Earlier today, I asked on Twitter whether other librarians considered Project Management certifications (eg, PRINCE2) worthwile, or if knowledge of frameworks was sufficient.
I received a number of great responses from @sallyheroes, @janholmquist, @ahornby, @ellyob, @damyantipatel, @camcd, @aekins (thank you all!). In summary, some had been on training courses, but found certification quality to be variable. Others noted they wanted certification, but due to cost and other demands this hadn’t been possible. And several shared that they thought experience and knowledge to be far more important overall.
Project Management is an great skill to have as an information professional, and can open up many opportunities. I have found working on projects with IT colleagues and consultants gave me the most exposure to PRINCE2 and Agile approaches, and the most experience in how projects really work, and where they can go off the rails. Get involved with systems migrations, web development, building new services as a project manager or team member.
My favourite book on the topic is Berkun’s Making Things Happen. An invaluable source when I started managing larger projects, and vastly more readable than the official PRINCE2 book.
Lean is another emerging approach, and which could be useful in reducing time to pilot and implement programmes and services. I’m keeping my eye out for forward-thinking libraries to start implementing it.
In my experience the least-utilised aspect of project management in libraries is identifying the problem before deciding on a solution.
Most library projects I’ve been involved in start with a great solution/idea/opportunity (ie this is what we want to do) without determining the problem that needs to be solved (ie why are we doing this).
All project management methodologies include problem definition of some kind, but they don’t tend to emphasise it as much as planning, risk, resource allocation etc.
If you’re curious, here’s a post I wrote about PMI and certification in general:
http://wp.me/p4vkk-4c
Thank you Scott, exactly the kind of commentary I was looking for. This, in particular, convinces me to save my pennies: “I’d prefer someone who does well in situations when there is less structure – no single scoring system and no study guide”
HI Fiona,
If you want to go technical in project management (knowing which forms to use, and what to do at each stage of the project), then I suggest you check the project management process series of articles on PM Hut (it’s called a hut).
Hope you’ll find it beneficial for your adventure in PM.
Sally: I remember PMing a project with exactly that problem (I showed up after the ideation stage). We should ask not only WHY are we doing this, but what are we willing to stop doing or change to make this new project a success.