When I am interested in a role for the next stage of my career, I believe that it is worthwhile to reach out to people in my network that do that role now. Therefore, before I made the move to program management, I engaged with various program managers in my network to find out more about the role and their experience in it.
In order to get the most responses and so to not waste the time of the program managers I sent them 3 targeted questions. I believed that these 3 questions would generate the most valuable answers and would provide me with the best insight possible into the role and world of program management.
The 3 questions were –
In your own words, provide an overview of the program manager role
Which are the top 3 talents / skills that a program manager needs to have? How do you recommend that I obtain them / improve them?
Knowing what you know now, what advice do you wish you could have given yourself before you started the journey to become a program manager?
The responses that I got from these questions allowed me to understand the role and life of a program manager in a way that was greater than by just reading a job description. As a result I was able to create my own personal development plan so to prepare myself for the move into a program manager role.
Successful International Project Management 