There are lots of things that go into making you a good project manager overall, but here are four broad areas that shape how other people see you and your ability to do a good job.
Your character
Having a leadership attitude focusing on trust, openness, integrity and honesty will show people your true character. Of course, you can choose your own personal values to live by, and as long as you adopt these and manage everything you do along those lines, people will see that you are credible and trustworthy.
The character also includes elements of tenacity and resilience. If you aren’t sure whether you display these characteristics, you can ask your colleagues to give you feedback. Most people are very happy to provide constructive feedback, but if you come up against any resistance to do so, offer them the chance to provide feedback anonymously or through a trusted third party like your line manager.
People also make judgments about how you spend your time and who you spend it with, so also look at these areas of your professional life. If you spend your time with one group of people, do people outside that group consider you to be part of a clique and difficult to approach? It is important to have friendly relationships with people at work, but you also want to show that you have a broad reach and are happy to talk to everyone. After all, who knows what insights or information they may have about your project? Don’t limit your circle of acquaintances at work.
Your technical skills
Technical skills include things like your ability to make decisions, your technical project management skills and those in using particular pieces of software, like Seavus Project Viewer. Technical skills also include scheduling and risk management.
People will see these skills in use and will make judgements about you based on them. On the other hand, you’ll also make judgements about yourself based on your ability to do these things. It is no shame not to be particularly good at something – no one is good at everything. What you do need to know is where your weaknesses lie so that you can ensure that there are other people in the department or on the project team who can pick up the slack for you in areas where you are not so strong. Surround yourself with experts!
Your results
People make decisions about how good a project manager you are based on your results. However, you have probably heard this before: you are only as good as your last project. Results are really important in project management. If you are in this job you are probably motivated by doing a good job, ticking things off lists and delivering. As a consequence, you’ll need to demonstrate that you can actually see things through to the end and deliver outcomes for the project and the company.
You can demonstrate this by setting goals and objectives. Take responsibility for project deliverables and put your hand up when these are not achieved. Create targets for yourself and your team and stick to them.
Again, if you are unclear about how you are doing in this area, ask for some feedback. Do people trust you to deliver the results?
Your interpersonal skills
Finally, your interpersonal skills are key are in making you a mediocre, good or excellent project manager. Interpersonal skills include:
- Networking
- Ability to work across the organisation
- Presentation skills
- Listening
- Teamwork and facilitation
- Coaching and mentoring.
These are the visible manifestations of some of your values and attitudes. You won’t be considered a great project manager by others if you deliver consistently and have excellent technical skills, but you achieve those results by annoying everyone you work with. Project work is about getting things done through other people, so you will need to work on those ‘soft’ skills if you want to stand out as a great individual!
What other things matter to you (and to the people around you) when it comes to deciding if you or someone else is a great project manager? If you have any examples of other criteria that are used to make that call, then let us know in the comments.