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Digital strategies: Special teams

Digital project managers partner with technologists to create a high-quality user experience
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Bryan Mavrow and Holly Paton

When experts in the field talk about what’s important in managing digital projects, the factor that comes up again and again is collaboration.

“The interesting thing about the digital space is that you need to create a collaborative team between the business and technology,” said Bryan Mavrow, senior vice-president of marketing for Langley-based First West Credit Union, which has 37 branches from suburban Vancouver to the Okanagan under two regional brands, Valley First and Envision Financial.

“We have a business team that has SPA – or single point of accountability – for the success of the project,” said Mavrow, who came to B.C.’s third-largest credit union last November from Vancouver’s Hot Tomali Communications, an integrated marketing agency.

He said the business lead is typically a digital marketer who understands the customers the company is hoping to engage, what its offerings are and its brand.

“It’s that trifecta that needs to come together to create the right execution of the digital project.”

Since these projects require diverse skill sets, the person who understands branding and how to engage customers is very unlikely to be the same person who knows how to code websites.

“So we tend to partner with a senior technologist in the organization who will have technical skills reporting to him or her,” said Mavrow, who is responsible for overall online development.

“And we collaborate so that we create the requirements for the project together and we execute together.”

First West will also bring in skills from outside the organization, depending on the need. It is currently building new websites for its two brands and went to FCV, an interactive ad agency in Vancouver, to create an excellent user experience.

“They helped us architect the content and worked with us in creating the visual design of the site,” Mavrow said.

Then the First West team, led by digital marketing manager Holly Paton, developed the templates, pages, content and imagery, and is building the site internally.

Digital marketing is fairly new territory, with few opportunities to earn a degree in the field, but Mavrow teaches a digital marketing course for the Canadian Marketing Association.

For Heiko Peters, director of project management at PNI Digital Media in Vancouver, PMs or project managers can come from many backgrounds: software developers, people with business degrees and people with project management degrees and diplomas.

Whatever the background, Peters said basic accreditation for project managers is becoming a project management professional (PMP) through the Project Management Institute, a non-profit located near Philadelphia. The Canadian West Coast chapter is in Vancouver.

“If you want to be a PM in the industry, having your PMP is beneficial because it’s a check that most employers have. It makes sure that you understand the fundamentals of project management.”

Applicants need at least a high school diploma with five years of project management or a bachelor’s degree with three years experience. Many books, e-learning courses and classroom experiences are available to prepare for the exam.

Peters’ office oversees PNI projects – the company provides software and technology to retailers, Internet portals and websites, and telecommunication service providers – and then each project is led by a PM.

“We use PMs that have agile experience,” he said. “Agile experience is all about iterative or incremental development – releasing short and fast and getting it in front of the client so that they can see the results and course correct along the way.”

Peters said there are certifications for agile PMs. One is the project management institute’s agile certified practitioner and another is the certified scrummaster designation. Scrum is an agile software- development method for project management.

He said most companies in the digital or software world are switching to agile.

“You can deliver better software, more predictably and faster.”

Peters said a PM in an agile environment is much more collaborative than in a traditional environment.

“It is less top-down and command and control. Their whole job is to identify roadblocks and remove them. They provide vision for the team, shield them and make them more effective and efficient.”

Important traits for agile PMs are being organized, adaptable, transparent, fast and, that key word again, collaborative.

“You need to find issues quickly and deal with them in a positive way,” Peters said.

“The last thing you want to do is tell the client two and a half months into a three-month project that you’re going to be late. You want to be as upfront as you can.”