Slashdot Mirror

All they mean is that the person had some spare time & money, and felt like doing something easy.

The project management certificate (35 hours of education) is a prerequisite for the Project Management Professional certification. The other prerequisites are a secondary degree and 7,500 hours of project experience. There's nothing easy about pursuing this certification.

https://www.pmi.org/certifications/types/project-management-pmp

Your winning strategy is to make ageism work for you by getting the same degree every ten years and stagnating at the entry level forever.

Your math is off. My second degree came 13 years after my first degree. I don't plan to get a certificate in project management (seven classes @ $1,000 each) until the 15 year mark (2022), which qualify me for the Project Management Professional.

Agreed. Your selling point is your knowledge of business as well as technical skills. That combination is ideal for project management or business analyst, and you can get certified relatively quickly.

  http://www.pmi.org/certificati...

Management has always been a high paying escape from engineering, whether the manager was a good engineer or not. I also blame PMI and CMM for blowing a lot of smoke in upper management's faces.

I'm an Australian living in Munich and I would also agree that a university qualification is almost a prerequisite. Getting a tertiary education here is cheap so just about everyone competing for a position will have a degree of some kind. I see this myself because I've only got a Bachelor of CS and most people either have a diploma or Masters. But I think that's only really a problem for people going into programming.

It seems like you've got a lot of experience, so why not just be a team leader or project manager? At this level experience counts more than a degree. One of my bosses recommended getting a qualification here and another colleague of mine got his qualification there too. It seems to be fairly well recognised in Germany.

Another thing to take care of is learning to speak a decent level of German. I can't tell if you're German or can speak German from your post (so if you do just ignore this), but personally speaking, able to speak a decent level of German played a large part in me getting my current job. I wouldn't have gotten it if I didn't speak German even though I was well qualified for it on paper. There are a lot of companies that don't care as much, but those are mainly larger international companies. Improve your German and you'll open up a lot of new options.

As a developer I mostly focus on MCPD's for whatever area I'm working on. .Net or Sharepoint. I then fill in MCTS's in the gaps for technologies like SQL Server and Biztalk.
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/certification/mcts.aspx

For system engineers there are specific exams too.
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/certification/mcitp.aspx

PMP is also a standard cert for management. I think most consultants/programmers should take this to understand the basics of how a project is put together.
http://www.pmi.org/Certification/Project-Management-Professional-PMP.aspx

I'd recommend starting out with the PMI body of knowledge...start here: PMI. ITIL is a very good framework for designing an ideal operational environment, but it's huge and very bureaucracy-centric if you're not careful. The ITIL content is not free, but you can take training courses or buy it yourself.

All that said, don't underestimate what you're getting into. Project management is not IT work. The job you do as a PM is totally different from anything you're going to do in your IT job. For one, you can't do any of the work yourself. A PM's job (in my estimation) seems to be begging and pleading workers and their managers to get things done on time.

Also, project management, like people management is a skill. You can either do it or you can't. I've seen IT guys promoted to project managers who fail horribly at it. Remember that you're not the "doer" anymore, all you do is keep records, hold meetings and yell at people who miss their dates. On the flip side, a truly good PM with IT skills is a godsend. Being able to understand that an IT project is NOT a construction project is a key skill. Traditional PMs will tell you that a project is a project. However, you know EXACTLY how long it takes a carpentry crew to frame a house, a plumber to lay pipe, and a drywall crew to put up walls. You sometimes have no idea how long it will take to find $obscure_bug[n]. Construction projects have at least a chance of coming in on time, and IT projects really don't unless they're totally simplistic. Keep that in mind and you'll do well!

I can't recommend becoming a "coder" given the current business conditions.

What is in desperate need is process-oriented software project managers. The good news is that you can come at this with a bit of coding background if you combine it with rigorous project management training on the PMP track. I'll admit that half of employers won't look at you as a project manager if you don't have "10 years coding experience," but the other half will be willing to overlook a depth of coding experience if you have a solid process-oriented project management training and attitude. And once you've landed a job as a software project manager and get a project or two under your belt, you will have the cred to work anywhere.

Even if you do move forward with a "coder" career, I suggest you bone up on your software project management processes, and point out in resumes and interviews that you are serious about project process.

There are 100 million potential coders on the planet, but if you are the kind of coder who can also gather requirements (in English, on site in the US ;), create work breakdown structures, generate project plans and test plans, track the project, and demonstrate successful testing, you will shine a bit above folks who can't, even if you have not ever written a compiler in class.

That's more than a joke. It's one of the basic principles of project management, as collected by the Project Management Institute.

They put it a little differently, (here's another view of it for a fixed scope, which is the specific case to which the parent post refers), but the basics are what the parent said.

As a working PM, I can attest that even in our own field there is a flexibility to the terms "project manager" and "project". Consider it a holy war of sorts. So when someone applies for a position as a PM, it often helps if they have a PMP certification so its clear what their definitions look like.

http://www.pmi.org/CareerDevelopment/Pages/Certification-and-the-Job-Market.aspx

Check out the Project Management Institute (PMI) and start working towards getting your Project Management Professional (PMP) designation. It will be worth salary dollars, too, and will help you move elsewhere when you have to. Also, read Drucker (anything written by or his stuff collected, like the "Daily Drucker" or "Essential Drucker").

The One Minute Manager book is a good starting place, too, since it will help you with some very basic concepts of how to deal with the social system of managing employees. This is a book that you can read in about an hour, and will at least give you something to start with.

Also, be very candid with your HR department or supervisor and say, "I don't know if I have all the right training for this - what programs are provided for training?" If you live near a major university or other big industry companies, there may be off-site programs (like UCLA's great technical management program, next one is in mid September), that are specifically for you. Think about it this way: what if they just said, "you've done such a great job programming C, we think you have enough experience and maturity to program in X, and teach it too." Your first response would be, "what's this X language, and when are the training classes that you are providing?" Far too many people fail as managers when they get promoted because they were never offered nor sought out the proper training.

links:
http://www.pmi.org/
http://www.uclaextension.edu/tmp
Search amazon for Drucker and One Mintute Manager

Project+ and CAPM are geared towards your need, with the PMP focused more towards very well-seasoned project managers.

I just recently became a lead and know from the projects I've worked on, that I would be a better manager. So I'm finally doing something about it and pursuing the project management path. I just picked up the All-in-One CAPM/PMP exam guide and the recommended study path for the CAPM is a month. As with most jobs you'll learn the bulk from doing it, but the cert won't hurt and may give you the jump start and mind set to help you get started.

some folks love certs and some hate them, but I've never had issue with getting them and I've always learned a few things along the way no matter how well I thought I knew a particular topic.

Project+ and CAPM are geared towards your need, with the PMP focused more towards very well-seasoned project managers.

I just recently became a lead and know from the projects I've worked on, that I would be a better manager. So I'm finally doing something about it and pursuing the project management path. I just picked up the All-in-One CAPM/PMP exam guide and the recommended study path for the CAPM is a month. As with most jobs you'll learn the bulk from doing it, but the cert won't hurt and may give you the jump start and mind set to help you get started.

some folks love certs and some hate them, but I've never had issue with getting them and I've always learned a few things along the way no matter how well I thought I knew a particular topic.

You'll never get anything done "for real" until it's important. Whether it's a personal project like the console emulator you mentioned, or a for-hire piece of work, or a chunk of Mozilla you really care about, you'll do it when you have to.

26 years ago, I did part-time work on a PDP-11-based system as I entered college. I found that in my classes, I'd write a 1000-line program that produced ten lines of code... and at work, I'd have a 1000-line program that produces 10,000 pages of output a month, on a much more constrained system. And my 1000 lines of code were equivalent to 3000-line versions by other students (and yes, I had documentation in my code)

Constraints make you work better. Read 37Signals' blog to find out how to work with less.

Big projects happen in little steps. Take a project management class -- look at the Project Management Institute to understand "work units" and "earned value" -- understand how to get work done and measure it.

It sounds like you should take a course in Project Management, and get a handle on how people handle budgeting and resource issues for projects, large and small.

Microsoft's Project can do this, but it isn't going to help much if you don't know anything about the project management models. You can even get a PM Certification now, which is in demand these days. While Project is helpful, there still aren't publicly available estimators for IT/IS projects: it's still easier to estimate how much building a skyscraper will cost (cost per square foot) than implementing MS Exchange in terms of cost per client.

In our IS projects, we think in terms of cost per function point, interface, and sync item.

MS Project can export in and out of MS Excel, of course. There are even third-party add-ons for MS Project.

Typical MBA textbook on Project Management:
Grey & Larson

You may want to check out the CAPM (Certified Associate in Project Management). You're eligible if you work 1500 hours of project work, or if you take 23 hours of project management training.

http://www.pmi.org/info/PDC_CAPM.asp

It was really the only book that I ran across that was exactly what it wanted to be: teach you project management so that you can pass the exam. Individually, the other books were a waste of money BUT were valuable as a collection.

There IS a lower level exam: the CAPM
from the pmi.org website
http://pmi.org/info/PDC_CAPM.asp

Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM®)

As project management grows in scope, importance and recognition, so do the related career and credential options available to you. The CAPM is designed for project team members and entry-level project managers, as well as qualified undergraduate and graduate students who want a credential to recognize their value to project team performance.

A CAPM Credential can benefit professionals from all disciplines by demonstrating clear direction to their work and by gaining knowledge of project management processes and terminology.

You can benefit from a CAPM if you are a:

Project team member;
Junior project management practitioner or new to the project management profession;
Undergraduate or graduate student with an interest in project management.
Professionals with project management skills are increasingly seen on the leadership track, and earning the CAPM from PMI is one of the best ways to advance your career. This credential can go a long way toward enhancing your employment and/or project assignment responsibilities -- and getting you recognized in the workplace.

CAPM candidates must first meet specific educational and project management related experience requirements and then pass a comprehensive 150 question computer-based examination.

Eligibility Criteria

    Educational Background
      Project Management Experience
              Project Management Education

    High school diploma
or equivalent

      1,500 hours of work on a
project team

      OR

      23 hours of
formal education

Absolutely -- good idea on Wikipedia; I checked out that article before I saw your link to it.

Also (VERY IMPORTANT) you do not mention if you are in a publicly-held company. (Don't laugh, gang; even relatively small companies of a few hundred people can be thinly-traded but publicly held).

If your company is public or planning to go public in the next few years, talk to your internal auditor, CFO, Controller, whoever -- IT Development Standards are part of the typical Sarbanes-Oxley audit.

Explain to whoever named you to this position that if any of your development touches on financial app support (yes, this includes Excel macros) you should be formalizing your procedures, and it takes a few years to get this stuff right.

Get them to spring for a few good books on project management (and make sure they include documentation templates and business process forms).

Get them to spring for a Project Management Institute membership for you ( http://www.pmi.org/ ). Coding standards should be the least of your worries!

Many people have been where you are now; tap their experience and avoid the pitfalls they got to live through.

You can find a bunch at the local PMI Chapter.

Having worked in such situations, my experience is that such "promotions" usually end up being bad for the company, the promoted employee, and the poor bastards who get assigned to the new manager. Please refer to the Peter Principle and its corollary, the Dilbert Principle.

Most good s/w engineer types seem to have poor personnel management skills, probably due to careers of deeply detailed, logic driven work. Managing people means delegating (i.e, ignore the details), and handling illogical behavior (i.e., people). Conversely, some of the best managers I've worked for were abysmal software developers.

However, one alternative is project management. While it does require some people skills, its usually a couple degrees of separation away from the crap personnel managers have to deal with, and exploits the detail-level discipline us s/w types seem good at. And its a great way to leverage the offshoring trend.

The project management profession has grown out of the experiece of failures and successes across many industries, organizations, and types of projects. Learn from those who have figured out what works and what is likely to go wrong. The Project Management Institute http://www.pmi.org/ has a lot of good reasources, and PMI certification would probably be worthwhile for you if you wish to pursue project management as a career focus. Learn the PMBOK - project management body of knowledge -- as well as the latest ideas specific to software projects.

Project management is cross-disciplinary, so a generalist is often more valuable than a specialist. Plan to keep reading and learning across all the relevant disciplines.

• Cost -- took more money than planned for
  
• Time -- took longer than planned for
  
• Quality -- product is not of the planned quality
  
• Scope -- project does not match planned scope which includes situations where additional features were added . The PMI considers this "gold plating" and a failure on the part of the project manager to keep the project within scope.
  
• Customer Satisfaction

The whole point of an open source project is the same as that of any other project: it's a goal-based activity, unique (as opposed to, say, on-going operational support; every Boston Marathon is 'unique' in that they don't all take place at the same time ;) ), and bounded by a finite time.

Sure, all those other aspects are useful measures, but if you want to know how the project is going, as opposed to how much fun it is, or how useful or 'good' it is, you must learn some basic project management skills.

The three main measures are time, cost and scope. Cost is generally less of an issue with FOSS. :) Time is where you can measure your progress. This is where you can do things like determine milestones, develop feature lists and so on, then during the project you have a standard to compare yourself to. Scope is the same. You may want to reduce the number of features to hit your (self-imposed) deadlines. You can always add more features in v1.1! The most important thing to do (if you're concerned about whether you're making progress is to plan first, before launching into code mode.

Not wanting to sound like flamebait. But I'll let you in on two little secrets:

If you find the right mate, you can have more fun than alone. It's called pooled resources.

Also, I don't know what you mean by "double mortgage". I have a mortgage. It's about $2400/month. I own a nice chunk of dirt, and it's fairly close to work.

What's the second secret? Simple. Live beneath your means.

Let me repeat: Live beneath your means.

This mean, instead of St. Tropez, maybe Montevideo.

And oh by the way. Kids shouldn't be a problem. If you travel places a little more frugal, you'll find readily available help baby-sitting, etc.

Take my advice. Don't shun marriage and kids. Sure, take your time. But definitely aim for working on a family by the time you reach early 30s. It's only fair to your children. You need to be young and healthy to take care of them.

Get a job and start earning money as soon as possible. Take long vacations. When your employer protests, make him fire you. If you do go work, he won't fire you, just protest. If he does protest. Take your severence, find a job, then travel.

Take your girlfriend, take you kid. If it's multiple partners sex you want, well that went out along time ago. We're no longer just living in the age of cuties, We gots the AIDS man! But if you must f everything that moves, you'll get even more by finding a girlfriend/wife that's open to the idea that you're young and need to work up a lot more batches than normal.

The course was from claremont consulting, out of LA, (though Sun paid for it for a group of us engineer types), and the book was used as a textbook to the class. It's called "Everything an Engineer should know about Project Management". It's not specific to the Software industry, but definately approaches PM in a way that's compatible with software engineers' mindsets.

Also consider joining the Project Management Institute. They have special interest groups around many professional categories, including Software Engineering.

If you really want to find out about the business of Project Management, check out a local chapter meeting of the Project Management Institute

PMI has all you need to know about certification and there are PMI meetings just about everywhere". Attend a few of those and you'll either be networked enough to improve things or fins a better job.

All the IEEE seem to be doing is codifying current 'best practices' in software engineering in a similar manner to the Project Management Institutes (ANSI std) "Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge"

SE *is* project management as far as I've experienced it, or a subset. No-one with any sense would ever suggest that stds will prevent cockups in projects - but being totally ignorant of what many considers best practices will make you more likely to stuff things up.

I really can't see why developers get so upset about groups trying to put up hand-rails and guidelines for managing large projects.

If you're sitting coding up a wee access database for a mate or writing a little bash script to check your logs then you don't need them - but projects of a larger scale, involving many organisations and multiple teams DO benefit from guidelines.

Dave