The Death of the Project Manager

Denise Thompson, PMP, is a Program/Project Manager in La Farge, Wisconsin.

  Career Development  

This week I’ve been in training for a new kind of method that promises to effectively deliver value on projects. As is the vogue practice these days, the terminology is new, the framework is different, the roles all have new names yet the ideas are very familiar: Deliver value faster, cheaper, better.

The most notable moment I experienced as a project manager in the week-long training occurred when we were asked to practice the pitch we might deliver to our organization’s executives to sell the new methodology. The intent of the pitch is to explain why the new methodology is the best way for the organization to manage projects (for those who love detail, don’t worry…the type of methodology doesn’t matter in this story).

When a classmate presented his pitch, he kicked it off with the statement: “We all know project managers are dead.” This captured the attention of the class, which I’m sure was his intent. At that moment, I don’t think he realized what a stir his comments would create in my mind. I guess I happened to be the one project manager in the room that didn’t know project managers were “dead”! (After all, I’m still breathing.)

Now that I think of it, I was the only project manager in the room. The rest of the group consisted of developers, architects and of course consultants. I …

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