More years ago now than I care to remember I was given my first project to manage. It was a small project, and to tell the truth I don't really remember what it was. I do still remember thinking "what do I do now?" - a question that was shortly answered when the phone started ringing with engineers on the other end asking for information. Lesson One: keep the consultants working.
I'd guess that is how most of us have learned project management skills: seat of the pants, on the job training. Sometimes it works just fine, sometimes we get caught with a mistake that costs a lot of money.
Some years back business started to look at how consulting firms worked, and liked what they saw with project management. Now almost every process oriented business has a project management office to manage those one time efforts. Most software is created in a project format, and the industry has leaned heavily on the design industry for job descriptions, much to our annoyance.
The Project Management Institute was created to establish standard processes for project management (PM). Although the standards and processes can be adapted and used in many industries, one of the smallest interest groups is the Design, Procurement and Construction area. It has only some 2,000 members out of some 400,000 PMI members worldwide. Rather ironic that the industry that pioneered PM has ignored developments to improve it.
There is also the CMAA - the Construction Management Association of America. As its name implies, its focus is on construction project and program management, and is heavily populated by contractors. Both PMI and CMAA offer certificates in PM, and for either one needs to show minimum levels of experience and pass an exam.
I'd like to see an architectural PM certification program as well. It's time we updated our PM skills - you can be sure that the contractors and owners rep's that we deal with will be doing just that.