If you’ve been managing projects for a while, you know that roles and titles can be confusing between project and program management. While there are similarities, critical differences exist that, if misunderstood, can lead to chaos and even project failure.
Although the distinction between project and program management might seem straightforward on paper, it’s often blurred out in practice. About 59% of project managers juggle 2 to 5 projects at a time, making the roles of project and program managers quite similar. Then, when should you bring in a program manager? This blog will help you outline the essential skills and responsibilities of effective program managers and help you determine when it’s time to add the “one” to your team boldly.
What is Program Management?
Program Management oversees a collection of projects united by a common organizational goal, strategic objective, or impact area. Compared to managing them individually, grouping these projects offers synergies, consistent oversight, and enhanced stakeholder visibility.
Program managers also help drive corporate transformation by assisting with agile transformations and implementing DevOps practices and standards. Program managers may be in sync with agile values such as partnership, team independence, and authority, delivering value to customers and adjusting to change in the moment. A program manager can carry agile and DevOps to life for teams across large programs or individual projects by tailoring programs to the detailed specifications and opportunities of the business.
Program Manager vs Project Manager
| Aspect | Program Manager | Project Manager |
|---|---|---|
| Scope & Focus | Oversees multiple related projects within a larger strategic framework. Their focus is on aligning these projects with broader organizational goals, ensuring they collectively deliver value and long-term benefits. | Manages a specific project with defined objectives, scope, and timelines. Their primary responsibility is to deliver the project on time, within budget, and according to the specified requirements. |
| Strategic & Tactical | Operates at a strategic level, ensuring that all projects within the program contribute to the organization’s overall vision. They focus on coordination, long-term outcomes, and how the program impacts the organization’s goals. | Works at a tactical level, handling day-to-day project execution. Their focus is on managing project tasks, milestones, and deliverables to achieve a successful project outcome. |
| Responsibilities |
|
|
| Timeline | Works with a long-term vision, often managing projects that span several years and evolve as organizational priorities change. | Works with a shorter, more specific timeframe, focusing on completing a project within its set deadlines. |
| Success Criteria | Success is measured by how well the collective projects meet the strategic objectives of the organization and deliver sustained benefits. | Success is measured by completing the project on time, within budget, and meeting the defined scope and quality standards. |
| Stakeholder | Manages stakeholders at the executive and cross-functional levels, ensuring alignment across the organization and with external partners. | Focuses on stakeholders directly involved in the project, including team members, clients, and sponsors. |
Key Functions of Program Management
Program managers must schedule their programs and maintain a strategic plan, review the status and progress of each project, mentor project managers, inform and advise stakeholders, and safeguard the quality of each project plan and its deliverables. Program managers consider the whole picture of these projects and evaluate the bigger context of the combined organization to affect the interdependencies by applying systems thinking.
While smaller companies may see program management as a luxury, larger organizations find it essential to coordinate individual projects with a strategic perspective. Project managers also focus on specific deliverables, while program managers always consider the bigger picture.
Another benefit is a steady level of application and governance of standards across multiple projects. With a single point of oversight, project statuses can be easily rolled up for a global view; this allows for fundamental quality criteria to be evenly and uniformly applied.
Program management is also often where comprehensive budget oversight takes place. It ensures funds are assigned appropriately across the entire array of active and planned projects instead of competing for funding.
Program management adds significant value when an organization embarks on large strategic initiatives requiring cross-functional collaboration and involving external dependencies. Due to its size and scope, any significant transformational activity—whether business, agile, or digital—needs a program management-oriented approach.
For program managers to be successful, they need a range of skills, especially in communication, given their broad responsibilities and high-level visibility.
There are three distinct types of communication:
- Status Reporting
- Direction Setting
- Problem-Solving
A challenging aspect of the role is that program managers must demonstrate their authority over related projects, even though few people report directly to them. They must establish themselves as senior leaders and day-to-day representatives for the executive sponsor of the initiative.
Key Traits of Effective Program Management
Consensus building: Create adjustment across multiple teams or even lines of business to ensure everyone is marching in the same direction and aware of their role in the grand scheme.
Risk assessment: Program managers need to identify, monitor, and address risks as they come up, escalating them when necessary but without constantly raising alarms or creating unnecessary panic and spotting and getting ahead of issues rather than simply reacting to them after the fact is a key differentiator for great program managers.
Attention to detail: Program management continuously assesses project progress and ties it back to budgets, strategic objectives, and deadlines. They’re also typically on the hook for guaranteeing everything is well-documented, whether they do it themselves or pass it on to others.
How to Introduce Program Management to Your Company
Step 1: Identify the Issues a Program Manager needs to fix
Before introducing any change in your team structure, knowing precisely why you’re adding someone to the team and the benefit they will bring is best. Work with your stakeholders within the team and the larger business to understand the present pain points in your delivery.
Specifically, watch for the signs we covered in the final section, such as resource challenges, team confusion, and lack of growth in business metrics. As you speak with stakeholders, document the conversations clearly to record the problems for future reference.
Step 2: Define a common program idea
Once you’ve identified the pain points, you need a strategic goal to develop a program around. If it’s inconsistent with a significant, strategic outcome, it’s a project, not a program.
With your pain points noted, take the time to understand how exactly you’re endorsing the organizational strategy. Eventually, supporting that strategy will become the program’s main focus, so it needs to be well-understood and supported by senior stakeholders.
Step 3: Hire or Promote an Exceptional Program Manager
You can’t just hire any old program manager. A large, strategic project manager must have the seniority, experience, and credibility to lead the entire team towards the objective.
While every organization has a different recruitment process, concentrate on related experience and expert certification when hunting for a program manager.
Step 4: Choose an Appropriate Program Management Methodology
You must choose the appropriate program management approach with the right candidate on board. This will give you a structured framework within which to work that maximizes your chances of success.
Here, you’ve got three options:
- If you’ve hired a certified program manager, they should be capable of recommending a methodology based on their certifications.
- If not, align your program methodology with your project methodology, taking it up in breadth, scope, and governance.
- If that’s still not right, get online and research a program management methodology that’s the right fit for your business.
Step 5: Use software to plan, track, and monitor your programs
A program is a pretty big undertaking, so you need help to make it a success. Do your research to find a program management tool that works for you. Specifically, look out for tools with features such as task management, a knowledge base, team chat, file storage, and time tracking to help you keep everything in one place.
Transition from Project to Program Management
There’s often a lot of misunderstanding about what program management actually involves. Many people consider a program a larger project, but it’s pretty different.
If you’re finding it hard to deliver results, manage resources efficiently, or keep track of the overall goals, it might be time to consider bringing in a program manager. Doing so can lead to better transparency, improved risk management, and a greater chance of achieving your business goals.
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