I agree with the all the skills that Dr. Simon mentioned in the lecture, and I would like to add another important skill a project manager to possess. This skill can fall under awareness, but I believe it deserves great attention because I don’t see it discussed in detail here. Some have implied it, like Mr. Baskar and jvv6, but I want to flesh it out a little more. A good project manager should have the skills necessary to avoid crunch in a project timeline. Crunch is something that happens in every project-based organization. What crunch refers to is the final weeks/months for the project deadline where team members are scrambling to make the product ready and meat the deadline. Crunch can have adverse effects on the project in the final stages, including tired workers making errors, potential for more mistakes, and even delaying the product further in a worst-case scenario. I’m not saying that a project manager should have the ability to predict Murphy’s law, but rather have the skills and expectations to avoid crunch in a project. If he/she can do that, the product will be better for it. Create reasonable expectations, understand the skill set of your team members, and create deadlines with room for delay. Avoiding crunch as much as possible will not only benefit the current project, but any subsequent project the team as a whole works on. As the article referenced says, “A plan can’t be a prediction of the future, it can only be a guide to our route.” That guide is only as good as the project manager who makes it.
references: http://www.projectmanagementguide.org/project-management/crunch-time
-Talha Chaudhry