11 Reasons To Love Being A Project Manager

If you’ve lost your enthusiasm for project management and need reminding of all the reasons you started this career in the first place, these 11 reasons should help you.

As a PM, there are probably plenty of reasons you can list as to why you love your job. To have a job that is so challenging, it makes sense that you have to have a passion for it to do it every day and to commit to continuing professional development to keep up with all the latest trends and best practises. To put your all into making every project as successful as it can possibly be. But if you’ve lost your enthusiasm for project management (as we all do from time to time) and need reminding of all the reasons you started this career in the first place, these 11 reasons should help you:

It Embraces Your Natural Skills

Obviously you need some project management training and experience to get ahead, but you also need some special natural skills not everybody has. Just some of the natural skills a PM might have are:

• Being organised
• Being able to think outside the box
• People skills
• Being self sufficient

Being a PM embraces your natural skills, enabling you to perform at an optimum level using skills that are already like second nature to you.

It Varies, All The Time

Lots of people get into project management because their job varies all the time. Working on different projects, with different people and organisations is great for someone who gets bored easily. You can be working on a certain type of project one day, applying a certain project management framework and methodology, only to find yourself the very next day working on the previous days polar opposite project. This can be considered a downside to some PM’s, but for most, it provides a constant challenge, and plenty of opportunity to learn and grow all the time.

People Vary, All The Time

You have to work with people all the time in project management. You work with your team, somebody else’s team, people from another company, people across the globe – the list is endless. As a PM you get to enjoy communicating with all these different people in lots of different ways. Socially and emotionally this is an amazing thing and it really is no wonder top PM’s have such phenomenal emotional intelligence.

You Are On The Cusp Of New Technologies

Project management is a career where you are constantly working with new technologies to improve your working practices. From apps aiding your personal organisation skills, to programs which aid your communication with your team who are based across the world, there has never been a more exciting time to be a project manager.

You Are Needed More And More

Statistics show that project management is one of the fastest growing industries in the world. Top project managers are highly sought after and recognised by some of the top organisations in the world. Companies are starting to create new PM job positions, make project management training available to staff. Some companies even require that staff complete PM certification before employment (see our Definitive Guide to Project Management Qualifications for more info). Knowing that your job is so important is a really great thing, and it is certainly something to love about project management.

You Get To Self Improve All The Time

There are so many project management training courses available, so many workshops and seminars, forums and chatrooms, you are able to self improve all the time. This is important as it means you can keep working your way up in terms of your skill set and your career. PM’s with an innate ability to do the job will naturally want to self improve all the time.

You Can Train For Bigger Things

Project management is a great training ground for bigger things such as owning your own company. Project managers have similar responsibilities to company owners, having to work with lots of different people, and take on similar challenges and issues. Obviously PM’s earn less money and don’t have quite the same responsibilities, but the type of work and job role responsibilities are comparable.

There Are Always Ups And Downs

With project management, your life will never be the kind where you work 9-5 then come home, relax, go to bed then get up again the next morning and do the same thing. You could be on a conference call with your team in Asia at 2am, you could be in a meeting on one side of a city one morning, then in a meeting with your team the other side an hour later. You have lots of little tasks to be completing, you have to apply lots of different strategies.

You Can Swap Industries

The general basis of project management is all about processes, which means you can apply your knowledge to any industry if you want to. Perhaps you love your industry, but you want to explore another one, you can easily apply your expertise to another industry and transform your career, making the job even more vibrant and exciting.

You Can Earn a High Salary

The salaries of top project managers are pretty plump, which means this type of career is both emotionally and financially rewarding.

You Can Be A Remote PM

You can easily be a remote PM right now if you want to be. Companies who cannot afford to fly over the best PM’s will often hire a remote PM who is happy to manage their team from across the globe. Other companies may hire PM’s remotely for just one section of their project. The demand for remote project managers is growing very quickly.

Want To Feel More Inspired?

If you are currently a PM who feels they need to reignite their passion for the job, or you’re a newcomer to the industry and you want skills to help you get ahead of others, consider investing in some project management training courses – there is always a new reason to fall back in love with project management.