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Dear JobsBlog: Following working for 9+ several years like a technical lead, I'm now contemplating a change in career route and am critically taking into consideration the Program Supervisor position. I work at a start-up and wear multiple hats like meeting customers, functioning with development teams, managing schedules,Microsoft Office 2007 Professional Plus, resource planning and risk analysis. I read the Zen of PM article, and I think I do some of it. I can see it is quite possible for someone from within Microsoft to change gears from SDE or SDET roles to a PM role. Do you see that happening to someone from outside? Do you have any specific advice for me in this regard -- like to get my resume noticed, given that I'm coming from a dev background? -Pondering PM Dear Pondering PM: System Management isn’t a consistent discipline across the technical industry, and as Steven Sinofsky blogged, “PM is unique to Microsoft and I think it is fair to say this is a position that is often copied but never duplicated.” The good news is, when hiring from outside Microsoft, we rarely interview people who have already been PMs because, well, there just aren’t several!Is a development background good? Yes! When I recruited for PMs, I usually looked for software engineers who had moved into roles like team lead, development/test manager or lead architect, or simply worked at really small companies and had to wear quite a few hats, as you describe. While technical depth and scope differ based on the function and product, PMs typically have computer science, computer engineering or math degrees, just like SDEs and SDETs. (We also hire PMs directly from college, usually looking for CS/CE students with team-based leadership experience.) Effective PMs do something we call “leading without authority.” That’s why we look for tried and true software engineers who walk the walk, talk the talk and thrive on managing the big picture as well as lots of moving parts and people. Essentially, they’re software engineers… with people skills. My resume advice? Showcase your hands-on technical skills blended with PM-like accomplishments: managing schedules and milestones, balancing customer requirements with business realities, writing specifications, designing prototypes, etc. Find more Plan Management posts on JobsBlog.

-Gretchen