I am currently in the middle of marathon training and I love listening to podcasts whilst I do my long runs so recently I’ve been catching up with my podcasts and a recent “Projectified” episode was called: “Change, what’s next for Project Management?” From December 2019 really stood out for me.

During the podcast, there was a lot of discussion around what is going to be changing in Project Management and what we need to do as Project Management professionals to adapt and thrive in the coming years. I think that there will be a lot of challenges around Artificial Intelligence and its adoption by organisations looking to “lead the change” and separate themselves from their competition. One area where organisations struggle is between the agile mindset from those executing projects to the more conservative organisational leadership and this can cause conflicts when using ‘new’ technology.

One quote that stood out to me during this podcast was: “it is going to be the application of knowledge and use of data rather than knowing the data”. This is quite a dramatic change for ‘traditional’ Project Managers as the advantage of your years of experience is replaced by how well you can intrepret the data that is now available to you and if you’re not able to intrepret it quickly/sufficiently then you will be at a big disadvantage.

Agile mindset

As I mentioned above, the agile mindset is something that is slowly becoming more mainstream in regular Project Management and I’m so glad that it is! Recently, the 7th Standard for Project Management has been released for public review and the agile mindset is mentioned as being one area of prominence.

Soft skills

Whenever I am asked: What should I be learning more about this year? I answer: Improve your soft skills! This is such an important area of not only project leadership but also personal development that I think is so important and can benefit us in every aspect of our lives. When was the last time that you really invested in improving your soft skills? If it’s been a while, perhaps it’s time to invest in yourself.

Networking

When was the last time that you attended a Professional networking event? Have you been working on your professional relationships and nourishing your network to support your career? I know that this is something that often gets pushed down in priority as it’s not seen as important but I can predict that the benefit of positive networking will become even more important in the coming year and it’s something we all need to be focusing on. How can you do this? I’d suggest using meetup.com/ your local PMI chapter to meet Professionals in your area and start attending conferences in your local area that can help you meet likeminded individuals.

What do you think are going to be the biggest challenges in the coming years?