How to Become a Top-Notch Project Manager in 2024

Before we begin, here are the most important things you should consider prior to starting a project management career:

• What does being a project manager mean? – the essential personality traits of a good project manager.
• A project manager’s skills—find out if you have the skills needed to work in the project management field.
• What does a project manager do? – an analysis of the most common project management responsibilities in the current job market.
• What’s the secret of a project management career? – tips on becoming better in the project management profession.
• How to become a project manager– education and the essential PM certificates you can get.
• Project manager salary – know how much to ask for according to your experience level.
• Project manager career problems – find out how project management experts dealt with problems when they were beginners and prepare to face any issues you might encounter successfully.
• Ways of managing projects and product development – Agile, Waterfall, PRINCE2, PRiSM, Six Sigma, Critical Path, and many more
• Project management tools and resources – project management software, communication and collaboration tools, and all the apps project managers need to manage a project from start to finish.

What does being a project manager mean?

Are you always the leader of your group who likes to keep everything and everyone organized and with a goal in mind?

If you answer yes, you could be on your way to a career in project management.

Project management is one of the most complex fields of work. There is no room for dullness in this profession. A project manager (PM) leads an entire project through initiation, planning, execution, control, and completion. Be prepared for a true adventure you’ll never get bored of.

Project managers always work in a team. They are most often friendly and great team players. Flexibility is crucial to team communication since you’ll be the builder and controller of the team. As a PM, you must adapt to different people, cultures, environments, and situations.

To be an excellent PM, you must simultaneously be a team leader, coworker, and supervisor. Project management is one of the most challenging careers, as no day is the same, and you will need all your project management skills to solve every problem. Also, you’ll be your team’s first contact when a problem occurs. They might expect you to have the answers to any inquiry. But this is what makes the project management career path interesting.

If you believe that you’re a person who knows people well from the second you meet them, this might be the right career path for you. You’ll deal with both formal and informal interactions. Essentially, project managers are similar to psychologists. They know precisely employees’ and clients’ problems, desires, and expectations. However, a PM won’t get emotionally involved in their projects despite being a people person.

Some of your duties in your career as a project manager will include taking part in the creation process, executing the project, preparing communication methods, finding solutions to recurring issues, monitoring the project’s progress from start to finish, and ensuring your team is getting things done, and many more. You’ll connect each project to the business world and its clients. And you’ll also do some paperwork 🙂

You must know that you will be held accountable for the project’s success. You will be held accountable for any mistakes your team makes or client complaints. In this position, you’ll focus on the accuracy of your work and that of your team.

This profession is constantly changing and facing new demands. If you’re the kind of person who prefers diversity, this is the type of career you’ll never get bored of. You can always switch the project you’re working on, the team you interact with, the industry you’re involved in, and even the processes and tools to ease your work. No project is the same. Yet, your expertise in this field will prove helpful whenever you encounter similar situations and issues. Similarly, your experience will be essential to solving problems quickly.

A project manager’s skills

Project management knowledge is sometimes just not enough for you to become a great PM. As discussed above, you need soft skills as well. Being a good communicator and an open leader is not enough. Daily project management challenges also require accountability, adaptability, analytical and strategic thinking, decisiveness, a stress-resistant personality, and a love for risk-taking. Being a multitasker with excellent written and oral communication skills can place you among the top project managers in your sector.

You should know that there is no specific project management skill for hard skills. Depending on the project, you’ll have to know everything. General business knowledge is highly desired. While you don’t have to be an expert in technical skills (such as coding), the more knowledgeable you are, the higher the chances are to come up with more accurate estimates. Leading a project is all about ensuring that your team members finish a task and deliver the final project successfully.

Another critical skill is understanding resource allocation and determining the proper timing of the resources needed within the project schedule. Whether you run a small or larger project, resource management software might come in handy to ease your work.

You should have adequate knowledge to spot an issue and suggest possible solutions. At the same time, you should know that many project managers have had previous jobs, such as software developers, marketing managers, accountants, designers, and so on. They hold solid knowledge of projects related to their previous fields of interest.

If you’re one of these people, you might be one step ahead of the others, but you must keep in mind that you’ll also need to develop your knowledge of project management processes, frameworks, and people management. You might be used to working individually, but project management is all about teamwork. Don’t panic if you realize that a project manager position is not the right fit for you. The project manager profession creates many new opportunities and pathways for other future careers.

Take a look at the skills of the most successful project managers and find out if you have what it takes to become like them and where you have to improve:

• solid understanding of business cases and risk management processes
• expert knowledge to meet specific circumstances
• proven project management and self-management skills
• strong leadership skills
• ability to monitor and control budgets
• critical thinking
• good communication and negotiation skills
• capability to make decisions under pressure
• strong interpersonal skills necessary to lead a team
• ability to define situations, document data, and draw conclusions
• strong business acumen
• ability to interpret instructions regardless of their form
• strong organizational and multitasking skills
• creative mindset
• analytical skills
• accuracy and attention to detail
• excellent time management skill
• capacity to maintain schedules and meet deadlines
• problem-solving skills
• self-motivation
• accountability
• time tracking skills
• work ethic
• working knowledge of project management tools

What does a project manager do?

Depending on the industry you work in, your duties might differ. In the following example you can see how you can manage a creative project using project management software:

I’ve have analyzed over 200 LinkedIn worldwide job postings and compiled this list of the most common project manager responsibilities. And this is quite an impressive list!

• define the overall scope of the project
• direct all project management phases
• set and manage project expectations with external and internal stakeholders
• coordinate and track various projects through an entire project lifecycle
• develop a detailed project management plan to track project progress
• mentor, motivate, and supervise project team members
• develop professional business relationships
• define the overall scope of the project
• prioritize the tasks of the project
• create and continuously update the project documentation
• create accurate forecasts for revenue and resource requirements
• partner with all departments to ensure work is done according to demands
• establish effective communication
• ensure team members have all the necessary information
• track work times and maintain accurate daily timesheets
• ensure project tasks are executed and reviewed within the predefined scope
• align various teams to maintain the quality of deliverables
• report and escalate issues to management when necessary
• conduct project status meetings, daily stand-ups, and retrospective meetings
• continuously follow up on the progress, risks, and opportunities of the project
• focus on customer satisfaction
• manage projects through KPIs
• manage budgets and billings
• act as the primary customer contact for project activities
• make recommendations for project improvements
• conduct workshops and training
• obtain customer input
• measure project performance using appropriate systems, tools, and techniques
• evaluate team performance

What’s the secret of a project management career path?

Project managers are good at their job for various reasons. There is no definite secret. Thinking that you hold the secrets of this job can make you believe you’re prepared for any situation. Nevertheless, many problems could occur anytime, making it impossible for you to know how to solve them without too much struggle. For this reason, it’s better to focus on being a great professional rather than hunting down the secrets of success. Doing what the best PMs are doing won’t guarantee you’ll become successful like them—being passionate and open to change whenever something is not working right is more important. The project management world is one of the most dynamic business environments. You should be able to adapt to its changing nature and become comfortable with it.

Another tip that project managers might hesitate to share is the use of project planning software. This software can automate their tasks and help them quickly plan and manage projects. Finding the best tools often takes a lot of time and testing. Also, your chosen apps and techniques can depend on your work style.

More experienced project managers might even be able to tell you some secrets that you’ll find nowhere else. The true secrets of this profession come only with experience. Even in project management, making mistakes and learning from them is a valid statement.

Meanwhile, some of the things that you can test are making sure that you understand the client’s requirements, picking the right team members, being able to create tasks in detail, making sure you have the best tools and systems for finishing the project, focusing on the real issues, setting reasonable requirements, always considering failure, and creating backup plans.

How to become a project manager

Where should you start your education to become a project manager?

Before beginning your project management journey, you must see if this career suits you. Read the stories of other project managers, reach out to them, ask questions, or try a project management internship. Additionally, you can take some introductory online courses to get your first look at this subject. Usually, these courses provide tasks and assignments designed to make you interact with this business branch and see if you can handle its responsibilities.

Here are some websites for online project management education opportunities: edX, Alison, Coursera, Simplilearn, and Udemy.

Also, when you start looking for a project manager job, write down all aspects your future workplace must have and list what you never want to deal with in your future career. Don’t rush into getting a job just for the sake of working. If you’re an entry-level project manager, you should find a work environment that allows you to grow through all project manager levels and learn more from your coworkers.

I want to emphasize the importance of having a mentor at the beginning of your project manager career. We’ve previously talked about how you could research the activity of other project managers before deciding whether this path is right for you. A mentor’s purpose is also to honestly highlight your mistakes so that you can use them to develop yourself further. A role model can shape your entire career. That’s why you should find a skilled project manager who could allocate part of his time to teach you what he already knows. You’ll master project management methods, methodologies, frameworks, processes, and best practices by working close to their side. A mentor will also ease your process of becoming a project manager.

Finding compatible project managers who want to share their wisdom and knowledge can be challenging. Most will be willing to do this in return for some help with their tasks. As a result, they’ll involve you in real projects and even supervise you. As a novice, having someone look at your work is imperative because you wouldn’t otherwise be able to know if you’re using your theoretical knowledge correctly. Trust is at the base of the trainee-mentor relationship. You believe they’ll share their tips with you, and they will allow you to work on projects with them.

Project management education

Your project management career can start with a project manager or business administration degree. Not having a diploma in project management is not a disadvantage; if you study it daily in an academic environment, you’ll have a head start. It’s never too late to switch to a career that suits your interests. PM does not belong to only one industry. Usually, projects will belong to another line of business, such as software, art, logistics, economics, linguistics, etc. A design agency might require you to hold a degree in Arts or Design to understand the field better. In this case, project management education is entirely up to your own will and desire to improve yourself professionally.

Self-development, self-learning, and a will to constantly develop oneself throughout a lifetime are vital for keeping your career at the top. Any college degree can be helpful for a future project manager since the academic world teaches you how to study and acquire knowledge gradually, which is essential for a PM who could have to learn about a new project’s main field quickly.

There are also numerous online project management degrees, learning resources, blogs, and programs that you can follow. These resources could be an option if you don’t live close to the college you’d like to attend or don’t have enough time to attend university. These three examples are degrees that you can get through online project management education:

• Online Master’s Degree in Project Management from the Colorado State University – Global Campus
• Bachelor of Science Degree in Business Administration from Purdue Global University
• Master of Business Administration in Project Management from the Liberty University.

For more learning opportunities like these, check out the best project management courses or other training resources you can take. Alternatively, you can look at some of the most commonly used project management terms.

Another way of educating yourself is getting a similar position. You don’t have to begin your career as a PM. You can start by managing more minor projects, products, or even teams. Alternatively, you can go for an internship in this field. Don’t get discouraged if the work you’ll be doing won’t seem like something you’ll love for the rest of your life. Sometimes, all it takes is to find a different project to work on—all project managers dream of working in a field that is one of their hobbies. If your hobby is in the field of business, you’re lucky.

Project management certifications

Are project management certificates still worth it?

Of course! As you advance in your project manager career, you’ll either need to certify your project management knowledge or your employer will ask you to get a certificate. Although certificates might slowly start losing their importance for recruiters, the experience you’ll get during training and exams is indispensable.

What you must remember is that certificates are not everything. A PM certificate is a plus, but extensive knowledge and experience in the field matter more for a project’s success. You could have all the diplomas in the world, but if you have no knowledge or work experience in project management, no one will want to work with you.

Which are the essential PM certificates out there?

Don’t rush into studying for just any project management certification. Some employers don’t accept them, while online certifications are almost useless. Also, it would be best if you studied for a certification related to the projects you work on or the industry you’re involved in.

Here’s a list of project management certifications that you should consider:

PMP® certification

Perhaps one of the most commonly known project management certifications, the Project Management Professional certification, provided by the Project Management Institute (PMI®), sets the standards for project management. The PMBOK Guide and Standards contain the essential guidelines and characteristics for project management. The PMBOK® Guide is the primary study resource, but you can use any other materials focusing on the PMP® exam.

Not just anybody can sit this test. The exam consists of 200 multiple-choice questions, and it requires three years of previous working experience as a project manager (or five if you don’t have a four-year degree in PM), at least 4,500 hours of experience working on directing a project (or 7,500 if you don’t have a four-year degree), and 35 hours of formal education on the project management process.

If you’re looking for a comprehensive course, the PMP® training offers widely accepted standards that can help you achieve project success. Remember that this certificate expires as you must renew it every three years due to the changing nature of project management standards.

Note: the PMBOK® Guide and the PMP® certification are primarily known in the USA, Canada, and the Middle East. For Europe, you might want to look for PRINCE2 certification.

Take a few minutes to find out some of the secrets of passing the PMP® exam:

The PRINCE2 Certification

The PRINCE2 (PRojects IN Controlled Environments) is a project management method. The UK government developed PRINCE2, so if you plan on working in the UK, you might want to give this certificate a go.

This certification has two main learning paths you can choose to pursue:

• PRINCE2 Foundation

This first level can confirm your basic knowledge of this method. There are no prerequisites to take this exam, but you should have previous experience with project management. Having this certificate doesn’t mean that you can be a project manager but that you can work in a team that uses PRINCE2 as a PM method.

• PRINCE2 Practitioner

The certification allows you to be a project manager who can apply PRINCE2 principles to a project. This level confirms whether the candidate can use the PRINCE2 method in real-life scenarios. It’s perhaps the most important one you can get if you want to work with PRINCE2.

Scrum certifications

Scrum is an Agile framework often used for product management or software-industry projects. Scrum.org provides assignments that can certify your Scrum knowledge. You can choose between the following assessments:

• Professional Scrum Master™
• Professional Scrum Product Owner™
• Professional Scrum Developer™
• Scaled Professional Scrum™
• Professional Agile Leadership™
• Professional Scrum With Kanban™

A series of open assignments are free if you’re not looking for a certification and want to test your command of Scrum.

Project manager salary

A project manager’s salary varies according to their work country and previous experience. According to Glassdoor, the average project manager salary in the United States is $75,474, while additional cash compensation can be between $1,541 and $19,755. Therefore, a PM’s annual income can be anywhere between $51,000 to $111,000. However, depending on your skills, experience, and knowledge, this project lead salary can be even lower or higher. Project management careers are still in high demand, and annual wages are expected to grow for all project manager levels in the next ten years.

If you’re unsure whether project management will still be desired, here’s a report on PM job growth. Companies are shifting their attention from typical routine actions to actual projects. More and more positions will be created, and there aren’t yet enough people qualified to fill all of them.

A day in the life of a project manager

This Knowledgehut article has captured the essence of what a day in the life of a project manager looks like:

Morning Routine: Review Process

• For most project managers, the day begins with a structured approach to reviewing tasks and correspondence. They start by combing through emails received the previous day, responding promptly, or scheduling responses as needed. Task trackers, including burndown charts and ongoing tasks, are then assessed to set priorities for the day. Lastly, any new tasks or defects are reviewed, aiding in the preparation of agendas for subsequent meetings.

Brief Team Lead Check-In

• Project managers typically hold concise meetings with team leaders to discuss pressing matters after the review process. These interactions ensure a clear understanding of ongoing activities across departments and help manage workload effectively.

Regular Synchronization Meeting

• Subsequently, project managers convene a daily synchronization meeting with the team, akin to a Scrum meeting. Team members report progress from the previous day, outline objectives for the current day, and highlight any challenges they face. This fosters alignment towards key deliverables.

Tackling Urgent Issues

• Post-sync-up, a designated time slot is allocated for addressing major issues identified during the meeting, often in smaller groups for focused discussion and resolution.

Dedicated Deep Work Time

• Following morning meetings, project managers engage in uninterrupted work on critical tasks such as drafting detailed communications, compiling reports, or updating project documentation.

Continuous Team Building Efforts

• Throughout the day, project managers allocate time for team-building activities, fostering camaraderie and trust among team members.

Stakeholder Engagement and Progress Meetings

• Project managers conduct daily progress meetings with stakeholders and clients, ensuring proactive communication and alignment on project objectives. They prepare thoroughly for these meetings, considering diverse time zones and scheduling accordingly.

Evening Routine

• As the day draws to a close, project managers prepare for the evening by disseminating meeting notes and providing guidance on actionable items for team members. Additionally, they allocate time to address any significant emails received during the day.

Planning for the Next Day

• The final task of the day involves planning activities for the following day, ensuring organizational clarity and preparedness to tackle upcoming tasks and challenges.

Project manager career problems

Project management careers are not perfect. Just like any other job, it has its downsides. It can be a difficult job, and you must be the right person to handle all project management challenges. Many PMs keep track of their projects, answer emails, and stay connected with their team after work or on holidays. Some PMs can work long, stressful hours to ensure a project is on track and deliver it before the deadline. More than this, as a project manager, you can’t expect to go home and disconnect entirely from your work.

If you work for a smaller company where you’re the only project manager, you might be in charge of all duties. You’ll need to juggle several projects and allocate enough daily time to manage and control them. If you’re barely starting your career, this could be impossible since you don’t have the necessary knowledge to manage your time accordingly.

On the other hand, you might not get to choose the project you’ll work on. In this case, you’ll get small projects that could waste your time. Similarly, you could come across a project related to a field you’re not interested in, making it difficult for you to want to learn more and grasp complete control of that domain.

A project manager’s responsibility is not easy to handle just by anyone. The pressure of delivering a project on time can be too much if you’re not used to holding such authority. Likewise, if you’re not resistant to stress, keep away from hard-to-handle projects or even from this vocation. From the outside, being a project manager could seem like you’ll maintain complete control of what goes on in the project development process.

Don’t get this wrong. However, the truth is that you are entirely dependent on what your clients want. You can make your own suggestions but also have to be flexible with any last-minute changes your client might want to make without complaining. Top management often gets to make the final decisions; therefore, the project management process is complicated to implement in a company where the principal and project managers hold similar powers.

Also, people don’t always like project managers. Employees like good project managers because they give detailed and accurate tasks, are considerate, and can lead by example. On the other hand, lousy project managers are the ones that emphasize the necessity of a lot of meta-work: too many meetings, presentations, status reports, and less actual work and growth opportunities. In other words, project managers dedicate themselves to providing valuable output rather than the development process.

There are also project managers who believe the project belongs to them. But it’s not just project managers. Product and program managers encounter the same issues, and the truth is that any employee can support meta-work. You’ll encounter problematic employees during your career, and getting them to understand your purpose will be challenging. Being unable to open up to your employees and listen to their opinions can only push them away.

To gain your team’s respect and avoid unnecessary arguments, learn to listen to others actively, focus on team cooperation, communicate openly, and aim for accurate project results, not just measurements and status documentation. Learn how you can become their mentor and ensure that how you guide them is as helpful and detailed as possible. Nobody hates anyone more than a project manager who throws random tasks with no accurate descriptions or client requirements to guide them. Doing this signifies that you don’t know much about the subject or the client’s requirements.

Value individuals and treat them with respect. Never see your team members as simple resources or machines that can instantly execute any task. Listen, understand, and adapt to their own needs. If you don’t like working with people and are impatient when waiting for coworkers to finish their duties, you might not be a good match for this job.

Advice for beginners from experienced project managers

We asked expert project managers the following questions:

What was the biggest problem you encountered when you started your PM career, and how did you overcome it?

Here’s what they had to say:

Carmen Pop, Global Project Manager @Dropbox

“My story on my career project management is as follows – I was assigned a project back in 2016, which seemed like a regular project at the start. However, after a first round of initiating and planning, it turned out to be a large program with multiple cross functional stakeholders within Dropbox and external technical vendors. This experience definitely pushed me out of my comfort zone as a project manager and it was difficult managing ongoing changes on a continuous basis.

My best advice besides the general rules of project management (initiating, planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, closing) is to remain compassionate and composed. People will get upset, things will not go the way you want them to, but as the project manager you are the glue that needs to keep everything together and moving forward. I believe I was able to achieve this in my project and as a result, we were able to launch as a team.”

Susanne Madsen, Project Leadership Coach, Facilitator, and Speaker @Susanne Madsen International

“When I first started out as a project manager my biggest problem was that I had no one to shadow, or learn from, within my company. For many many years I was the only project manager around. It would have probably fast-tracked my career had I had someone to ask for advice, but instead I learned to find my own answers, to rely on my intuition and to use common sense. I always tried to find the most simple and effective way to track and communicate something without the use of jargon. To learn about the project management process I researched the internet and studied the PRINCE2 manual at my own initiative. Furthermore, I often asked myself: “what would the head of department do right now?” That helped me to gain a different perspective and make sure that I was focusing on the right things.”

Glauco Paiva, Senior Delivery Project Manager @Microsoft

“In my career as a project manager my biggest problem was how to manage the anxiety to do the things done in a scenario which we cannot control the others. The experience through delivering projects, interacting (listening to) with other people as a customer, partner or the same company, studying techniques and the last but not the least thing, always keep pursuing to understand myself. When you recognize your limitations as respect yourself, you can achieve and leverage the best from the others, for me it is the nicest thing we can do. So, it is possible to work with a satisfied team and helping the business to grow. ”

Bert Heymans, Senior Project Manager @Journeyman PM

“The biggest problem I encountered when I started my PM career was deciding what not to do in order to get good at project management. I have a technical background and made the common mistake of dividing my time between project management and production related tasks while I should have been concentrating on project management only. It’s really hard to let go of something you know how to do very well because you’re used to doing it and feel like it’s expected of you.

After a while I learned and discovered how deep the project management skill set runs and how many things you need to know and do to be good at it. Project management is 90% communication (at least) and learning how to do that as effective as possible takes time and practice. Even just getting the right people to listen to you requires leadership skills, tact and creating rapport. Those skills take time to develop, and you’ll never learn them from a book.

My advice for people in a similar situation who want to get good at project management would be to let go as soon as possible and focus on doing project management work. If you don’t know or if it’s just not clear what “doing project management work” means in your company, educate yourself or switch to another company or department.”

Ben Aston, Owner @The Digital PM

“I tend to be pretty optimistic and naturally, I’m a ‘just wing it’ kind of guy. So when I first started my career as a project manager and relied on my natural instincts to just take it easy, perhaps unsurprisingly, projects kept on going over budget, timelines slipped and clients got mad when they didn’t get what they thought they had paid for.

It was soon brought to my attention that the way I was managing projects wasn’t really managing at all – I was just letting projects happen around me – hoping for the best and that everything would work itself out in the end. The lesson I quickly learned is that if I wanted to succeed as a project manager, I needed to park my optimism and be more of a pragmatic realist.

I had to learn to lead projects more proactively and assertively. Not just hoping that the team knew what they were doing but making sure they were briefed properly. Not just hoping they were on track but making sure they knew the milestones and dependencies. Not just hoping we were on time and budget but tracking progress daily. Not just hoping the client knew what was going on but making sure everything was documented properly. You get the idea – it’s a lot more effort, but it’s what gets results.”

Elizabeth Harrin, Project Management Expert @Rebel’s Guide to Project Management

“When I first started out, I think the biggest issue for me was being taken seriously at work. As a young woman in a project management position, I was trying to influence others more senior and older than myself. I was lucky to have the support of a good mentor and a supportive line manager as well, plus I was able to attend leadership training. Having confidence in my abilities and knowing what I was able to contribute made me feel more positive about the difference I was making.

For people in a similar situation, beginning their careers, I’d advise you to get a mentor, and also to be brave! Believe that you have the right to be taken seriously because of what you bring to the table.”

Ramiro Rodrigues, Owner @RR Project Consulting

“It´s known that a great PM professional has to have this triad of skills – technical, managerial, and behavioral. I knew that the first two could be acquired with study and that the most complex to develop would be the last one. So I plunged into two fronts: 1 – self-assessment and analysis to understand my behavior and seek to change my mindset of what I knew that needed to change; 2 – study of philosophy to better understand the nuances of human behavior. In short, if you want to succeed as PM, know that you need to understand yourself. This made and continues to make all the difference in my professional life (and personal).”

Alejandro Roman, Integrative Technology Projects Engineer – Project Management Office @Huenei IT Services

“It was the beginning of 2003 when I started my career in project management and led my first project: the MPLS network update of the Atento Global Holding Client (for ten countries). The problem appeared since the MPLS Service Upgrade had installed Cisco Router equipment and there was a significant delay from the manufacturer in the delivery of this equipment. This made it necessary for us to opt for a local supplier in Argentina to be able to comply in a timely manner with what was planned with the client. The chosen strategy was successful and the time and budget of the project were met.”

Stéphane Parent, CEO @Leader Maker

“The biggest problem I encountered when I started my project management career was that I was the only project manager at my office. There was nobody around me I could reach out to ask questions or get coaching.

What I had to do was build out my virtual network to provide the support I needed during my project management learning and growth. Through phone calls, emails and discussion boards, I was able to get the encouragement and answers that helped me with my first projects.”

Ways of managing projects and product development

There are several approaches to project management and its methods, methodologies, or frameworks, which are constantly changing. New frameworks and PM trends appear all the time. You’re mistaken if you think you can get away with knowing only Agile for the rest of your career. Your framework depends entirely on your company, project, and team. A company might indeed want you to own a particular certificate or have experience with a specific one. However, you can’t solely rely on the use of a method. As a project manager, you’ll probably get to work with more than just one throughout your career.

We have compared and simplified a list of eight project management methodologies. You’ll also find out which are better for your work process and style.

Agile

Agile is a series of practices and principles that are best for products and initiatives that face various changes during their progress. This mindset is based on short delivery cycles (sprints) and a dynamic work culture supporting continuous collaboration. “Just like its name, Agile means being adaptable – the ability to gracefully adapt to rapidly changing customer needs,” remarks Kamlesh Ravlani, an Agile Coach and Scrum Trainer at Agile For Growth.

Agile focuses on team members and their regular feedback that can reshape the course of a project. Stakeholders will review each stage and recommend adjustments accordingly. This system allows the entire team to share a project’s responsibility by being in charge of specific individuals or collaborative tasks. There is no clear predefined path or extensive control as projects are very flexible. Objectives are named from the beginning but can change deliverables and outcomes.

Scrum

Scrum is used predominantly in software or product development. Small cross-functional teams work with a Product Owner responsible for the product’s direction. “A Scrum Master then serves the entire team and ensures that all obstacles are cleared.”, says Kamlesh Ravlani. The Scrum process is divided into smaller cycles of 2 weeks (usually). Every day, the team members review what they’ve done and what they’ll work on for the rest of the day during the daily stand-up meeting.

Kanban

Kanban is a method that allows you to get a visual overview of your tasks. The method consists of a physical or digital board with three columns (To Do, In progress, Done). These include tasks written on cards that can be moved from one progress stage to another until completion. Kanban focuses on an entire team’s capacity to work collectively and can help you manage your workflow and best identify bottlenecks early on. Among the benefits of Kanban software are visualization, flexibility, and continuous delivery.

Extreme Programming

Extreme Programming aims to improve software quality (hence its name). Like Scrum, it relies on quick sprints, frequent releases, and constant stakeholder collaboration that can improve productivity. With this framework, project managers can avoid employee burnout and increase the quality of project deliverables.

Waterfall

This traditional approach breaks your workload into tasks you must execute in strict order. One has to complete each task before starting to work on another one. Similarly, one phase won’t start before you complete the previous one. Extensive planning sits at the base of this approach. It comes with clear timelines and set budgets that support success. Outlining all steps before development can eliminate risks and misunderstandings. Waterfall implies investing more time in the early stages of project development to prevent errors and save maintenance time. Its downside is that it has not yet adapted to the requirements of modern software development. It works better for companies and industries that build physical products. There are seven main phases/components to this method:

• Client Requirements
• Design
• Creation (Construction)
• Integration
• Validation (Testing)
• Installation
• Continuous Maintenance

PRINCE2 (Projects In Controlled Environments2)

In PRINCE2, control over the project is divided between a higher-authority project board and a project manager. While the board is responsible for providing resources and setting business justification, the project manager oversees daily activities and team management. This project management method includes all of the essential themes, principles, and processes needed to conduct a project from start to finish. Compared to other methods, PRINCE2 can offer greater control of resources, increased management of risks, structured accountability allocation, focus on the final user, regular review cycles, and organized planning and execution.

PRiSM (Projects integrating Sustainable Methods)

If you’re a fan of sustainability, this is the method for you. PRiSM considers environmental factors during the project management process. It is commonly used for construction, architecture, or landscape projects that impact the environment. It can help project managers reduce pollution, eliminate waste, and save energy.

Six Sigma

Centered around quality control, the main focus of the Six Sigma approach is reducing defects, bugs, and errors. It is driven by data that must be analyzed to discover nonconformities from the original specifications before an issue arises. All decisions are made based on existing data and statistics. The goal of this approach is to deliver efficient and uniform products. The six main steps of Six Sigma are Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control, and Synergize.

Critical Path

This method can help you prioritize tasks and identify a project’s shortest timeline. Project managers can investigate milestones, dependencies, and deadlines more efficiently. A project model uses four elements: a list of the required tasks, the work hours needed for each task, dependencies, and milestones. A project manager has to decide which item is essential (critical activities) and which can be delayed without disturbing the project’s final date (non-critical activities). Scientists and manufacturers usually use this method because of the heavy emphasis on a task’s length. Established on the theory that you can’t start working on a task until another is finished, the Critical Path method allows for faster completion times, fair resource allocation, and bottleneck prevention.

Lean

Are you tired of waste? Lean supports delivering high-quality products with fewer people and resources in less time. Focusing on customer value, bottleneck removal, and repeated process improvement eliminates waste. Using this method can help a small team deliver excellent results in a short amount of time without spending a fortune on materials. Lean focuses on moving the main goal toward valuable product delivery with fewer resources. It also helps companies adapt rapidly to changing customer desires and behaviors.

PMI’s PMBOK

With this guide, project managers can divide projects into the following five process groups selected by the Project Management Institute (PMI):

• Initiating
• Planning
• Executing
• Monitoring
• Closing

The PMI standards are used mainly in the USA, Canada, and the Middle East and contain the project management processes and techniques needed to complete projects. They are more of a reference guide that outlines project management standards than an actual method.

Tools and resources for project managers

Sometimes, it takes more than just a great project manager to complete a project on time and within budget. Times have changed. Project management software can now ease your work and eliminate the hassle of working with paperwork that can be lost forever.

Let’s start with the essential tools we recommend you use from the beginning of your career.

Your entire team will need a complete system for creating project documentation. Your best free option, in this case, is the Google Suite. Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides can all be used collaboratively. This way, you can work with your team members efficiently, even remotely. Also, using Google Drive, you can ensure the safety of your data. Remember always to connect your files to cloud storage providers so you don’t lose any documents. Similar file-sharing systems include Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive, and Apple iCloud Drive.

Efficient collaboration is critical to ensuring that each task is completed according to your client’s requirements and that no mistakes are made. You’ll need a place to ask questions, share news, plan meetings, clarify tasks, and get feedback. In this sense, there are many collaboration tools, such as Slack, that you can connect your entire team to. If you prefer face-to-face interaction, you can also use video chat services. In this case, Slack works as a video calling system, too, but you can opt for other alternatives like Skype, Google Hangouts, or Viber.

It would be best not to ignore the productivity aspect of the entire project development process. For this purpose, you can organize your articles, notes, and documents using Evernote, Pocket, or Google Keep. And if you want to keep track of your time on a task or project, you can always use time tracking software. Some time tracking tools worth mentioning are Paymo, My Hours, Toggl, and Timely. These can help you see exactly where you’re slacking through time reports and improve your work performance by fixing those time-related issues. And don’t worry if you’re constantly on the move. Any online free time tracker offers mobile functionality to capture time data anywhere.

The tools mentioned above are mere “toys” compared to complex project management apps. Even if you’re a project management beginner, you should get used to using one or more advanced tools. If you’re looking for a complete solution to do all of the above tasks in one place, turn to project management software that can bring all your required features together. This complete platform option will eliminate your need to switch between different apps. You can search for the best project management software for your specific needs on several platforms. Some of the most comprehensive project management platforms you can use include Paymo, Scoro, Teamwork Projects, or Hive.

What are the benefits of using end-to-end project management tools?

• Schedule priorities
• Organize teams
• Assign tasks quickly and accurately
• Manage clients
• Keep track of work times
• Collaborate easily
• Oversee projects
• Improve team productivity
• Integrate with other tools
• Speed up project development
• Increase reliability
• Maintain complete control of resources and finances
• Track project development
• Monitor team activity
• Keep all of your files in one safe database
• Access all data from anywhere
• Share documents
• Manage budgets, expenses, and invoices
• Create timesheets and budget reports
• Prevent and eliminate risks
• Detect bottlenecks and fix issues or errors

This time, the focus will be on projects and other types of work. You must use work management software if your team often works on non-project activities besides project-related ones. These provide more flexibility and can be used for projects too.

What’s next for you?

Your career path doesn’t have to stop at being a project manager. You can become a program manager and handle multiple related projects. Another alternative is a portfolio manager position. They are responsible for choosing and prioritizing future projects according to an organization’s rules and strategy. Finally, you can become a project management office manager. This job helps ensure the entire company’s project organization. If you have higher expectations from your career, you can always opt for an executive position or start your own company.

You can use websites such as Glassdoor and Jooble to find a project management job and see what others say about the workplace you plan on applying to and what salary range to expect.

Also, try Paymo for free to start working with project management software or use it to track your learning process. Paymo is free and does not have limitations for schools, colleges, and universities.

If we’ve convinced you that project management is the perfect career, you can start your PM learning journey now. Follow the above steps and begin preparing for a successful future in project management.

Bookmark this guide and return to it whenever you need more tips to help you become a project manager. If you found it helpful, please share it with your friends or teammates who might be interested in project management.