Project Managers, the Unsung Heroes

Project management is often an overlooked and underappreciated role in many business ventures. I’ll admit, I was guilty of underestimating its significance before starting my current Project Management Internship at Laundry Service, a full-service media agency.  As I’ve traversed through the past three months in my internship, I started to realize how important the role really is and how I’ve actually been applying some of the skillset in my everyday life. 

Project management is different in every industry and varies from company to company.  Project managers (PMs) act as the glue that holds everything together — supporting team members, keeping projects within budget, and meeting deadlines. At my agency, PMs are tasked with various roles to ensure projects are running smoothly, such as — scheduling cross-departmental meetings, creating workback schedules for varying workstreams, facilitating conversations between different teams, among many other responsibilities. In essence, they ensure that all moving parts come together as planned. As I engaged with my internship, I learned a lot of new skills that I could apply to future opportunities, but also realized how fundamental project management is outside of the workplace. 

As a third-year university marketing student, much of my education revolves around group projects and collaborative learning. Reflecting on the past three years, I realize how project management-like skills have been pivotal to my academic success. For example, last fall, I took a marketing course that paired us with real clients to implement marketing strategies as part of a semester-long project. I served as the primary point of contact between my group and our client. Coordinating our different calendars and relaying information from my team to her taught me a lot about organization and how important it is to have a delegated person to be responsible for these cross-team conversations. It also helped build a stronger relationship with our client by fostering consistent and direct interaction.

This semester, I’m experiencing a similar dynamic in my Digital Marketing course. My group is tasked with improving Google Ads for one of my university’s schools. Again, I’ve stepped into the role of communicator between my group and the school’s marketing team. These classroom experiences have deepened my appreciation for the complex work that PMs do in a professional setting. While project management is far more than just scheduling and communication, these elements have shown me how crucial the role is in ensuring the success of any initiative.

These personal experiences highlight how project management plays a recurring role in my life. As I explore future career options, project management is one that I deeply resonate with and can see myself finding a lot of joy in. I encourage you to think about the projects you’ve been part of or the campaigns you’ve admired—consider the effort behind the scenes to bring those visions to life. Project managers are the unsung heroes of the business world who rally all the components together to make mere visions tangible results.