If your business is striving to develop its project management protocol, there is an abundance of technological resources that exist to help you. But it is important to understand that as helpful as these resources might be, they are only supplements for PMP training, not replacements. A company that is serious about project management will invest in both the personnel and the software that contribute to this process. But if any company must make a short-term choice between one or the other, it’s a safe bet that PMP training offers the better return on investment.

The larger point here is that it is important to recognize technological resources for what they are: supplements to human resources. No existing software is so sophisticated that it can actually replace human input altogether. Probably no credible person has ever claimed otherwise with regard to project management software. But it’s not difficult to imagine that some businesses or team leaders have convinced themselves that such resources diminish the need for PMP training.

In truth, though, PMP training is the very thing that teaches a company’s employees how to effectively utilize project management software. It doesn’t matter how sophisticated is the software that’s utilized by your company. Your team will get the most out of it, by far, when the team leader brings extensive PMP training to bear on it. And you can expect an even more impressive result if the entire team has similar project management training, perhaps reflecting the same agile protocol, which provides them with a framework for like-minded collaboration.

Certainly, it is quite possible that your company will find better project management software to invest in after the fact. More specifically, it is quite possible that some such resources will be specifically suited to your team’s particular brand of PMP training. But this must necessarily be an after-the-fact proposition. Established practices should be in place first, because it is easier and more effective to invest in project management software that will facilitate your PMP training than it is to work in the opposite direction.

That’s not to say that tailoring PMP training to a particular set of technological resources is impossible. But it’s easier to update a computer system than it is to update a human mind, let alone several minds that have been trained to work together in an institutional setting. Your project team is your primary resource, and unless something drastic happens to disrupt the coherence of that team, your subsequent investments should generally support how its members currently work together.

If your company is struggling to find its footing in terms of project management protocol, focus on outfitting employees with the kind of PMP training that will allow them to do everything manually if need be. Once they’ve reached that level, you may find that subsequent investments in software create quantum leaps in efficiency and collaborative productivity, allowing your well-trained team to devote all of its human resources to developing a better product.