What is project management?

I fell into Project Management as a career…

For those of you that aren’t aware of my story, I currently work as a transformational life coach and I’m also an artist. However, my background is actually pharmacy; I have a degree in pharmacy and also a PhD in Pharmaceutical Science.

After my PhD, I moved into my PhD supervisor’s spin-out company in pharmaceutical clinical research. My role was all encompassing, as it was such a small company (there were just 3 of us when I started!). I wore many hats - from Human Resources and Health & Safety, to hands on manufacturing of the pharmaceuticals and then dispensing them to our clinical trial volunteers! I also helped look after the volunteers, making lunches and so on, whilst they were in our facility!

Seven years in I was approached by another organisation, who had a vacancy in project management. They felt that the role in project management would play to my strengths… and they were right!

I joined as a Project Manager responsible for client projects at the Glasgow site, and when I left 6 years later I was a Senior Director of Global Program Management with teams of project managers across Europe and America.

Organisation, systems & processes are my jam!

BUT WHAT EXACTLY IS PROJECT MANAGEMENT?

The definition of project management from The Association for Project Management (APM) is “Project management is the application of processes, methods, skills, knowledge and experience to achieve specific project objectives according to the project acceptance criteria within agreed parameters. Project management has final deliverables that are constrained to a finite timescale and budget.

A key factor that distinguishes project management from just 'management' is that it has this final deliverable and a finite timespan, unlike management which is an ongoing process.”

My role as a project manager in the pharmaceutical industry was to work with the scientists (our project team) to deliver the pharmaceutical product we were manufacturing for our customers, on time and to budget.

WHY IS PROJECT MANAGEMENT RELEVANT TO ME?

Now you might be thinking, this is all great Sarah - but why does project management matter to me?

I’m here to tell you that there are plenty project management strategies that are applicable to our own lives, and also your small business if you have one.

Such as,

• Planning / goal setting

• Effective communication

• Monitoring finances

• Being organised

• Time management

• Streamlined processes