PM vs. COR

Most who know me know that I wear many hats at work. My business card reads "Project Manager". My Annual Performance Review reads Program Manager. And I'm also a Contract Officer Representative or COR.

This is a complicated set-up because most people think that there is virtually no difference between being a PM and a COR, but I think they are really distinct roles. I will try to highlight the differences between them. I'll run each role across the 6 dimensions of project management:

As you can see, the differences are subtle, but important. Perhaps there are some situations in which the contractor does or delivers everything important for project success, but my experience has been that if you only focus on the contractor work you are missing a lot of the overall project. A lot of times I think the government personnel play the position of the COR and think that they are getting all the work done. I am not in that camp, but for people like me, it is difficult for me to tell you which hat I'm wearing at any given time. Since I perform as both the PM and the COR, I don't see much of a difference. It is all just work to me. But in situations in which they are different people, or when there is just a COR and no PM, I can see how things could easily break down.