It Took 35 Years Before I Landed a Project Manager Title: How My Journey Evolved

I was 35 when I landed my first official "Project Manager" title.

Before that, I had been a(n):

- Bank Teller
- Customer Service Specialist
- Accounting Assistant
- Office Admin
- Innkeeper
- Financial Analyst
- Account Manager
- Implementation Specialist
- Business Owner

Some of these roles were within the same company, and some date back to high school (I started working at age 14!!).

By the time I was officially a "Project Manager", I had worked across industries like Banking/Finance, Hospitality, and Tech.

It is now clear to me that this diverse experience served as informal preparation for my career in project management.

Actually, scratch that.

This diverse experience IS my career in project management. 💡

While I may not have been using terms like "work breakdown structure" or "process groups", the concepts were understood on a deeply practical level.

In fact, I remember the day I picked up the PMBOK and started reading. I was amazed to realize that what my intuition had been guiding me to do all these years was an actual thing called project management.

From there, I began documenting my project management journey on YouTube. I combined the study of theory with my own practical understanding of how to build and execute. The vocabulary may have been foreign to me, but the principles were not.

I know many of you are on a quest to land the Project Manager title. Maybe it's for increase in pay, more opportunities, or simply proof that you can do it - all valid reasons.

But this is your gentle reminder that the work you're doing, the experience you're gaining, and the results you're driving are what really matters - regardless of your title.

And in the end, it always works out the way it's supposed to. 💫

❓ What does your trajectory to project management look like?