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December 08, 2004
Project Manager or Project Coper?
I've been in a very dark place work-wise of late, so I've been reflecting a lot on my previous work experiences looking for various patterns that might shed some light on various forms of organizational behaviour that seem to get right up my clacker. The result of one such musing is the demarkation of PMs I've worked with into three groups; Project Manager, Project Mismanager or Project Coper.
A Project Manager is someone who spends most/all their time actively managing the project in the traditional sense. As such, most of their time is spent dealing with the bureacracy incumbent in most organizations and generally running interference for the development team.
A Project Mismanager is the Dilbert-style PHB from Hell. Still an active participant in the life of a project, the Mismanager devotes their time to micromanaging the development team or otherwise getting in their way. Their projects tend to happen despite of them, rather than because of them.
A Project Coper is little more than a PM facade. Although they have the title, it's certainly not a position they devote much time to and when they do, it's usually in a very reactive manner. Any correlation between their behaviour and the outcome of the project is purely coincidental.
I've had quite a mix of these three types during my professional life so far:
Project Manager: 4 instances
Project Mismanager: 1 instance
Project Coper: 5 instances
Curiously, my experiences show a strange correlation between people's first names and the Project Coper role, although I'll keep the names private to protect the guilty.
Overall, I'm happier working with a Project Coper as they tend to keep out of my way. I also suspect that Copers and Mismanagers are mutually exclusive at a genetic level, although the Mismanager probably has ambitions/deceptions of ascending to true PM status.
What are other people's experiences? Have you been besieged with PMs of one type or another? Do you see a correlation between PM-quality and your level of morale on the project?
Posted by Andy Marks at December 8, 2004 04:04 PM
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