In your company, you are the brain. You (with your team) make decisions that affect your companies success or failure. You plan all the steps and you have the vision. But when it comes to enforcing those steps to reach the goals on a specific project, piece of work or client onboarding, that’s when the project manager steps in.
Project managers are of great importance because they are the ones that drive projects through to completion, taking accountability ensuring success. Their usual responsibilities are planning, executing, and closing projects however this can flexible depending on the types of projects you have and what you need.
Finding a good project manager these days is not a simple task. Great project managers are people that can lead others, have great attention to detail and can drive things to completion even in the most difficult of circumstances.
Here on JobRack, we have many high-quality remote project managers from Eastern Europe and employers who have hired them returned with great feedback on the successes they’ve achieved for their business. Our employers reported not just that the normal benefits of Eastern Europeans such as their extreme dedication to work, and direct style, but also that their English skills are fantastic along with their flexibility, which results in them being able to provide amazing quality when it comes to planning, executing and delivering projects successfully.
So, if you want your own awesome project manager then read on, in this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about hiring project managers.
Write a great project manager job advert (or get someone else to!)
Always make sure you put effort into writing a high-quality job description that will be the advert for your job.
Great project managers are in high demand and your advert needs to persuade them to want to work for you and your business. The better you describe what you are looking for and need, better the chances of getting quality applicants that meet your requirements.
Ensure your job post has these headings:
- Who are you / your business – what do you do?
- The position you are hiring for
- Mandatory skills your candidates must have
- Desirable skills your candidates might have
- Experience you want them to have
- What do you expect from them as a possible future employee
- What can they expect from you
- Ways of working – with you and your team
- What’s in it for them? What’s great about working for your company
- How to apply
Want to see a great example? Check out this job advert on JobRack for some inspiration!
If you’d like some help writing your job description and the whole hiring process then check out our Done For You Service!
Choose where to advertise your project manager role
This step might seem obvious but if you want to find the right people for your business you need to be looking in the right places!
In order to find a great project manager, you’ll need to publish a job advert on at least one relevant platform. You have a variety of options when it comes to hiring platforms and it’s essential that you choose the right place to find your project manager.
Great sites include:
- We Work Remotely – You can find really good project managers from all over the world here for a single job post fee of $299
- Remoteok.io – Just like We Work Remotely, these guys target only remote workers, and you can find a remote project manager for a single job post fee of $299
- Upwork – one of the most popular places to find remote workers. However, even though Upwork is huge, you are likely to get plenty of applications but usually from people who are working per project, not the full or part time employee who will work with you on growing your business. Also, considering the latest Upwork fee changes, hiring on Upwork might not be the right choice for you.
- TopTal – TopTal is famous for having extremely high-quality freelancers as they only accept the top 3%. Even though you will without a doubt find high-quality project managers, you can end up paying anywhere between $60-$160 per hour.
- JobRack – With over 7,000 Eastern European jobseekers including hundreds of project managers, plenty of employers are having huge success hiring project managers from JobRack. Job posts cost just $249 and we work closely with you to help you get the great team member you’re looking for.
No one says it better than our customers:
Now you’ve got your job post and you’ve decided where to advertise, time to wait a short while for great project managers to apply and you’re onto choosing who to hire!
Select the best applicants and test them
It’s important you allow at least a few days for quality applications to come in. We normally recommend 5-7 days to be sure of a good response.
Check the applications you’ve received and start to filter candidates you think would be a great fit for the role. This number might be 2 or 20 or more, just make sure you review their applications in detail, especially the things that are most important to you.
Once you have filtered we recommend assigning a short test task that gives you a chance to see how the top candidates work, how they communicate and how they behave in general.
Testing candidates will allow applicants to back up their application, and it will show you who provides the quality and responsiveness that works for you.
You have a range of options to test project managers from online competency tests through to scenario-based testing. You need to ensure you choose tests that are relevant to the types of projects you want your new project manager to manager.
For example, if they will be managing software development projects you need to ensure they have a strong understanding of your chosen delivery methodology as well as the key processes involved.
For scenario-based testing you can simply set them a scenario and ask them to produce a project plan or other relevant document, write a project closure/lessons learned report or create a project startup document that details how the project in your scenario will be managed.
Ensure you set the same task to all candidates and provide as much detail as possible to help them have the full picture of the project they would be managing in the test scenario.
When they complete the tests you set, you will have all the outputs you need to decide who’s ready for the next step.
After reviewing and choosing your shortlist it’s time to speak to them in an interview.
Schedule an interview with the top performers
You’ve selected your top performers – job seekers who sent great applications you liked and did the test to an acceptable standard
It’s time to meet them!
Schedule a video interview (Skype, Zoom etc) and prepare a set of questions to ask them.
If you want to have a successful interview, here’s a couple of stages for you to think about going through with your candidate:
- Introduction – Welcome your candidate with a smile, take time to put them at ease, have some light chat about their day, where they are in the world, etc.
- Lose the tension! – Bear in mind that your candidate is probably nervous, nervous people don’t show you their true potential so it’s up to you to relax them and put them at ease.
- Start talking business – after the initial chat move into the interview. Start the conversation about their application and test. Say a couple of words of praise about their work and ask them to talk about their past experience and why they want your job.
- Ensure that through your interview questions you understand how they work, when and where they like to work, what their availability is and get a feeling for whether they’re the team fit you’re looking for and need for your business.
Key for every interview is to get to know your candidate better and to see would they be a good fit for your company.
What questions should you ask?
Of course, you want an A-player. But you don’t want A-player that isn’t the right fit for your business and your team. It would just be a wrong vibe and disruptive for your company.
Some subjects you should consider talking about:
- Past experiences, what projects went well, when have they had a project that failed, what did they learn?
- Why did they left the previous role?
- Why do they want the position with you?
- What are they looking for over the next few years?
- What’s their greatest passion?
- How do they relax? What do they do in their spare time?
All of these questions will tell you more about the person you will work with, so they are very important.
Bear in mind that it’s impossible to fully know someone based on one interview. It will take time as you get to know each other during the first months of them working for you, but during the interview do your best to see is the candidate what you and your business are looking for.
Expectations, Contracts, and Onboarding
You selected your new project manager rockstar. Congratulations!
It’s time for the onboarding process.
During this process, it’s very important that you set clear expectations with your new team member to act as the foundation for a great working relationship.
Prepare the contract or agreement and make sure that you have clear and precise information included like:
- Salary details including how and when it will be paid
- Holiday / Paid leave details
- Sick leave details
- Ways of working and your expectations
Cover these key points ahead of time to avoid future misunderstandings and frustration
Also, before your new employee starts working, decide together about payment methods for their salary. This is a complete story in itself because there are numerous options, so we covered it in a whole article that you can check out by clicking here.
Beside all these things, introduce your new employee to your team, get them familiar with your companies SOPs and ways of working, above all, remember to invest time in them if you want them to become a really great employee.
Got more questions about hiring remote workers? You can check our FAQ here.
Summary
Project managers are a hugely important part of scaling any business. You can find great project managers all over the world so it’s important to choose the right place to find your own rockstar project manager.
Take time to prepare a great job description and ensure you have the time to focus on the hiring process. Every hour invested in hiring the right person now will pay back again and again in the future.
If you’re worried about managing the hiring process or having the time to invest, then take a look at our ‘Done For You’ services where our expert recruiters and hiring managers will handle it all for you, writing the job description, advertising for candidates, filtering/vetting, and fully testing them before delivering 2-3 fully great candidates ready for your final interview and selection.
Here at JobRack we have hundreds of great project managers on our database. Whether you’re looking to manage the hiring process yourself or whether you’d like an expert hiring manager to handle it for you we can help.
JobRack job posts are just $249 and you can have your project manager job post live in just a few minutes and getting quality applications within a few days. Click here to post your job!
Our Done-For-You service starts from $1500. Saving you over 40 hours of time and effort, we apply our expertise to find you the very best people for your role. Once fully tested, vetted and interviewed full details are provided ready for your final review and decision. Click here to learn more and book a free call to discuss.
