Software Development Project Manager
Learn more about the software development project manager job: tasks, educational background, skills, salary and employment opportunities.
Combining technical and managerial experience, the software development project manager guarantees the delivery of the high-quality software entrusted to his team on time and within budget.
Other job titles: software project coordinator, project supervisor, technical project manager, project manager, project director.
Summary:
Software Development Project Manager Job
He plays a key part in every stage of a software development:
- Upstream, he will propose relevant technical solutions in response to a problem, assess the necessary development costs and associated risks.
- During the project, he will set up the teams, define the training needs, manage the workload fluctuations, monitor teams’ work until the software is delivered and into its final validation.
- At the same time, he will be the technical interface with the applicant (e.g. the customer) and in particular the reporting part.
Become Software Development Project Manager
Generally, the software development project manager holds a master’s degree in computer science or equivalent (5 years studies), awarded by the University or an engineering school.
Skills
To be a good software development project manager, it is better to have technical experience, for example as a software developer:
- For the applicant, this technical culture allows to fully understand the challenges of the projects and the implications of the choices made. So, he will be able to argue in a precise way and, if he believes it is necessary, to propose alternatives.
- For a team of developers, legitimacy is built above all thanks to a know-how.
Hervé, project director at AViSTO, says: «If you are a young software development project manager and you do not master the technical aspects of the mission, it is very complicated to create cohesion around you.»
Then, he has to know how to manage, which means listening and talking with the members of his team.
This allows to know well his engineers, and therefore to be able to actuate the right levers to keep them motivated throughout the project, but also to determine when to let them work. For example, in rush moments, a manager who has technical experience and who knows his team well will be able to define the right priorities and not bother his developers with non priority points that will be more efficient to deal with in a second time. This situational intelligence avoids many unnecessary conflicts.
Finally, of course, a certain degree of rigor must be exercised in order to fulfill his commitments to the applicant: all deliverables must be provided on the announced dates.
Profile
It is recommended to justify at least one successful experience in complex software development and to master several programming languages.
Having already evolved in the industrial sector where will be used the software (e.g. Internet of Objects, medical…) is positive.
And of course have team spirit!
Software Development Project Manager Salary
His salary depends on his training, his experience (especially in team management), projects scope to carry out, the industrial environments where he worked, etc.
So he can gain approximately from 40K € to 60K € per year, sometimes more.
Career
A confirmed project director can evolve into:
- Project director
- Technical manager
- Commercial engineer
Opinion of the job for AViSTO
Hervé talks about his experience at AViSTO:
“Since I arrived, I have only worked for big companies, the customer network is very rich. Then, what I thought about AViSTO before coming, I think it even more today: we discuss, we have a relationship of trust with our business manager, we can tell him we want to see something else, change the project. This is what I told the engineers who make up my team that AViSTO is a human enterprise, I sincerely believe it.”
Software Development Project Manager Employment
AVISTO hires in France!