I often find myself being asked how my career path led me to Project Management to which I reply, “it just happened”. As an engineer, I started out having direct involvement in the project lifecycle as part of the EPCM puzzle, with the transition into project management from design not overly large. It is a common transition and often as result of business resource availability and or lack of organisational capability. And that’s that, many would jump straight onto LinkedIn and change their job title to Project Manager and the sky is the limit. Once that role title is on someone’s CV, it never goes away.

The title Project Manager is broad and can describe a person’s occupation for anyone who manages a project team of a few, all the way up to teams of hundreds on multibillion-dollar projects. Project Managers and the function of project management is where the rubber hits the road for a business to realise return on investment and this is why continued professional development and accreditation is important. We are all unique with varied experiences, talents and weaknesses.

Generally businesses exist to make money and this is often done through the successful implementation of projects, within the bounds business case. As a consulting company we are exposed to a wide variety of business environments, all needing to invest more time and energy in their organisation’s project management capability (people and process). Sadly cost and time pressures usually ensure that this doesn’t happen, swiftly closing out one project and moving onto the next.

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result”.

This saying resonates with me…I have yet to see an effective project Plan Do Check Act feedback loop, effectively ingraining the lessons learned into people and process; the common foundation to all businesses and underpin a projects lifecycle.

No one’s perfect and you don’t know what you don’t know, fostering an environment of genuine continuous improvement in the field of project management is good for projects, good for teams and the sustainable future of society.

Author: Luke Betros