Do project managers need IT skills for technical projects?

by Nicki Carruth | Mar 21, 2023 | Technical Assurance

One of the most in-demand skills in New Zealand’s tech sector are those who’re capable of coordinating resources, budget and systems to deliver technology-based solutions within a business – we’re talking about an IT Project Manager. A project manager working on an IT project has all the typical business impact considerations and the complexities of technology to think about. In this article, we explore the common question of whether a good IT project manager needs to possess hard technical skills to be successful in the role.

How IT projects differ from other business initiatives

While many great project managers are involved in IT projects as well as other types of initiatives, there are a few elements that are unique to a technology project. The outcomes are tangible in both the technology that’s delivered to the business and the resulting processes, operations and financial benefits. The day to day considerations of an IT project manager demand fast transition between people, process, budget, milestones (typical project elements) and deep technical conversations with developers, architects, designers and so on. Their morning can involve a team brainstorm to solve an integration challenge and immediately lead into a steering committee meeting about resource requirements and budgets.

The very nature of the subject matter here demands serious brain power from the IT project manager. While the PM might not have the development chops themselves, they need to understand the application of these skills to meet business requirements. In many ways this can be even more challenging; determining a technical solution’s fit for the business need. It demands problem solving, clever consulting and translation abilities. There’s also a real dependence on knowing how to get the pertinent information from the right people in the team.

Relationship Between Programmes and Projects IQANZ

The role of a project manager

A project manager’s role is to lead a team of people to deliver on a business outcome, as defined by a project scope and acceptance criteria. They must lead this team whilst keeping to a set budget and hitting agreed milestones for completion. Our team knows firsthand how challenging a job project management is.

The project manager doesn’t and must not be pulled into completing the delivery themselves. Even those who’ve come up through technical disciplines and evolved into a PM won’t give the organisation what it needs by jumping on the tools constantly. A project manager doing their job effectively will support delivery, stakeholders and leadership to work together and deliver the desired outcome. First and foremost, a PM needs to fulfil this responsibility. Additional skills and experience can still provide value, but the core capabilities need to be met to add value to the project.

Benefit of bringing technical expertise to a PM role

We’ve worked alongside many project managers who began their careers in the technical delivery they now manage in other people. There are many benefits to having worked as a delivery team member in past projects. Here’s just a few:

Understanding the why and how of delivery in depth.
Being able to communicate with a technical team in their language.
Providing an experienced eye across designs, code or other deliverables.
Appreciation for the delivery team’s workload and challenges.
Ability to provide additional coaching to the team on technical disciplines.

These are just some of the skills that an experienced technical IT professional can bring to the table. It’s important to reiterate that these skills should be viewed as complementary to a foundation of good project management skills; not a replacement for them.

Facilitating implementation

The project manager should, above all, be an excellent implementation guide for a technical team. Delivering on technical solutions requires the coordination of front and back-end development, integration with other systems, user experience, testing and other business units. An IT project manager should be comfortable driving discussions between the delivery team and the business. They should then be able to convey the activity to any stakeholders, including those in the leadership team.

Implementation is often complex in a large organisation where many different processes, systems and people will be affected by the project’s deliverables. The IT project manager has to be adept at protecting their project team’s work, whilst also staying in tune with the strategic needs of the business and any barriers that may exist in the business between the team’s efforts and ultimately gaining sign-off. A good example of this is project scope conflicts. These can occur either due to a lack of engagement with key stakeholders on the scope, or simply a fundamental disagreement as to the appropriate scope of project deliverables. Without a good IT project manager, these issues can hit the delivery team directly, derailing their work day and greatly impacting the timeline and budget. With an IT project manager in place, who brings both excellent project management skills and applicable working knowledge of the disciplines in play, many discussions or disagreements won’t even reach the delivery team – the PM can resolve these or defend the scope on their own or with the support of senior leaders.

Implementation is more than just helping a project team develop and design a solution. How the solution is integrated into the business is critical to get right – otherwise a change may be met with a negative response. It’s here where a good IT Project Manager demonstrates their value to the business. Their job is to help facilitate the training, onboarding and adoption of the new solution into both a suite of other systems and daily processes. Succeeding here will depend on the PM’s ability to work alongside the leaders of each impacted business unit. Together, they’ll ensure the desired outcomes of the project are realised in the business – not simply a system that’s been developed and left underutilised.

The ability to identify capabilities in IT professionals

Given the success of a project is dependent on the people involved, a PM is usually involved in recruiting delivery team members. They’ll need to be able to define the project’s needs and often communicate this in a job description and interview. If the PM can’t determine whether or not someone has the right skills, they risk wasting the budget and negatively impacting the project’s deliverables. When a PM is recruiting, there are some skills and key experience that can help calibrate their decision-making. However, this doesn’t mean the PM needs to have done all (or any) of the jobs they hire for. Rather it means that an effective, experienced project manager will be able to determine the right skills needed to solve certain challenges. When discussing with candidates in an interview context, a good IT project manager can ask the right questions then identify if the responses are satisfactory or not. Identifying and applying skill sets to the project in the most effective way is a nuanced ability – one that every organisation looks for when they contract or hire an IT project manager.

Translating complexity into stakeholder-friendly comms

There’s seemingly no shortage of jargon in the digital space. And with organisations relying upon technology to improve each part of the business more and more each year, there’s a great demand for individuals who can help bridge the gap between the technical detail and the business application. In our experience, some of the most effective IT project managers have sharpened their communication skills to fluently convey technical detail in terms that senior, non-technical leadership can understand. They’ll often need to consult with finance, marketing, legal, customer service, sales or any other business unit whilst the solution is being designed.

Being able to bridge this gap is critical not only for explaining to the end users the value of the project, but also for conveying business feedback to the delivery team; making feature changes or improvements as required. This is even more important in the user acceptance testing phase where feedback will be coming through at scale.

A good technical translator is a real asset to a project team, and can unlock stakeholder support and sign off.

Making upskilling part of the job

Regardless of existing technical expertise, an IT project manager should, in our opinion, always be finding ways to stay up to date with the latest industry trends and technologies. Solving business problems can now be done in a myriad of ways, so it’s important to have some understanding of what languages and frameworks are out there.

Upskilling is something that all of us could benefit from making part of our weekly professional lives. For an IT project manager, upskilling can take many valuable forms, from technical disciplines through to other project methodologies and communication skills. For those who wish to excel as a PM, the learning is never truly complete.

Need guidance on your IT project?

IQANZ provides specialist assurance services for technology projects across the private and public sectors. We apply proven assurance methodologies along with a high level of technical expertise to help guide projects and programmes to success. If you’re interested in getting independent, expert help on your technology project, get in touch with our team.