The Project Management Market – a survey by Arras People

Our friends at Arras People – project management & project office recruitment specialists – have carried out their fourth annual survey of the UK project management market. Having interviewed 1,200 project managers, and building on the picture from previous surveys, this one shows how the current economic climate is affecting salaries, aspirations and professional issues.

Arras People estimate that there are nearly 80,000 people working as project managers in the UK alone, and it classifies it as “an occupation which has evolved from short-term ‘task force’-type activities to a fully fledged professional career based on the effective management of change”.

Recession bites: according to the survey, it is only beginning to get tough, with 47% of contractors saying that the number of available contracts decreased in 2008 and 60% expecting cuts and redundancies in their sector. The number of employees who expect their salaries to remain unchanged – or even fall – in 2009, increased from 35 to 60% from last year’s survey.

Accreditations and qualifications: previous Arras People surveys have noted a continuing trend towards accreditation through qualification and/ or membership of a professional body.

Programme Office – has it caught on? Over 60% of respondents reported that their organisation had a PMO, with 35% of them working within one.

Salaries: there are both high and low earners in most roles across genders, but there is a pecking order: programme managers earn more than change managers, who earn a little more than project managers, and they all earn more than project staff. Higher salaries are on the private sector, the lower band is in the public sector, but the middle band has the same weight on both. And there is a gender gap: more males are on the higher salary brackets and more female in the lower ones.

The overwhelming majority of interviewees (a resounding 84%) believe that they have “a significant contribution to make in turning the UK economy around”. We think they are absolutely right in following Sir Winston Churchill’s advice: “When going through hell, keep going!”

If you would like to check the full report, just clck here.