How to Become a Technical Project Manager
Music, people and project management—it’s a perfect blend and what Corey Apar loves about her job.
Want a job at the intersection of business and technology? You may be interested in learning how to become a technical project manager. As a technical project manager, you’ll have one foot in each world by managing business aspects of a tech project, such as timelines and budgets, while keeping the technical details straight. These significant responsibilities require a solid skillset.
Already work in the tech space? Or maybe you’ve built a solid career in project management already. Either way, read on to learn more about the education and experience you need to become a technical project manager.
What Is a Technical Project Manager?
Project managers oversee internal projects for their employer or work for a company that completes projects for clients on a contract basis. They are typically middle managers who have staff reporting to them but also need to run some decisions by higher management.
Technical project management focuses on tech projects such as software, hardware, storage, or networking. As a technical project manager you might work for a tech company or the tech department of a company by managing the creation of a new web application for a healthcare facility, for example.
What Does a Technical Project Manager Do?
Project managers are responsible for a project from beginning to end or, using PM language, a full lifecycle, from inception to completion. Most project managers have a team supporting their work, so they manage both staff and the project itself. If you work for a smaller company or on a smaller project, you could be the only team member on the project. These are some typical job responsibilities of technical project managers:
- developing, planning, overseeing, and executing projects
- brainstorming project ideas
- determining goals, deliverables, and timelines
- determining what technology is needed to complete the project
- assigning responsibilities to team members
- planning budgets
- overseeing workflow
- holding project meetings with project team members and stakeholders
- overseeing product testing and troubleshooting
- solving technical issues
- tracking KPIs and other metrics
- documenting and keeping stakeholders informed of project progress
- presenting the completed project to stakeholders
Learn more about what project managers do in this job description for project managers.
How to Become a Project Manager in Tech
Project managers are multitaskers. To succeed in this field, you’ll need to be able to juggle a variety of responsibilities and sometimes multiple projects at once. It’s therefore key to be detail-oriented and organized. You’ll need a creative side as well to come up with new and inventive solutions to common problems like a lack of resources and time constraints. In addition, project managers need good social skills to interface with coworkers, team members, clients, and managers.
What Degree Should Technical Project Managers Get?
Most project managers have at least a bachelor’s degree and some have master’s degrees. Employers have different requirements for this. These are some common majors for project managers:
- a relevant technical degree, for example in IT, computer engineering, or computer science
- a project management degree
- a business administration degree, for example an MBA degree
Do Technical Project Managers Need Certification?
Optional certifications can help you advance on the technical project manager job market. The most common options are from the Project Management Institute (PMI). Below are some examples, ranged by the least amount of experience to the most senior certificates:
- Project Management Ready: An entry-level certification if you have 0-3 years of experience.
- Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM): This requires 23 contact hours in project management and a high school diploma.
- Project Management Professional (PMP): Becoming a PMP requires a bachelor’s degree, project management training or CAPM certificate, and experience leading projects.
You can learn more about the requirements for general project managers in our article on how to become a project manager.
Additional Tech Experience for Technical Project Managers
In addition to education and certifications, hands-on technical experience is valuable if you want to become a technical project manager, for example with:
- project management tools such as Jira, Confluence, Abstract, Git
- programming languages such as SQL, Python, C, C++
- developer platforms such as .NET
- cloud computing platforms such as Microsoft Azure, Heroku, or Amazon Web Services
What Is the Typical Technical Project Manager Career Path?
“Project manager” isn’t an entry-level position. It’s likely you need a few years of work experience to become a technical project manager. Depending on the nature of the job you want, you might want to consider taking one of these technical project manager career paths:
- Project management career path: Some project managers start in an entry-level position, such as assistant project manager, project scheduler, or project coordinator, and work their way up to being full project managers. With some additional technical knowledge and training, they may pivot to becoming technical project managers early on or later in their careers.
- Technical jobs career path: If you have a technical degree, you might start in another technical job, for example as a software developer, engineer, or scrum master, and then become a technical project manager later in your career.
- Business management career path: Some technical project managers start out in a business job such as business analyst before gaining more technical and project management experience.
After you’ve worked as a project manager for a few years, you can advance to a more senior position like lead project manager, executive project manager, or senior project manager. At large companies, project management may be its own department and is managed by a director of project management.
What Is a Typical Technical Project Manager Salary?
The median technical project manager salary is $97,221, compared to general project managers, who make a median salary or $85,037. By using Monster’s salary tools, you can compare salaries in different cities to evaluate different job markets for technical project managers.
How to Find Jobs in Technical Project Management
Once you have the degree and certifications you need, it’s time to display your qualifications in a well-written resume and cover letter. Read our IT project manager resume sample and cover letter sample for some ideas on how to make your job application stand out.
Then search for jobs as a project manager on Monster.
Are you looking to move for the best job opportunities? Search for jobs in the locations with the highest demands for project managers. They include:
The top cities with the most jobs for project managers include:
Create a Roadmap for Your Job Search With Monster
Join Monster to plan out your search for technical project manager jobs. Create a profile and upload your resume so that you can make it visible to tech recruiters who use our database. You can also sign up for notifications of new job openings in tech project management. Meanwhile, start applying to available jobs to maximize your chances of finding the right job sooner.