Practical tips every engineer needs to know about managing a project

As a manager I realize that what we ask from senior engineers, are skills which they are likely not trained for. We ask them to lead a team of engineers, using people skills foreign to many. We ask them to organize and manage a project, without any training on how to effectively manage a project. We hope that these skills have been passed along by the senior engineers before them. In this article, I capture a few key nuggets every engineer needs to know about managing a project. Just like being able to speak in public, knowing basic project management is important to every engineer.

TL;DR — Takeaways

Managing a project is hard. Do not underestimate it. There is an entire career dedicated to managing projects. Respect the role. Just because somebody is not writing a line of code, doesn’t mean they do not an important role in the project. The difference between a well managed project and a haphazardly run project is day and night, and affects your productivity and happiness. You will observe how a project team goes through various stages and how you need to adopt your style throughout the project. At the same time, fear not, with a few tips you can get the basics going. Every engineer should know the basics and build experience managing a project.

Start simple: build a shared understanding by writing a project charter. This is a short document (3 pages maximum) capturing:

• What are we doing (scope) and not…