Karolina Rucinska
Senior IT Project Mananger | Mentor | Founder of PM Challenges
What is my story?
My first serious job was in marketing and social media. My subsequent career challenges involved organizing events and later, business analysis. Then came the day when I found myself simply… unemployed! I asked myself, “What now? What do I really want to do career-wise?” During my studies, I was deeply interested in skills and their analysis—so I used my knowledge for a thorough examination of my own skills. I spent the next several days searching and analyzing job positions, different industries, trends, and development opportunities. After a month, I had my answer: I would be excellent as an IT Project Manager! Fortunately, I wasn’t wrong… and now I’m here to share with you all my knowledge.
Why PM Challenges?
I have a good job, so why did I decide on this additional effort? I think sharing knowledge is my obligation, and helping others is just my way of ‘giving back’. I started PM Challenges to share my knowledge without buzzwords. I’m focusing on the practical aspects of working as an IT Project Manager — to support Juniors/Mids/Senior Project Managers in IT and those who simply want to understand the Project Manager role to decide if it’s right for them. I want to support mainly women in their career journey—to make sure that they will remember how strong and full of passion they are!
Me as a Senior IT Project Manager
My journey with project management started in 2012… and today, I can say that I have over 10 years of experience in project management. Since 2017, I’ve been a certified Project Manager with a Project Management Professional (PMP)® Certificate (issued by the Project Management Institute). I’m life-long learner so you can check my full education on my linkedin.
I bring a track record of delivering projects that consistently provide tangible value to end users. I’m experienced in IT projects, including AI, ML, integrations, migrations, and new product development. I have successfully managed initiatives within both waterfall and agile environments.
My proficiency extends to various project management methodologies, including PM2, Scrum, SAFe, PM2, and PRINCE2.
I promote a positive team atmosphere, built upon a foundation of trust and a commitment to continuous improvement.
That was a typical “bla..bla..bla..” now some concretes… my key achievements:
– Built an engaged project team that was able to use Design Thinking and Lean Startup to based on gathered data predict users’ needs with 99% accuracy.
– Integrated the 4D framework into the software development process, resulting in a 50% acceleration of product development.
– Managed conflicts successfully and dealt with motivation drops in the team: instead of “this project is just a shit,” the team transformed to “Ok, let’s get more users’ feedback to improve our product!”
– Reduced the time of the NPD process by 50% through designing and implementing an innovation strategy.
– Brought savings of $60k in customer service processes by a 25% reduction in problem-solving time (data for the first 6 months after project release).
– Brought savings of $10k by effective experimentation on new product development.
– Organized the first Global Legal Hackathon in Poland—feedback from users: event evaluated at 4.8/5.
Me: Speaker and Mentor
– TechLeaders 10th edition (2025): Mentor
– TechLeaders 9th edition (2024): Mentor
– 17th International Congress of PMI (2022): Speaker
– 16th International Cngress of PMI (2021): Speaker
– Global Legal Hackathon Poland: Mentor & Speaker
– MarTech Hackathon Poland: Mentor & Speaker