How long does it normally take to qualify as a project manager?

[Deleted member 290061]

Can project management be learnt on the job?

 

[noseall]

Can project management be learnt on the job?

It certainly can. And you learn faster and better when poor decisions affect your own pocket.

 

[Old Salt]

Yes but qualifications will be required at some point. My SiL was on the tools installing fibre optics and gradually took on larger and larger jobs building experience. Then moved onto costing, surveying and managing smaller projects. Night school, exams, prince etc and he is now the installations director for a data company who install fibre and mobile phone masts.

As regards the timescales it depends how hard you work and study but probably about 2 to 3 years for smaller projects. 10 or 15 years for HS2.

 

[transam]

Can project management be learnt on the job?

most builders or a lot of builders are project managers

doubt some paper qualification is relevant to most of em

or would amount to a bag of beans ??

knowledge from hands on experience is the relevant qualification

 

[johnny2007]

I know a lot of qualified clueless project managers and a lot of illiterate knowledgeable ones.

 

[Lazzy]

I know a lot of qualified clueless project managers and a lot of illiterate knowledgeable ones.

Let's assume you know a few knowledgeable qualified project managers, would you say they are
considerablely better than a good unqualified project manager or not ?

 

[ironsidebod]

Given that you can get a PRINCE2 practitioner qualification in 5 days, I'd say an education is important but experience is key to being "good".

 

[Lazzy]

Given that you can get a PRINCE2 practitioner qualification in 5 days, I'd say an education is important but experience is key to being "good".

Let's assume you know a few experienced knowledgeable qualified project managers, would you say they are
considerablely better than an experienced good unqualified project manager or not ?

 

[johnny2007]

Let's assume you know a few knowledgeable qualified project managers, would you say they are
considerablely better than a good unqualified project manager or not ?

There are qualified people who have extensive experience and knowledge and are constantly keeping up with changes.
There are also the qualified who attend every course going and have a ton of paperwork to prove they're good but in practice they haven't got a clue.
Then there are the totally unqualified, some extremely good, and some extremely not good.
In other words, a piece of paper is no guarantee of knowledge.
At the same time, experience is not guarantee of knowing what they're doing.

 

[JohnD]

Given that you can get a PRINCE2 practitioner qualification in 5 days, I'd say an education is important but experience is key to being "good".

What, 5 days as a beginner?

I'd been doing it for a few years before I went on the course.

Though I had previously run PM training courses while working at *** which used a similar process with a different name.

I've met a few ernest young consultants who've been on a course and never done the job, and have No Eye Deer.

 

[ironsidebod]

What, 5 days as a beginner?

I'd been doing it for a few years before I went on the course.

Though I had previously run PM training courses while working at *** which used a similar process with a different name.

I've met a few ernest young consultants who've been on a course and never done the job, and have No Eye Deer.

Yes! If you have any gumption at all it's a piece of **** to pass without doing any prior study.

 

[ironsidebod]

Let's assume you know a few experienced knowledgeable qualified project managers, would you say they are
considerablely better than an experienced good unqualified project manager or not ?

It's not that straight forward. It's important that anyone knows the fundamentals, the norms and the expectations. Some grasp this without qualification but these tend to be exceptional people IME.

The rest need a solid foundation to build upon, some do and use their experience to learn and grow and are good to excellent, some don't and are good to terrible. Your mileage may vary.

Long story short. In my experience good project managers just are.

 

[Deleted member 290061]

I've had an interest in trying to do the role of a project manager but would be more suited to learning on the job

 

[charliegolf]

Teaboy Jim might have a view?

 

[JohnD]

I've had an interest in trying to do the role of a project manager but would be more suited to learning on the job

you need a combination of serious professional training, and maybe five years of practical experience.