Ron Waller, PMP, PMI Fellow, CEM
Chair PMCert™
Project driven organizations need competent project managers to reach their objectives. A valid project manager competency-based certification program can provide the answers to questions about project managers. The process is:
Except for the asapm™ competency-based credential, there is no other
project manager certification supported by a member driven professional organization
in the USA. There are other credential issuing organizations, but they are
affiliations of commercial for-profit or academic enterprises and are not
globally recognized. Also, such credentials do not require the candidate to
provide performance evidence of having actually managed a real project. And,
while there are many PMI® PMPs® who have or are currently managing
projects (including myself), this is not a project manager credential and
no project manager experience is required to qualify.
The first step in a credentialing program is to determine what is desired
to certify and why. Credentialing always means differentiating. An appropriate
project manager certification model should have an adequate number of roles
to differentiate among the practitioners that have active project leadership
responsibility. The asapm role model (based on the globally recognized IPMA
ICB) is:
Competencies are usually defined as clusters of related knowledge, attitudes, skills, capabilities, and other personal characteristics held by an individual affecting a major part of their professional work. Several models dominate the competency assessment process
Competency-based assessment is the evaluation of a candidate’s competence against a set of established standards. Since leadership and vision cannot be assessed with the same reliability as planning and scheduling, “indicators,” which can convey an inference of various competencies, are usually used. Relying on a single assessment approach reduces precision and decreases reliability. An integrated approach to competency assessment combines standards and approaches in a holistic set. Each of the above models has strengths and weaknesses; the asapm model uses all three.
Competency assessment requires that the evidence, provided by the candidate, infer a competency level to the appropriate standard. The candidate submits a self-prepared project report, peer references, and other supporting evidence. “Experience,” i.e. just having spent time in a particular environment or role, is not and does not support a competency by itself. The candidate must also document performance.
American Society for the Advancement of Project Management
PMCert, the credentialing organization for asapm
For questions about the program or project manager credentialing please email - ron@asapm.org
The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) recommends a taxonomy based risk identification which may provide a useful starting point for project managers working in software development. SEI describes it as “a method for facilitating the systematic and repeatable identification of risks associated with the development of a software-dependent project. This method, derived from published literature and previous experience in developing software, was tested in active government-funded defense and civilian software development projects for both its usefulness and for improving the method itself. Results of the field tests encouraged the claim that the described method is useful, usable, and efficient. The report concludes with some macro-level lessons learned from the field tests and a brief overview of future work in establishing risk management on a firm footing in software development projects.” (http://www.sei.cmu.edu/pub/documents/93.reports/pdf/tr06.93.pdf)
David Curling, former editor of PM World Today writes: “… it is a great check list for those in the software development business. I know that I would have given my right arm for such a list when I was involved in the management of major IT systems in the Canadian Federal Government.”