The crisis in Project Management

We live and work in a country which enjoys the third largest PMI membership. Coming right after the United States and Canada, we are part of a national community with seven chapters and more than 12,500 members. The total number of estimated PMP certified project managers in India is 16,000.

Because of its critical role in saving costs and delivering projects on time, there has always been a higher measure of accountability attached to the PM profession. One would think that this would become especially apparent in the current economic slowdown.

But contrary to expectations we are witnessing a downward trend in the growth of the profession. This can be seen especially in the ITES space where PM has been traditionally sponsored by corporate. Training and certification are being cut back.

The answers we are trying to find here must look beyond the ‘rational’ practices of organizations who are having to manage operational contingencies in the current economic climate by cutting costs.

PM in the real world

It is far from controversial to suggest that there has always been an organizational bias towards PMs: They have been looked upon as non-billable cost centers rather than critical resources required for executing successful projects.

Today the trend is getting worse: Abhinav Mayak, Asst. VP Migration, points to recent trends wherein “an artificial need is being created for Program Managers to take Project Manager as well as Program Manager Role at the same time”. This means that technical leads who had earlier been promoted to PM positions based on their technical skills are today being asked to oversee multiple projects within the same organization.

Other than the absurdity of this multiple-hat role, there are significant risks posed by individuals who lack project specific competencies that have an impact on critical thinking and decision making in project environments.

1. Customer engagement and communication suffers due to the unnecessary overlapping of focus areas e.g. program managers need to focus on business benefit enablement and project manager focus on project delivery aspects

2. Costly delays in performance due to sub optimal decision making. This is an outcome of underestimating the management and governance effort required to manage project complexity.

3. Inconsistency in communications due to lack of a commonly shared vocabulary may lead to a loss of credibility among stakeholders.

In this scenario, where project managers are essentially ‘management-agnostic’ themselves, I am concerned about the kind of crash and burn scenarios Indian outsourcing companies will face while operating under the lack of PM bandwidth.

On the other hand, let me present three advantages that organizations can enjoy when they employ project managers who are familiar with formal project management methodologies

1. Project teams will be aligned to the needs of the stakeholders when the project manager understands the decision making that goes with the business side of the project.

2. Teams will be armed with the ability to resolve progress and performance issues with use of proven processes and methods and will not have to leave project outcomes to chance and heroic efforts

3. By bringing in transparency and reliability on the project status, sponsors will benefit from a clearer picture of project progress and the consequently the project will face fewer conflicts.

The road ahead

Another senior PM I spoke with, Ruchikar Dalela, pointed out that “this is a self-critical period for the PM practices of the various Business Units. The delivery management teams are expected to show visible improvements in the management of projects”.

Hemant Arora, Product Champion, reminds us to use measurement metrics to show “that PM was not only necessary, but it was vital to ensure that profitability was assured in wafer-thin net projects by proper PM”.

Training programs must also be seen as specific skill-enhancing investments. Proposals will need to need to articulate concrete details on the true impact of the learning. It would be needed to show current gaps in PM competencies and how the proposed investment would realistically bridge these gaps, and what improvements in margins would result by bridging such gaps.