Category Archives: Project management career progression

CV Tips, CV Writing, Friday Snippet, Job Applications, News, Project Management, Project management career progression, Project management CV, The CV Righter

Free Project Management CV writing essential guide

Leave a comment

Are you trying to put together your resume but unsure of what you should be included in your CV? Over the past couple of months we have covered a great deal of information on CV writing for project professionals on the blog and have drawn together all this information into one easy guide.

Covering areas such as:

  • An explanation of why job applications are rejected – a great start to writing your CV is to understand the pitfalls of making an application.
  • Basic CV structure – an easy guide through the structuring of a professional CV, what to include!
  • Understanding your target audience – you need to know what your prospective employers want to know about you, some handy hints to get you started.
  • Specific detail about writing your profile and examples of good and bad profiles.
  • The benefits of adding key achievements and what to state.
  • Employment history – addressed with specific examples of a role, written the right and the wrong way.
  • Information about stating referees and hobbies in your CV – understand how an employer views these.

This document has been compiled for those of you who want to write your CV yourself – however once you start to understand the complexity of writing your CV to include your experience and skill-set versus what the employer needs to understand, you may decide to take up the services of a professional CV writer such as The CV Righter. There’s no shame in it – in fact having a recruiters’ perspective to how your CV reads is invaluable in the ever competitive job market.

If you would like a free essential guide to CV writing, please contact us through our webpage here.

Careers Advice, guest blogger, Happy work environment, management advice, Project management career progression

Five Things To Do Before You Ask For A Raise

Leave a comment

Salary negotiations are tricky. And this is especially the case when you have been with the same employer for a number of years. You are likely to have grown somewhat comfortable, happy even. What if they say no? Do you have to quit?

The longer you work somewhere, the more personal the threat of rejection is too. After all, your employers are likely to know you pretty well. Are you really not worth more money?

Unfortunately however, those who don’t ask, rarely receive. If you want a raise, you’re therefore going to have to man up and ask for one. Before you charge into your bosses office however, make sure that you first do the following five things.

Make Your Value Known

Were you caught sleeping at your desk last week or did you just land a major client? Your answer to this question should determine whether or not now is the right time to ask for a raise.

Clever employees only ask for a raise when they are at their most valuable. They wait until their purpose is clear. They wait until their absence would appear to be a major loss for their employer. What have you done recently to deserve a raise?

Write Down a Number

Do you know how much you are worth? Before even thinking about asking for a raise, you need to understand what a reasonable raise would be. Ask for too much and you can expect an immediate refusal. Ask for too little and you’re a chump.

Use one of the many salary calculators available online. Factor in your qualifications and experience and determine what people like you are making nationwide. Ask your co workers what they make, while being tactful, of course. If you’ve got a friend in human resources, call him.

Once you’ve established what you’re worth, ask for ten percent more. It pays to be strategic when it comes to salary negotiations. You also might just get it.

See Your Boss Smile

Your boss might act like a robot but he’s a human just like you. He probably doesn’t like Mondays and some day’s he probably has a hangover. Timing is therefore something that you want to have on your side.

You shouldn’t use this as an excuse to procrastinate for weeks at a time, but you also shouldn’t approach him when he’s screaming.

Ask Yourself What You Want

You want money. We all want money. But sometimes employers don’t want to give it away. They will therefore come up with other possible incentives. These can include a company car, better health insurance, more time off, a nicer chair.

If all you want is money, stand your ground. But it is worth noting that the more flexible you are in terms of what you want, the more likely you are to get it. And who wouldn’t want a month off?

Practice Your Rejection Speech

Finally, the biggest mistake that you can make when it comes to salary negotiation is to raise your voice. If your request for more money is turned down, a smile might be difficult, but it’s necessary.

Salary negotiation is not a one time question and answer session, it’s an ongoing process. If you are turned down today, there is no law that says you can’t ask again next month. In fact, your boss is likely to expect it.

Provided you are graceful in defeat and you don’t take insult in rejection, you can ask for a raise as many times as you like. Provided you are worth it, you will eventually get it. But if you start screaming, it’s game over. And you just lost.

Ed Smith is a well-known job consultant based in London who shares the details for those seeking  internal communication jobs  through his informative blogs.

Careers Advice, CV Tips, Job Applications, Project Management, Project management career progression, Project management CV, project management resume

Applying for too many project management jobs – Friday snippet

Leave a comment

When it comes to making job applications, the easiest route would be to apply for anything which remotely fits your skill set – however doing this can have a detrimental affect on your plight to secure a new role. Look at it from the recruiter or hiring managers perspective, by applying for anything with the word “project” in it you are demonstrating that you have not read the job description or that you do not understand where you skill set sits in the project environment. If you are currently at the project coordinator level and are applying for senior project manager or programme manager positions it is pretty clear that you are not quite ready for such roles unless your remit has actually seen you performing these delivery duties at the levels seen in the JD. In which case you will need to clearly demonstrate these skills in your CV, do not change your job title but ensure you cover the delivery experience and types of projects and programmes being managed.

By taking the time to read through job descriptions and match up your skills to the requirements you will yield much more effective applications for the roles and as such will have a greater success rate for securing interviews. Although it may seem like you have to put a bit of effort in to begin with and with recruiters and employers often not responding to applications which can be frustrating – you are demonstrating your professional approach and buy-in to securing a role which is right for you. I have come across a great deal of recruiters, HR staff and line managers who tend to disregard multiple applications for vastly differing roles as they already have a huge list of applications to review and being frustrated they will recognise a name and reject it outright without checking the resume against the requirements because of this kind of practice.

Remember that you are being tested from the minute you apply for a role – first impressions last, be remembered for the right reasons.

Careers Advice, CV Tips, Friday Snippet, Networking, News, Project Management, Project management career progression

Building up your PPM network

Leave a comment

With the increasing use of social networking sites such as Twitter, Linkedin, Google+, Facebook, Pinterest etc there is no excuse not to get professionally involved in project management groups to widen your networks – however some groups can seem a little cliquey to begin with and when first starting out it can seem like your first day at a new school when you have no friends. The key to engaging with groups is to make sure you sit back and take a look at how others communicate, gaining a sense of etiquette and what is OK to talk about will set you in good stead to start engaging with like-minded individuals. Do not be afraid to ask questions to get involved in the groups and strike up a conversation. Also take a look at some of the more prominent and respected members of the groups to see their backgrounds and read through their blogs. Taking an interest in a particular subject or adding your opinion will gain you credibility quite quickly too. Once you start to strike up conversations you will find others get involved and add their comments too.

If you have a particular interest in a subject then research to see if there are groups already formed covering the subject and also check out journals – each month they will pick topics for their content and you may well have something you can add in the form of an article. Make sure you are prominent in social networks if you plan to do this so others can make contact after reading your article. You will be surprised by how many do make the effort to make contact to discuss the subject further or simply to agree / disagree with your opinions.

As a project professional I would suggest as a bare minimum you have a Linkedin account which is up to date and a twitter account which will help you be contactable – then join in some of the active groups, there are hundreds on Linkedin and a good starting point for twitter would be #pmot and #pmchat.

By widening your network you will naturally start to keep abreast of new techniques being used and also share in the war stories of project professionals in the battlefield of project management. Not only will this enhance your working knowledge of PPM you may also get to hear about new job opportunities, writing articles for journals will enhance your resume and demonstrate your dedication to the PPM profession.