Analysis of Agile project manager competencies from recruitment signals

As Agile project management has become increasingly popular as a project management methodology, Agile project managers (AgPM) are important in leading and managing Agile projects. However, professional project management bodies and the academic literature lag behind industry practices in articulating competency frameworks for understanding the requirements of AgPM. This study examines the organizational expectations for AgPM competencies as signaled to the job market through advertisements. Using an integrated framework of Agile project competencies, we conduct a content analysis of AgPM job advertisements from the Australian and New Zealand job market. Our results identified the frequently signaled personal, practice and perspective competencies, including the co-occurrences of these competencies, for recruiting AgPM. Additionally, we identified the more frequently utilized individual personal and project-related practice competencies, as well as the less utilized Agile-focused perspective competencies. The findings of this study will help the Agile movement consider the competencies that are more important for organizations to learn; allow employers to articulate their competency requirements for potential jobs; and enable job seekers to understand and develop the required competencies for successful application to AgPM roles. Overall, this study provides an empirical grounding in the specific competencies required for the AgPM role in industry.