Hiring Project Managers: Should PMPs Apply?

Mark Mullaly is president of Interthink Consulting Incorporated, an organizational development and change firm specializing in the creation of effective organizational project management solutions. Since 1990, it has worked with companies throughout North America to develop, enhance and implement effective project management tools, processes, structures and capabilities. Mark was most recently co-lead investigator of the Value of Project Management research project sponsored by PMI. You can read more of his writing at markmullaly.com.

 

In the last decade, the popularity of the Project Management Professional (PMP) designation and similar certifications has exploded. Partly, this reflects what the demographics of project management associations demonstrate--the use of project management is growing, most particularly in organizations and industries that have not been considered traditional project management environments.

Ten years ago, the number of PMPs was less than 10,000 (I was the 6,944th). Today, there are more than 100,000 people who are currently certified as PMPs, and the certificate numbers are on the threshold of 200,000. These are interesting statistics--enough people to populate a small city have decided that holding a PMP designation is important; an equal number have thought it important at one point in their careers, but have since let the designation lapse.

Yet these statistics belie the true popularity of the PMP and designations like it. The fact that people are getting their designation is a symptom of a much larger fact--the number of organizations that use the PMP as a screening criterion in their process of hiring project managers has gone through the roof. Today, it is the rare job posting for a project manager that doesn't ask for PMP certification as a qualification. More importantly, hiring managers candidly admit that they only look at resumes of those who have their …

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