Back at Visa when I was there, we had multiple levels of project management to deal with. On one technology project I delivered and managed, I had administrative project managers that wanted my GANTT. I had a implementation project manager for the global solutions group that was there to ensure I got hardware, software, infrastructure in place. It was fun to a point. When it stopped being fun was when the GANTT became king and the work effort dimmed to a secondary thing. Luckily, the project management team I dealt with never allowed that to happen.
I’m back to doing some of that “speak” but at a level that I enjoy. I kinda come from a project management background you could say. Even way back at Edwards AFB, I managed multi-disciplinary environmental projects that considered the effects of large scale engineering projects on cultural and natural resources, ground water, hazardous waste issues, and all that. I had a team on one project that stretched across USAF, Southern California Edison, Department of Energy, NEPA, and a whole host of others as team. When I changed to technology, I started managing technology delivery projects, professional services gigs which normally came in at 250k to about 500k in size. I also managed software teams that did web and enterprise software. Always different challenges in the “speak” we had to do. I’ve managed geographically disparate teams in different continents and found the geographical challenge to be one of the greatest but yet most satisfying to bridge.
Now its a kinder and gentler speak but there is still a set of requirements to doing project management. Its a mindset change and the tools all change. I’m enjoying it and I’m remembering other managers I associated with here and there. It can be fun and it can be completely boring and rather dehumanizing at times. Life’s goals just don’t fit into MS Project.
Unless you buy the lifeline plugin that is 
