality; plus the focus on testing and subsequent integration went on without hiccups. As a result of these efforts, the CIO at the client end has increased the scope of work and the contract work to GlobalSystems.

Parag—a senior PM for the same account—would also speak well about Ramesh; except that Ramesh would always ignore his requests not to overdo the quality and testing tasks in order to save time and cost; after all the projects were now all about fix bid. But hey, a satisfied client is what one needs and the fact that the contract scope has been increased indicates that quality work always pays.

Given that the scope of work is increasing for the client account the organization has decided to increase the headcount of resources. For Ramesh, this only meant more rookies to be handled. In order to manage resources effectively and take on additional scope of work, Haresh in consultation with Parag voiced his idea about grooming Ramesh to take on the PM role and develop another project lead; they both agreed that, given current constraints, this was the best way to manage the account.  They approach Ramesh to explain the situation and present him with the new proposition. To help him move into the role, they also identify the PMP prep training program and certification to facilitate Ramesh to move into his new role.

Ramesh is an intelligent engineer from IIT Mumbai. After working in the IT industry for now almost 4 years, he is just not sure if he would like to be a PM.  For Ramesh being a PM means giving up on the technical aspects of his work which he enjoys a lot. The satisfaction in developing a solution and managing a small team of 6-8 young engineers gave him a kick.  He is also not sure if PM is right choice for him.  PMs are often non-billable resources; no wonder then that with the dollar rising and margins getting tougher, he is not sure if this is right career choice for him.  To add to this there is increasing pressure from parents to get married. Ramesh is also concerned that moving into a new role would mean starting from scratch.

Will this new role pay well?

Will be succeed in the new role?

Is he cut out for it…? Ramesh is confused and uncertain.

Is PM a growing profession or just a glorified technical leader role?

Is the PM profession growing in ITES industry?

Apart from the fact that most Indian IT services organizations still seem upbeat about their recruitment numbers, with over 5 percent of their employees in the PM role, I can see no foreseeable decline in demand for Project Managers.

But is it a rewarding profession, satisfying enough to stray from a well beaten technical career path?  Other indicators we could agree on to measure growth in PM profession would be the salary and compensation structure of Project Managers in the country.  Going through the data in the PMI salary survey, I was surprised to see that there is data available for India too.  And the data was available for 3 time periods i.e. 2003, 2005, 2007 across the following Job Profiles i.e. Project Manager Level1, Level 2, Level 3 and Program Manager.

Now before we get excited over compensation figures, let’s understand the job description at different levels of the organization. The table below summarizes the job description as defined by PMI in its career framework.  I have added a column to indicate what it means in the India IT services role/designations.

JOB/Role: Program Manager

Responsibilities and Description as per PMI Career Framework

•    Responsible for the coordinated management of multiple related projects. In many cases, ongoing operations which are directed toward a common objective.
•    Works with constituent Project Managers (who are responsible to the program manager for the execution of their project and its impact on the program) to monitor cost, schedule, and technical performance of component projects and operations.
•    Works to ensure the ultimate success of the program.
•    Generally responsible for determining and coordinating the sharing of resources among their constituent projects to the overall benefit of the program.
•    Usually responsible for stakeholder management, particularly stakeholders external to the organization.

India IT Services Industry Role observation

•    Designated as an engagement manager or an account manager who oversees all the projects being delivered to a specific client account
•    May not have PMs reporting into him.
•    Coordinates with Delivery Heads of multiple units/centers to ensure deliveries to the client.

JOB/Role: Project Manager III

Responsibilities and Description as per PMI Career Framework

•    Works under general direction of either a Portfolio Manager or in some cases a Program Manager
•    Oversees high-priority projects, which often require considerable resources and high levels of functional integration.
•    Takes projects from original concept through final implementation, in addition to the duties of a Project Manager II.
•    Interfaces with all areas affected by the project including end users, distributors, and vendors.
•    Ensures adherence to quality standards and reviews project deliverables.
•    May communicate with a company executive regarding the status of specific projects.

India IT Services Industry Role observation

•    Designated as a senior project manager who is involved with a project from proposal phase to delivery stage.
•    Plays a significant role in defining the overall solution strategy or approach along with breakdown of deliverables across multiple teams/delivery centers.
•    Communicates directly with the on-site account/Program manager and to the delivery heads.
•    Coordinates and communicates directly with client program/project manager.
•    May not be reporting directly to the Program Manager.
•    Carries most of the performance tasks related to Project Integration, Scope, Time, Cost, Risk and Communication Management (especially with client and senior management).
•    Other major tasks would include performance analysis & reporting along with resource & schedule analysis and control.

JOB/Role: Project Manager II

Responsibilities and Description as per PMI Career Framework

•    Works under general supervision of either a Portfolio Manager or a Program Manager
•    Oversees multiple projects or one larger project.
•    Responsible for assembling project team, assigning individual responsibilities, identifying appropriate resources needed, and developing schedule to ensure timely completion of project.
•    Also responsible for duties of Project Manager I
•    May communicate with a Senior Project Manager, Functional Area Manager, or Program Manager regarding status of specific projects.

India IT Services Industry Role observation

•    Works under the direct supervision of the PM II
•    May be in charge of assembly and assigning responsibility to project and tech leads.
•    Carries out most of the PM performance tasks related to Time, Effort, Quality, HR and Communication Management.

JOB/Role: Project Manager I

Responsibilities and Description as per PMI Career Framework

•    Works under direct supervision of a more senior project manager, a Portfolio Manager, or a Program Manager
•    Oversees a small project or phase(s) of a larger project.
•    Responsible for all aspects of the project over the entire project life (initiate, plan, execute, control, close).
•    Familiar with system scope and project objectives, as well as the role and function of each team member, to effectively coordinate the activities of the team.

India IT Services Industry Role observation

•    Starts as  a project or a technical leader
•    Responsible for the project life cycle, deliverables, and activities.
•    Charged with managing  technical resources as well as quality of the deliverables

Here are the figures sourced from the PMI 4th PM salary survey report.  I have taken the median compensation that includes the salary plus variable.  Although, PMI doesn’t say what constitutes the total compensation over and above the salary, this is a safe assumption made.  Given that the difference between the salary and compensation is less than or equal to 10 percent, I am assuming it would mean the variable based on performance and would not include benefits etc.

Interestingly the difference between PM L3 and PgM in terms of compensation is hardly 10 percent, which to me indicates that some of the L3 PMs are designated as PgM; but by and large their roles remain the same.  This is particularly true for IT services industry as Program Management definition and related processes and roles are yet to be clearly articulated by many organizations.  Given the fact that they are service providers, there is a major overlap between roles of a PgM, Account Manager, Engagement Manager, Relationship Manager Etc.

As we can see, there has been a median increase of 50 percent (taking 2003 as a base). I would say that the numbers look quite good, given the growing number of new clients the Indian IT services industry acquired during this period. More significantly, IT industry is also experiencing an average growth of 30-40%. This growth needs to be sustained by growing headcounts and overall economic growth and development in the country. All of this put together indicates an upward trend in the countrywide growth of demand for project managers.

But given the reality of the falling dollar, we may see a decline in the salary component. My prediction would be that perhaps the variable portion would increase as focus would now be on performance based compensation and not just an appraisal based increment, which to a large extent is given to almost all.

In spite of the possible slowdown in the US economy work being off-shored will increase. New mergers and on-card acquisitions in the BFSI sector could bring in more integration projects across major technology applications as well as infrastructure.  But the challenge would shift to delivering projects within time and under tighter budgetary constraints.  These circumstances hold promise for the role of PM in Indian IT services industry.

But what is worrying is the way industry is going about in-sourcing more PMs and developing existing managers. The current L&D initiatives related to the PM role are perhaps short sighted with only PMP® certification as their goal. We cannot yet see a competency based solution on the horizon.

Epilogue

Ramesh finally takes the call and decides to plunge into the new role of a PM, attends the PMP Exam program organized by his organization, and has started preparations for the examination.  After getting through IIT JEE and IIT, cracking an exam is an easy task for Ramesh.

Right now, however, he is occupied with the next client visit to the Bangalore center. The Program Manager from the client end is coming down to review the Program and Project Management Practices of the organization and especially the Project Office for their account. There will be a meeting followed by an evaluation of Project Managers working on the project.