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Within the publishing industry, a lot of the glory of finished projects goes to the editorial and writing teams. However, a lot of the credit belongs to project management. These are the hard-working behind-the-scenes teams of the publishing industry. Handling not only financial matters, but getting the work done on time, the PM team is absolutely essential.
Bids. Within textbook publishing offices and textbook packagers alike, PMs assign work to outside sources. Focusing on the packagers, as this is where my experience lies, project managers help to assemble bids to potential clients. After the client puts together a set of bidding documents for those companies they want to bid, project management will often fill portions of the bidding documents, sending it to editorial, design, and other teams to fill in the blanks. Upper management will then send the rates and samples to the client.
Managing Internal Financials. Though they are not always responsible for getting the rates of subcontractors, project management is responsible for making sure teams do not over-allocate based on SOWs and P&Ls. SOWs are Statements of Work given to contract and subcontract employees. They have line items to detail what exactly the company wants the contractor to do while in a specific project. They are given rates based on the work in the SOWs. P&Ls are internal documents that project managers keep a close eye on, as well. P&L stands for Profit and Loss. These documents are set up with the whole scope of a given project, as per the agreement between a client and a packager. They allow for a fast look at financial components. For example, if an editor wanted to hire x amount of copy editors, the PM could use a P&L to say look: we budgeted for y amount of copy editors. How can we make this work? In short, PMs make sure that in a given project, the team stays within their means. Though sometimes the scope of the project can be difficult to control. This bleeds into the next project management responsibility.
In-House and/or Client Management. Within both textbook packagers and publishers, sometimes work does not go according to plan. Sometimes a subcontractor takes longer than expected to make a deliverable. Sometimes a piece of art a team thought they had the rights to is not able to be modified in the way they needed it modified. This is where project management really shines. Sort of functioning as a team captain, PMs make sure that everyone working on the team is doing the best they can. And, as cliche as it sounds, the PMs will fight to continue to let everyone do their best work. Of course, when it's a textbook packager's team, the PM will have to continue to fill in the client on progress. They may have to go back and forth multiple times between the internal team and the client to get new, acceptable estimates for tasks. They may have to negotiate if the client needs new work done, and it was not originally within the budget. Ultimately, regardless of the team they belong to, the PM must have an excellent bedside manner, and be willing to work hard to compromise.
Schedules and Organizational BTS. As if this all of this was not enough, PMs are needed the most intensely behind the scenes. Day-to-day work for PMs is, of course, maintaining everything above... plus managing/creating schedules, organizing team meetings, sending out transmittals, and more. Any creative team within academic publishing relies greatly on the project management staff.
This is to say, that "Type A" personalities really thrive in this position. If you like fitting together puzzle pieces, and love working with a bunch of different types of people, a project management position may be in your future. You will likely not be starting at the level of a project manager--a Project Coordinator or Assistant Project Manager position will likely be your starting role. But, even in these roles, much of the PM work for small projects will land in your hands. So, if this is of interest, be prepared to put in the work.
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