Conflicts and Power Clashes between Functional Managers and Project Managers

From experience I have never seen conflicts between Functional Managers and PMs and that's mainly because in the companies in which I have worked functional managers were more senior than the PMs. The project managers were considered individual contributors at the same level as the project team members and with no formal authority while the functional managers were part of the management team. Functional managers are often project sponsors.

What I did see is conflicts between projects and the functional department that was doing BAU support and was about to take ownership over the system/software that was delivered. Project people often try to cut corners to deliver and sometime deliver unfinished products. When this happens I have seen functional managers refusing to take ownership of the software forcing the project to continue working on it until the functional manager was happy. From a functional point of view the products worked but they were too difficult to support.

Also I have seen resource conflicts in which two or more projects or projects and operational activities have competed for the same resources. Projectized organization would not solve these kind of issues, on the contrary they will make matters worse as these structures are more rigid when it comes to resources flexibility. They only solution is to hire or contract more people.

However when it comes to actually performing the work there is no doubt that the functional managers is the boss and not the PM. I think many PMs are frustrated that they are not bosses and they don't have people reporting to them.

PMs who understand their duties and know that they are managing projects and not people (as subordinates) don't end up getting into conflicts with functional managers. Your duty as a PM is to get along with all the project stakeholders including functional managers. If you try to give orders to their direct reports obviously they are not going to like this and you may fail as a PM.

Always be prepared to go back to the project mission when discussing/justifying your decisions or questioning someone else's opinions. You have to be able to show that the preferred course of action is in the best interest of the project. The best interest of the project should be defined in the project mission. Hopefully this keeps the egos out of the equation.

Hi Peter,

One should be prepared for getting back to the project mission, but it probably won't be an easy undertaking.
Exercising your soft skills (such as persuading, influencing and maintaining focus) and these sort of challenges will make you grow onto becoming a greater PM.

Hi Suzi,

Among such highly valuable peers and experts, we boost our own value :)
Stepping on the shoulders of giants :)

You’re roaring the community spirit Joao ;-) cheers

A lot of good comments already posted by peers.

I wrote a blog entry a while ago on this topic. Feel free to take a look:

https://www.projectmanagement.com/blog-pos...g--not-begging-

A project is an endeavor or initiative to achieve a defined deliverable (scope) within specified constraints (time and costs). Keeping a steady eye on the mission and focusing all effort to achieve that mission is to only way to achieve project success. Using the "soft skills" as noted is part of that effort. However, from a PM's perspective, this must be done to benefit the project.
You say that getting back to the project mission won't be an easy undertaking - you should not have to 'get back' to the mission, the mission should be front and center.
Should the mission need to be changed in order to make it achievable, so be it.