PMI Global Insights

By: Jill Diffendal
PMI Staff

Recently, I presented on Power Skills at PMXPO. Power skills are a critical skill set for project managers and the focus of PMI’s Pulse of the Profession 2023 report: Power Skills, Redefining Project Success. I shared PMI research on the topic and offered recommendations on how and why project professionals should spend time building their power skills.

Power skills are abilities and behaviors that facilitate effective and efficient working with others. They anchor one leg of PMI’s Talent Triangle, alongside Ways of Working and Business Acumen, as a critical component of the ideal skill set for project professionals.

They’re also critical for organizations. Power skills have the potential to boost benefits realization management maturity, organizational agility and project management maturity – all key drivers of project success, as per our research for Pulse of the Profession 2023. Power skills also make organizations significantly better at completing projects that meet business goals, reducing the amount of scope creep, and shrinking budget loss in case the project fails.

During my presentation, I received a lot of great questions that we didn’t get a chance to cover, and my responses are below.

Are there objective KPIs for assessing power skills?

Since power skills are personal attributes, they are difficult to measure. However, 91% of organizations that prioritize power skills are known to evaluate them in individuals, and 86% in teams. The most common ways to evaluate them are formal performance assessments, supervisor/manager assessments, customer feedback, 360-degree surveys, and standardized testing.

Quantitative evaluations are more difficult due to the nature of these attributes. Power skills such as “motivation, communication, critical thinking, problem-solving, and conflict resolution don’t have direct cause-and-effect outcomes and are intangible and unquantifiable,” as noted by Emeritus Institute of Management in a recent article. Hence, the best key performance indicator for them is anecdotal evidence, accumulated and evaluated over time.

How should I evaluate power skills in my teams?

Determine which power skills your company values the most. Next, map these out to each role. Then use a combination of self-assessment, 360-degree feedback and team assessment to measure your employee performance. Do this every quarter, over a year or more. 
You can also create a customized rubric to define exceptional, acceptable, and unacceptable demonstration of power skills. This can make the assessment more quantifiable and provide clear examples of mastery of these skills.

One measurement and expectations for power skills have been set, that while assessments are periodic, power skills are everyday. It is critical for project managers and senior project leaders to role model your organization’s critical power skills, to demonstrate clear expectations across the hierarchy.

Where can I get training on these power skills?

Training on power skills, regardless of your years of experience or place in the organizational hierarchy, is a never-ending process. Project professionals wanting to seek power skills training can take this power skill self-assessment PMI offers at no cost to better understand your strengths and areas of improvement.

You can then explore the courses available across most e-learning platforms, including LinkedIn Learning, Udemy and Coursera, to find one that suits your immediate needs. You can also explore training options with PMI for some of the power skills such as communication and strategic planning via our training hub.

Some other ways to upskill your power skills include:

• Read books that help you build power skills. Here’s a short list to start with.
• Shadow strong leadership. Whether it’s a dedicated mentor within your organization or someone from your professional network, find people whose power skills you respect, and use them as a model to emulate. However, make sure you choose someone whose responsibilities align with the type of roles you aspire to in the years to come.
• Step up to take on more responsibility. Volunteer for challenging assignments or offer to fill in for a project leader on their time off, to better understand where in the learning curve you are, and what power skills you need to focus more on developing.

What’s a good way to improve strategic thinking?

Strategic thinking, one of the four top power skills for project managers according to PMI research, is not a stand-alone skill that can be developed in isolation. It requires you to understand the complexity of the organization, gain exposure to strategic roles and responsibility, apply a learner’s approach, and identify invisible patterns. Below are some ways you can improve your strategic thinking capabilities:

• Seek cross-functional exposure. Strategic thinking is hardly something that can be developed in a silo. Seek opportunities that offer you cross-functional exposure, enabling you to learn how your organization functions beyond just your role or team. This will help you understand facets of projects that you might have been blind to otherwise.
• Observe and seek trends. Gain a solid understanding of the context of your work, such as industry trends and business drivers, by exploring and synthesizing internal and external data and information. Then connect with peers to soundboard your observations of the marketplace and gain a broader perspective.
• Make time for thinking. Meetings and busy-ness are an everyday reality for most project professionals. In the midst of full calendars, consciously create regular time for thinking and absorbing new information.
• Ask strategic questions. Whether it is about a challenge, an opportunity or an ambiguity you face in your current role, ask strategic questions to your leaders and follow up on answers consistently.

I am grateful to the PMI team for inviting me to speak on power skills at PMXPO. If you’d like to watch the presentation, it is available on demand through 31 January at no cost. Visit the PMI Virtual Experience Series for more details.