Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Growth of Project Management Professionals

membership summary
Each month when the Project Management Institute (PMI) publishes their PMI Today newsletter magazine I look at the Fact File page where they provide the number of members, published copies of the PMBOK Guide, and active credential holders (CAPM, PMP, PgMP, PMI-RMP, PMI-SP, AND PMI-ACP). Noting these numbers we can see the size of the project management profession and the credentials these professionals possess.

Over the past 18 months I have been capturing these PMI-reported numbers in a spreadsheet in order to make observations on trends in the project management profession. For instance, this month there were 3,490 more active certified PMP professionals than the previous month and 13.55% more than this time in 2013. What really caught my attention was when I compared the number of active PMI members in June to this time in 2013. PMI membership actually dropped from 451,871 to 449,769 (a decline of 2,102 members).

Looking at this closer I see a trend in both PMI membership as well as PMP certifications. While both membership and PMP certifications continue to grow from this time in 2013. The growth has slowed throughout 2014. The image at the top of this posting summarizes the % change each moth from the same time the in 2013 (ex. percent increase from January 2013 to January 2014).

Why do we see a slowdown in the growth of PMI members and PMP credential holders? Is it the time of the year were members forget to renew or are there environmental factors leading to a slowdown in the number of project managers becoming active in the professional organization? I have not yet captured the numbers before 2013 but it will be interesting to see if this growth pattern occurs each year or if this is a new trend. For the sake of the profession, let's hope this is not a new trend.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Skills to Look for in Project Managers

Today I read a brief article describing the eight skills to look for when hiring an IT project manager. The headlines caught my attention...