All posts by Nicola Caswell-Thorp

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Careers Advice, Friday Snippet, No, PMO, Project Management, Risk Management

Friday the 13th Risk Management – Friday Snippet

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Anyone who knows me well – knows that as such I am not superstitious but being a little accident prone to say the least, I am cautious on days which are deemed as unlucky. So today I am writing to you covered in bubble wrap, laptop running off a battery, all sharp objects and obstructions removed from my vicinity…

So I would like to address project safeguarding – as we all know, it is not just the dreaded Friday 13th when things can go wrong and in a time when no one can afford slippage what can we do to ensure we keep things on track?

Risk management – certainly nothing new here however if anything, more emphasis has been placed on this element of project management over the past few years due to the collapse of the banks and resulting EU troubles. More organisations are demanding project professionals with a greater awareness of risk management and PMOs come into their own here by promoting risk management through workshops within the business. Putting greater emphasis on risk frameworks and creating a robust risk register to ensure you are considering the bigger picture will not only put you in good stead with your stakeholders but will also raise your profile within the team and if you are good – you could become a champion in this field. As Risk Managers command an attractive salary and dedicated risk managers are in a minority, this could be a prime opportunity to break into a specialist field and really give your career a push in the right direction. Risk management is not just for financial services; all organisations taking forward business transformation will be very interested in a dedicated risk specialist. This could be a particularly good focus for contractors who go from assignment to assignment and need to hit the ground running – if you have great exposure to a number of industries and sectors coupled with the risk exposure you can potentially command very rewarding day rates.

Just some food for thought – I hope it has whetted some appetites out there and please do be careful today!

Careers Advice, CV Tips, CV Writing, Job Applications, PMO, Project Management

Stating achievements on your CV

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Your CV is a professional document which details your work history and skills – as a project professional you should look to ensure you are demonstrating your ability to add value and administer change. The nature of project management is to achieve a change and as such you should be addressing your achievements in your CV. If you are a seasoned project professional either deliverer or supporter of projects you will have a list of completed and ongoing projects which could fulfil a thesis word count requirement. Therefore it is important to describe the types of projects in your remit and save a dedicated section on the CV to bullet point a few of your key achievements. Personally I would look to create a good long list of key achievements and interchange them on your CV for a more tailored application – ensuring you are highlighting projects which are particularly relevant to the role you are applying for.

The key to writing key achievements is to be clear and concise; consider these points when constructing your bullets:

  1. What is the project / task in hand – give a brief description.
  2. What was your input – remember the aim of a CV is to talk about you not your team, if you formed part of a team delivering XXX it is OK to state this but ensure you state your actual involvement.
  3. What was the outcome – what did you actually achieve from the project / task, talk about the benefits. Increasing productivity or reducing waste, can you add £’s or %’s here?

A CV should look to address 4 to 6 bullet points of key achievements – the aim is to give the hiring manager a flavour of what you can do and there will be ample opportunity to discuss other achievements at interview.

Adding the key achievements towards the top of the CV will assist the hiring manager in understanding your strengths from the outset and lends a nice flow to the document to follow into your most recent role. Try to avoid using achievements which are too old, using more recent examples is especially important for IT roles as technology moves along so quickly – the current work is likely to be of interest to the hiring manager.

If you were a product and wanting to sell well to the consumer the key elements of sales are what you can do – market yourself in the best light possible by highlighting your best attributes to the target audience. Your CV is your own marketing document – if you were to sit in the hiring managers’ shoes, what would you expect to see?

At The CV Righter we work with you to understand your best marketing skills and ensure you are selling yourself in the best light by taking your portfolio and hand picking the parts which are relevant to your target employers. For a free CV review visit: www.thecvrighter.co.uk

Careers Advice, CV Tips, CV Writing, News, PMO, Project Management

Making the right decision about your CV

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I have noticed a couple of warnings about professional CV writing services on recruiter websites which are a little broad in their advice and wanted to address them. There are hundreds if not thousands of CV writing resources and services available today and I agree some are not ideal for the project management domain in that they are services which merely place your current CV into a template and rephrase your information to a professional language for employers and recruiters. This is not ideal and although it may work for some roles it is not the best use of your money for a service which promises to yield you results.

The CV resources available online are somewhat generic for PPM professionals and although they may prove a good starting point – for those who seek such guidance it may be fair to say that writing your own CV is proving a difficult task. This is where The CV Righter can support you; by offering a competitively priced collaborative service which is far reached from the generic professional CV writing services available.

At The CV Righter we understand project management in all its forms and having been a practitioner in the field of PPM and recruited specifically for project management roles across every industry from project administrator to programme director; our consultant is well versed in understanding both what you do and what is required in today’s job market.

Working closely with our clients we spend a good deal of time talking through your career history, how you work and understanding the context. Once a CV has been created (not from template) we then send over a first draft to check that all the information is true to you and has been interpreted correctly. A further discussion takes place to clarify any points and highlight any changes required. The CV is then reworked and sent back to you for further approval / notes. Once you are happy with the CV a final proof reading takes place to ensure it is as clear and concise as possible. On completion of the CV we then discuss moving forward – sometimes candidates wish to understand the current job market and how recruiters view CVs, others require assistance on where to look for roles and how to search effectively. Another service we provide is to target roles which are not advertised – putting you ahead of the game.

Throughout the service you are in control and we are here to bounce ideas off. At no point do we ever endorse including misleading information nor do we put greater emphasis on areas of weakness to enable you to get the job. We believe that in demonstrating your true skills and abilities we can gain you greater success to actually get the role not just get interviews.

For a free CV review – please feel free to get in touch and learn how your CV reads to others: www.thecvrighter.co.uk

Careers Advice, Cover letters, Friday Snippet, PMO, Project Management, Q&A

Portfolio , Programme, Project – What’s the difference? Friday snippet

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OK so today we are going back to basics, talking through what a portfolio, programme and project actually are. I was in consultation with a project manager last week who was describing his current project list, as we talked through his input into the business he asked if he was in fact a programme manager – which lead me to write this blog piece. Having spent more years than I care to remember delivering and studying in the field of project management it dawned on me that a great deal of professionals currently working in the field of project management rarely get an outsider perspective and certainly won’t have read through the skip load of books I have. So those of us who are well into the field of PPM are sat inside a rather well oiled bubble and there are hundreds of effective and hard working PPM professionals out there who are just beginning to learn of our bubble. So for all those new to the bubble – welcome and here’s a basic overview of the 3 Ps.

  • PROJECT – A piece of work with a definite start and end, and clearly defined deliverable.
  • PROGRAMME – A programme is a number of related projects run collectively to obtain specific strategic objectives and benefits.
  • PORTFOLIO – A portfolio is an assortment of projects or programmes categorised to facilitate meeting strategic business objectives through effective management. This is a centralised management of programmes, projects and sometimes portfolios which aren’t necessarily interdependent or related directly.

 

OK so now we have cleared that up in the simplest form – here’s a couple of useful links for further information (APM MSP MoP) . Once you start to get a grasp of the basics, I assure you, you will be drawn into wanting to know more.

If you are in need of some advice about what it is you actually do – get in touch, no question is a stupid question and with a little consultation we will have you well placed for taking that next step to finding a new role: www.thecvrighter.co.uk