What is the role of the project interface manager?

Question

Who is the project interface manager? What is his role and what are his responsibilities? Who does he report to (does he report to the project manager)? How does this role compare to that of the project coordinator?

Answer 1

In projects where there are lots of companies involved, interface management becomes a full time job, which is the job of the project interface manager. In smaller projects, interface management is part of the project manager's responsibilities, but in large projects, it becomes assigned to a dedicated role (the project interface manager) who reports to the project manager.

Project interface managers are common in large construction projects or in infrastructure projects. Their main role is to manage all the communication between the different stakeholders (including organizations and people) on the project. This could be a daunting task, because they need to ensure that all stakeholders are always on the same page, and they need to resolve situations where stakeholders have different opinions about something.

Some of the responsibilities of the Project Interface Manager are:

- Create a stakeholder map
- Manage the stakeholders' requirements and ensure that these requirements are not conflicting with other requirements
- Monitor the project schedule in terms of the old and new requirements
- Ensure new requirements are included in the project schedule and are being executed, which means that the project interface manager constantly communicates with the team executing the project
- Report any unresolved discrepancies to the project manager who will then take high level actions to resolve them, or escalate them (The same way the project manager is sponsored by the project sponsor, the project interface manager is sponsored by the project manager)
- Periodically produce reports relevant to his duties.

Responsibilities may also include risk/issue management activities.