Differences between program manager role in service based vs product based company

Program Management role differs a lot between service and product based companies. To our surprise, many people are yet unaware of the differences. In this article, you will find a high level summary of differences. These differences holds good to 90% of the organisations. You may find some variances depending on the size and age of the organisation and its PMO. Off course this is covered in depth in the only Practical Program Management course in the world Post Graduate certificate in Program Management Below is the hierarchy differences between Program Manager role in service and product based companies. As you can see, Program manager role in Service based companies is a people manager, more or less like Delivery Manager.

Responsibilities / Activities	Service Based Company	Product Based Company
PEOPLE MANAGEMENT	People Management responsibilities are present. Typical reportees are project managers, team leads, architects etc.	Individual contributor role. Principal / Director program managers have reporting of program managers
PROJECT MANAGEMENT INVOLVEMENT	Being the Manager of project managers direct Project Management responsibilities are limited.	Drives the projects
DELIVERY OWNERSHIP	Being the Manager of project managers direct delivery responsibilities are limited. As the ownership is with the respective Project Managers	Owns the project delivery
ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT	Yes	No
BUSINESS GROWTH	Yes	No
DRIVES COMPLEX PROJECTS?	No	Yes
HANDS ON ROLE?	No	Yes
AVERAGE SALARY FACTOR	1.5 times the experience	3 times the experience (2X of service based companies)
EXPENDABLE ROLE?	Yes, Mostly non billable and adds less value	No, Program Managers contribution is quite significant in Product Based companies.

Abhishek Sharma

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