Project management is an evolving field offering numerous opportunities and challenges for new graduates and seasoned professionals alike. According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), demand for skilled project managers (PMs) is increasing, with a projected 15.7 million new roles created between 2010 and 2020. Accompanying this demand are requirements for additional education and certification.

Don Gottwald, PhD, CCP, PMP, and Loran Walker*, DMIT, PMP, Capella University faculty members who teach project management in the School of Business & Technology, share their history in and thoughts about this growing field.

 

Q. How did you get into project management?

A. “Like everybody else—by accident,” says Gottwald with a chuckle. Walker had a similar path: “I was already doing it, but didn’t know it had a name,” he says. “Then I took a class for my master’s and learned it did have a name, a rhyme, a reason, and a process.”

 

Q. What aspect of project management is most interesting to you?

A. “The completion of the project, when you’ve done a great job, and the customer is happy,” says Walker. “The planning is most onerous, but the end is most satisfying—that’s the payoff.”

Gottwald is fascinated by leadership of virtual teams (work groups that primarily interact electronically). “Virtual teams need to work harder to communicate, and not just the to-do lists, but the assumptions and expectations.”

 

Q. How is the project manager’s role changing?

A. In a nutshell, it’s becoming increasingly more professional and more demanding. “Project management has been around for a while, but now it’s being recognized,” says Walker. “There are new certifications and degree programs, accreditation, and PMI, which offers Congresses and symposiums.”

“It used to be that someone would recommend a project, the steering committee decided to do it and developed a charter, and a PM was assigned to deliver,” Gottwald adds. “PMs didn’t do requirements analysis and didn’t necessarily understand the end-user needs. But today, a PM needs to look at the bigger picture, dig in, and develop a common, shared vision of success for the initiative, where everyone speaks the same language.”

 

Q. What’s the most important skill that a successful project manager needs?

A. “There are three: communication, communication, communication,” says Gottwald with a smile. “A PM must be able to speak the language at every level—from the executive level down to the final end-user.”

Walker concurs. “The so-called ‘soft skills’—people skills—they’re critical. PMs need to be able to convey messages, recognize talent, and move people along. They need to be well-organized and understand another discipline’s language, because it’s likely the work they do will be multidisciplinary. And they must be able to analyze strengths and weaknesses of plans.”

 

Q. What are the top challenges you see for project management professionals in the next five years?

A. “The biggest change is requirements analysis,” says Gottwald. “PMs need to understand what success is, what it looks like. Every project is different, and that makes it difficult. They all need unique approaches, and they need to take internal and external dependencies into consideration.”

Walker outlined two major challenges. “Employers are not investing in employees,” he says. “They want fully trained employees from day one and aren’t doing internal training the way they used to, so many PMs are facing gaps in skills.” He notes that virtual teams have these same issues and more: “The multinational corporations will hire the best of the best, and that means a team can be scattered all over the world. There can be language barriers, culture issues, time zones to manage—it’s much more challenging.”

 

Q. How is Capella addressing those issues?

A. Gottwald points to the fact that Capella’s bachelor’s- and master’s-level project management degree programs have been accredited by the PMI, and the university is in the process of applying for accreditation for its doctoral programs. “Accreditation is rigorous, and puts us in the same framework of what is being recommended nationally by the PMI,” he says.

Walker points to the coursework itself. “Each course is a project,” he shares. “Students can apply what they’ve studied immediately in the workplace. We’ve heard that many times from graduates—‘I used this immediately’ or ‘It really helped my career.’”

 

Q. Why is it important to be a member of PMI or other professional organizations?

A. “You’ll stay in tune with what’s going on, what new training you need to acquire, the best practices, and networking,” says Gottwald.

“It’s a large mentoring society,” Walker adds. “You meet and learn from current practitioners who talk about problems, solutions, and new processes. You can also find a shoulder to cry on—someone who understands what your plight is when a project isn’t going well.”

 

Capella offers project management degree programs in both business and information technology (IT):

A concentration in project management can be added to any BS business or IT program.

 

*Interviewee Loran Walker passed away in 2014.
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