The Training Pyramid: 3 Tips to Stay Relevant as a PM

Rob Saxon is a Project Management Professional, Certified Information Systems Auditor and a trained Six Sigma Specialist. Rob is currently developing methods to integrate project management into previously unexplored areas of business.

  Career Development   Work Breakdown Structures (WBS)  

With the proliferation of certification and dedication to training on the part of companies, more great PMs are emerging every day. This increase in the number of skilled project managers is a great turn of events: We have more project management intellectual capital and experience today as a profession than ever before. We have a larger professional community, and therefore more industry expertise. Project management is gaining more relevance as a career path daily, and most of us work with a greater number of skilled PMs than we did 15 years ago.

All that said, one of the potentially troubling results of this phenomenon is that the project management discipline is quickly becoming commoditized. As each day passes and each newly minted project manager arrives in the workforce, the battle to maintain value and relevance becomes fiercer. One method we can use to ensure that our skills (and therefore our value) are continually on the rise is to make efficient use of training and certification.

Most companies will tout training and certification as a cornerstone of their investment in their people. Indeed, many companies invest millions of dollars in a training curriculum, and it would do well for each of us to take advantage of this perk. We as project managers need to take into account very specific factors when we take advantage of training and create our overall …

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