Project Management in IT

Defence and commercial business use of IT since the 1950's is one of the major contributors to the development of modern project management and techniques. PRINCE originally conceived for IT Projects by the UK government, followed by PRINCE2, has been widely adopted as the de facto method for controlling projects. However, from the cost and time over runs and issues with IT project managers there is still a lot to achieve. Therefore IT Project Management is here to stay!

Within IT there are a number of different types of IT project manager, the nature of your project and operating environment will likely dictate the skills and experience required and when!

Technical Project Managers – these are specialists, experts at say ensuring you SAP requirements planning or contact centre is implemented often they are leading experts in there subject area and likely to be quite hands on, very knowledgeable about the products and the companies that supply them. Their projects typically are very well defined and as Henry Ford is reputed to have said, "You can have it any colour you want as long as it is black".

The second type of IT Project Manger is someone who is quite hands off, used to working with a number of groups and teams to ensure the business gets what it needs from the company's IT developments. This is likely someone who is very good at influencing to ensure change accepted and have the resources required to get the job done. It may seem like this person is endlessly talking with people. They will be ascertaining status and reporting both good and bad news while searching for solutions to problems. These IT Project Managers are likely more technically aware than they admit or like to be known. They are skilled at knowing when and how to ask the hard questions and gain insight into the challenges that the implementers on respective projects are facing. The projects they generally work often are not well conceived, and they will be encountering constant change in requirements budget and quality of deliverables. A key ability is to live with ambiguity whilst striving to gain structure and control.

Development Project Managers, (or Development IT Project Managers) - another breed, those that work with in the application development getting code written and tested to do what it says on the box, ensuring regression testing and unit testing are done and possibly managing the delivery of a version while another is being developed and yet another initiated. Project Management is an important part of many change programme and projects. We still have lot to learn about scoping projects that involve IT to provide business change and benefits.

Further Information

A good link to research further education in IT Project Management is at Learndirect where you will find a good overview of IT Project Management roles and additional information sources.

Birmingham City University Offer an IT Project Management with International Business MSc, if you wish to work in a global corporate dealing with IT this course will be of inertest to you coupling business, IT and Project Management with an international context.

Recruit project management staff with specific IT Project Management knowledge and experience

Arras People has candidates registered with us looking for permanent and interim IT project management roles. Recent roles recruited for include:

Project Manager - Financial Business Services

Permanent Project Manager required to manage Business Services projects for our Financial services client. Reporting to the Head of Business Service you will successfully manage projects from business case to delivered product in an informal Prince 2 environment. Liaising with internal and external parties as required, your projects will be predominantly managing the integration and support of new financial products into the business and existing business Systems.

Key Skills

1. Demonstrable experience in similar role
2. Experience / knowledge of the full project life cycle
3. Project manager comfortable in the appliance of IT for Business goals
4. Experience of financial sector
5. Motivated Leader able to manage through the full Project lifecycle
6. An industry recognised project management qualification would be an advantage
7. Proficient with the use of IT packages
8. Knowledge and experience of project software and methodologies

Person Specification

1. Good communication skills
2. Problem solver with leadership and initiative to drive the project to success
3. Excellent planning and organisational skills
4. Ability to manage multiple projects
5. Team player
6. Accuracy and attention to detail
7. Customer Service Focus

Programme Manager - Financial Trading Systems / Implementation

Senior Implementation Project Manager required for a large firm of brokers in either Manchester or Leeds in a permanent role. This role is ideal for any experienced systems implementation project manager looking for a new opportunity in the Financial Services sector and is actively looking to relocate or resides in the North West / Yorkshire.

Key Skills

1. Extensive managerial experience at a senior level
2. Experience in the IT financial services sector highly desirable
3. Degree or equivalent experience
4. Project Management experience and ideally a related qualification
5. Programme Management experience managing a portfolio of 30+ projects
6. Preparation, presentation and recommendation of business cases

Person Specification

1. Leadership: ensures that others buy into the IS departments' mission, goals, culture and policy.
2. Influence: influences others to a desired outcome through building persuasive arguments. Can balance the needs of multiple stakeholders and satisfy diverse and often contradicting needs of different interest groups.
3. Flexibility: evaluates situations and decides what approach to take.
4. Organisational: understands the power relationships in all relevant organisation structures.
5. Commercial: sets and manages to cost-effective budgets.
6. Resilience: stays calm under pressure and displays emotional resilience
7. Intellectual: demonstrates an ability to think conceptually and strategically.
8. Maturity, credibility and integrity. An ability to work independently with a minimum of direction.

Business Analyst - Financial Services Processing Experience

This Business Analyst position is within our Client's Business Development Team and requires a BA with well developed analytical skills to work with current clients, regulatory bodies and product management to identify business needs, legal/regulatory requirements and processing options.

As the ideal candidate, you will have a strong background as a Business Analyst with experience in retail banking, ideally card operations or product management and enjoy client-facing work.

This is a fantastic opportunity to work for a leading global organisation, with career development opportunity and excellent benefits.

Key Skills

A strong background as a Business Analyst with specific experience in processing

• Retail banking
• Consumer lending
• Credit/debit cards

A background in card operations or product management is preferred and a proven knowledge of revolving credit software.

Person Specification

1. Client Facing Skills
2. Self Starter
3. Highly Analytical Skills
4. Excellent Interpersonal Skills
5. Authoritative
6. Commercially Aware

IT Project Manager - Internal Infrastructure Projects

A new opportunity has arisen within a leading pharmaceuticals consultancy for a pragmatic IT Projects Manager to undertake internal IT infrastructure projects. Reporting to the IT Program Manager, this role will provide a bridge between business departments and technical teams to implement strategies designed to maximise efficiency of the business.

Key Skills

1. Graduate-level education or equivalent IT experience.
2. PRINCE2 Practitioner qualification.
3. Demonstrable IT project management experience within a multi-site corporate or public sector environment.
4. Demonstrable effective Project Leadership or IT Project Management experience.
5. Demonstrated ability to manage, develop and motivate a team.
6. Top-level knowledge of network technologies and topologies, as well as solid experience of Microsoft operating systems, common business applications, internet use and email.
7. Able to identify and understand business needs and formulate technical proposals to meet those identified business needs.
8. Good analytical and implementation capabilities in order to understand problems, specify solutions in a structured manner and carry them out with attention to detail.
9. Ability and desire to absorb information quickly and apply it appropriately.
10. Enthusiastic, organised and methodical with a proven willingness to take responsibility and ownership and an ability to get things done.
11. Ability to manage many critical tasks and projects independently whilst keeping an eye on the business priorities and getting issues resolved effectively and expediently.

Person Specification

1. Ability to work on own initiative without supervision and to work under pressure to tight deadlines.
2. Team player.
3. Excellent communication skills – verbal and written, maintaining a calm and professional manner and sense of humour even when under pressure or in frustrating situations.
4. Confident, articulate individual, good telephone manner, comfortable in face-to-face meetings.
5. Pharmaceutical or health care industry experience would be advantageous.

Project Manager for a healthcare organisation with information management & technology projects (IM&T) projects within their Informatics department.

Project Manager - Full lifecycle IT Development for an organisation specifically specialising in transaction processing and major client/server based developments.

Contract IT Infrastructure and Applications Project Manager in infrastructure design and migration streams in a Microsoft environment.

Programme Manager - Outsourced Solutions for an information solutions organisation based in the City.

Principal Consultant (IT/Management Consultancy) – Professional Services.

Project Manager - a strong and innovative player in the delivery of content rich web based solutions.

Project Co-ordinator (IT/Software Lifecycle/Surrey) - a software solutions provider.

Project Management Candidates Available Today

Arras People has registered IT project management candidates looking for both permanent and interim roles, a significant proportion have skills and experience within the information technology business function and within IT organisations.

Candidates registered with APM & PRINCE2 qualifications supported by specific IT project management training.

Contact Arras People Project Management Recruitment to find out more about the IT Project Management & IT Programme Management resources we have available to work with you on an interim contract role or as a permanent employee. We currently have over 16000 project management professionals registered with us, many with significant IT related experience and skills.

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