Chief of staff vs project manager

The differences between chiefs of staff and project managers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. Additionally, a chief of staff has an average salary of $130,835, which is higher than the $91,578 average annual salary of a project manager.

The top three skills for a chief of staff include PET, team support and project management. The most important skills for a project manager are project management, project scope, and customer service.

Chief of staff vs project manager overview

	Chief Of Staff	Project Manager
Yearly salary	$130,835	$91,578
Hourly rate	$62.90	$44.03
Growth rate	6%	8%
Number of jobs	124,272	167,116
Job satisfaction	-	4.17
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 63%	Bachelor's Degree, 68%
Average age	52	47
Years of experience	-	-

What does a chief of staff do?

A chief of staff primarily supports an executive through performing various administrative tasks. Most of their responsibilities revolve around collaborating with other executive support personnel to devise strategies that will help the company, responding to inquiries and correspondence, approving communications letters, managing schedules, setting appointments, and serving as an advisor to the executive. Furthermore, when it comes to issues and disputes, the chief of staff must be quick to conduct research and perform damage control to help the executive and the company rise from the occasion.

What does a project manager do?

Project managers oversee a specific project related to the organization's business. They manage the whole project from inception to evaluation. They initiate planning with involved departments, follow-through on the plans, ensure smooth execution of the plans, and evaluate the project for further improvements should these be needed. In line with this, project managers also ensure that the project is cost-efficient and well within the budget. They also manage the different work teams involved in the project and ensure that things are running smoothly on this aspect as well.

Chief of staff vs project manager salary

Chiefs of staff and project managers have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Chief Of Staff	Project Manager
Average salary	$130,835	$91,578
Salary range	Between $85,000 And $200,000	Between $64,000 And $129,000
Highest paying City	San Francisco, CA	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	California	California
Best paying company	Lyft	The Citadel
Best paying industry	Start-up	Technology

Differences between chief of staff and project manager education

There are a few differences between a chief of staff and a project manager in terms of educational background:

	Chief Of Staff	Project Manager
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 63%	Bachelor's Degree, 68%
Most common major	Business	Business
Most common college	University of Pennsylvania	University of Pennsylvania

Chief of staff vs project manager demographics

Here are the differences between chiefs of staff' and project managers' demographics:

	Chief Of Staff	Project Manager
Average age	52	47
Gender ratio	Male, 62.0% Female, 38.0%	Male, 68.9% Female, 31.1%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 3.8% Unknown, 3.9% Hispanic or Latino, 7.9% Asian, 7.8% White, 76.0% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.6%	Black or African American, 7.7% Unknown, 4.7% Hispanic or Latino, 12.9% Asian, 9.0% White, 65.0% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7%
LGBT Percentage	12%	10%

Differences between chief of staff and project manager duties and responsibilities

Chief of staff example responsibilities.

Lead headquarters (HQ) operations staff.
Manage the G3's fiscal year budget planning, formulation, and execution.
Supervise the G2 administrative section and maintain and manage the G2 budget and material resources.
Manage the predeployment training and the deployment process to receiving commands, and subsequent redeployment and deactivation.
Manage budgets of $75,000 to $22 million paying keen attention to cost containment and ROI.
Credit for managing and improving the HAZMAT program, which serve as a benchmark example for the base community.

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Project manager example responsibilities.

Schedule and manage the GCP audit process.
Define, develop and manage metrics and KPIs systems for new product business group.
Manage the application process for the FDA medical device, minority and small business certifications.
Manage multiple projects and resources simultaneously while mentoring, coaching and implementing best practices, SOX and HIPAA compliance standards.
Lead teams using the Informatica ETL tool for the design and development of multiple financial and risk enterprise data warehouses.
Administer and manage Salesforce requirements.

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Chief of staff vs project manager skills

Common chief of staff skills

PET, 15%
Team Support, 11%
Project Management, 8%
Oversight, 7%
Direct Reports, 6%
Marketing Campaigns, 6%

Common project manager skills

Project Management, 23%
Project Scope, 6%
Customer Service, 6%
Infrastructure, 5%
Status Reports, 4%
Risk Management, 3%

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Updated January 8, 2025

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