Have you got what it takes?

“As project managers, QSs tend to be solely focused on the money. They just don’t have the wider focus on the job, the left brain stuff.” So says a project manager with a background in, not QSing unsurprisingly, but engineering. “Project management is more an art than a science,” continues Alan Moore, director at Trench Farrow, the specialist PM. Proving the point, last week the firm chose a chartered engineer, Tony Bowen, for a senior job in project management in London.

So what is the perfect mix of skills and experience you need to be the ultimate project manager? Opinions vary. Ask an engineer and he or she will say an engineering background is ideal. Architects will tell you they are best equipped for project management. And both are likely to have forthright views on why the other professions aren’t up to the job. This said, QS News has discovered some key traits that experts across disciplines agree are needed to be brilliant at project management.

Project managers from each profession make compelling cases for why their skills make them the best.

Architects can make excellent project managers, says Moore, who employs a few of them himself. “They are good at the left brain stuff and good at understanding the process. But they need to be the project type architect rather than the designer type.

The architects here (at Trench Farrow) realise they are never going to be Norman Foster or Ken Shuttleworth.”

Occasionally it is necessary to be firm and impose a bit of discipline but bully boy tactics don’t work

Alan Moore, director, Trench Farrow

He also claims architects struggle with the intricacies of procurement, engineering and management. But he adds that Trench Farrow brings them up to speed through training.

Moore is particularly sceptical of QSing as a background for a project manager. “QSs tend to be solely focused on the money, they just don’t have the wider focus on the job... When I was a kid I wanted to be an engineer. I could see what it meant, building bridges and so on. How many QSs can say that? Where’s the passion?”

Moore saves his sharpest weaponry for property agent PMs: “I hear they are like the fifth wheel on a car, they get the project with no competition simply because their agents are already doing the deal,” he says.

Moore is not alone in thinking engineers make particularly good PMs. Dean Benson, operations director of infrastructure at Mace, says most of the firm’s PMs have an engineering background.

Architects are good at the left brain stuff and good at understanding the process. But they need to be the project type architect rather than the designer type...

Michael Thirkettle, chief executive of multidisciplinary firm McBains Cooper, argues that the best PMs are those not allied to any discipline. “If you have a guy with a QS background, he’s going to get involved on the cost side and be ignorant of the architectural side. They are always going to be biased to the side they know best. And project managers should not feel comfortable,” he says.

Neither does Thirkettle believe PMs need a huge amount of technical knowledge.

“You don’t need to be an anorak. What you need is to be good at processes and people.

It’s about leadership and human relationships.”

QSs tend to be solely focused on the money, they just don’t have the wider focus on the job

Alan Moore, director, Trench Farrow

But one project manager with a QSing background disputes this. Mandy Wheeler, senior PM at Davis Langdon, says the understanding of financial and legal issues she got from her training as a QS are invaluable in project management. “As a project manager the important thing at the end of the day is the money. If you’re building something for the client, you have to do it one time, to the right quality and for the right price. They aren’t doing the project for charity after all.”

She says knowing the ins and outs of contracts is also vital, particularly when it comes to change control. Managing changes to a project, such as a decision to add an extra floor to a building, and all the implications for contracts and the programme are a massive part of the project manager’s job.

Wheeler also argues that she is comfortable with the softer issues: “I chose to come out of QSing – that proves I’m not a strictly QS type of person.”

She makes a point of not getting bogged down in cost issues, she says, allowing the PQS on the project to advise her instead. But Wheeler adds diplomatically that people from all the professions can make decent project managers. Moore accepts this too, he says, as long as they have the right approach.

As a PM the important thing at the end of the day is the money. If you’re building something for the client, you have to do it one time, to the right quality and for the right price

Mandy Wheeler, senior PM, Davis Langdon

The ideal project manager should be like the client’s GP, Moore says. “You are their closest advisor. You have to earn their trust, know when to bring in other consultants, know how the market works, how to structure projects and procurement arrangements and you lead the client through it all.”

But this is not as simple as it might sound. Moore says the biggest challenges are finding the ultimate decision-maker at the client’s company, whether it’s the CEO, CFO or facilities manager, and then getting the client to make decisions in a timely manner. You have to be a canny operator to pull this off, he reckons.

He says 80% of the role is client-facing and only 20% is project-facing. On the project side, the role requires equal skill. The PM must lead the project team, supplying it with information, decisions and money. “Occasionally it is necessary to be firm and impose a bit of discipline but bully boy tactics don’t work.”

Thirkettle agrees: “It’s not about kick, bollock and bite. Calmness is important.”

It’s not about kick, bollock and bite. Calmness is important

Michael Thirkettle, chief executive, McBains Cooper

The means of communication a PM uses also makes a difference. “Email is an absolute disaster. Any project manager who uses it has lost the plot. It’s easy to hand out bollockings by email. It has its place in terms of registering and distributing information, creating audit trails. But really. Make a bloody phone call!” He adds that he has banned directors at McBains Cooper from sending emails regarding project issues.

Getting on with the project team helps. Vinod Thakrar, director of PM at developer Hammerson, advises: “Put your boots on and visit them on site, go down the pub with them, it’s about having a banter with people”.

The toughest thing, he says, is getting people from different disciplines to work together. “There will always be weak people in the team, so you have to get the best out of them.”

Thakrar says a grounding in the basics of construction are important for a project manager but these can be picked up through training as a QS, engineer, architect or building surveyor as well as through a course in PM itself. The trickier thing for a project manager is to master the less tangible skills in diplomacy, leadership and, it seems, a certain amount of guile.