Project Manager / Scrum Master / Agile Coach Career Path

Hi Dora,

instead of creating 3 professional career paths, you could think about one with several pathways. With hybrid usages growing, a project manager could be working as a scrum master or agile coach for some time. You already have several specialties and job roles listed under PM. I could think about even more - like business analyst, estimator, scheduler, leadership coach, test manager, quality assurer.

For example, a PMO leader nowadays certainly has to understand all value delivery methods used in a company.

My personal path was PM - senior PM - PMO lead - quality assurer (as part of PMO) - program manager. A next step in the career depends much on the opportunities/needs arising.

Also, having only one career path, it can be better positioned within HR and in contrast to other professions. At IBM, PM was positioned between management and specialist career paths.

Leadership/personality development I think should be a big part of a PM career.

Have you considered how paths overlap? I can see skills and learning that would be common to two or even all three of the paths. You may want to break the paths down into competencies.

thanks very interesting point. what is happenning now is seeing 3 roles complete different and with different perspectives without transitions from one to another. for example saying that a PM is not able to do a scrum master functions.

Sounds arrogant. Why should a project manager not be able to pass a 2 day scrum master class, many do. And servant leadership is a prevailing mindset anyhow.

What is the rationale or value in siloing these roles? Seems more valuable to the organization and individual to focus on competencies, as Stephane mentioned. Additionally, with the amount of overlap in the roles, siloing seems counter-intuitive.