Careers Advice, Job Applications, Q&A, Transferable Skills

Applying for roles I am over-qualified for – Questions answered.

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This week we have a fantastic question from someone looking to work for their dream employer – by (almost) any means….

Hi Nicola, can you advise about applying for a junior/admin role at your dream employers … Just to get a foot in the door at the right company. I’d be interested to know how to pitch an application for a job I could be described as over qualified for.

Vicky – Northampton.

Hi Vicky – great question! I’m not sure you are going to like my response though, as applying for roles less senior to your current role can be seen as a step backwards it is often the case that employers will discard your application for a number of reasons such as:

  1. HR / hiring manager may be anxious that you may be looking for a way into the business with no real desire to stay in the role – wanting to progress is great for most employers but when you are already a step or two ahead of the role, this means you will be in the advertised role for a few months before making a move upwards. This leaves HR and the hiring manager with the initial problem of filling the Admin role; this is essentially deemed as a waste of time and money recruitment wise.
  2. Suspecting you are looking for an easy-ride role, as it is more junior you perceive it as a job you can sit back in and not really engage. Whereas a less qualified person would see the role as a challenge and really work hard / demonstrate keenness.
  3. Your potential line manager may feel intimidated by you, especially if you have held a more senior role to them and have more experience – their job feels threatened by your presence.

My advice would be to wait for a role which is more in-line with your current seniority ideally as rejections for roles tends to put a mark against your name as candidates make an impression that they are either desperate for a role and applying for anything or didn’t read / understand the job descriptions – applications would then be rejected or put to the bottom of the pile.

Have you tried making a direct approach to the business in question? LinkedIn can be a great way-in, by looking up heads of departments etc and making contact you could start to form some relationships with the right people and then once a relevant role comes to your attention you can make an application and your name will already be known in the right circles. When you do make contact – ask questions about what career backgrounds the business tends to attract, how often XXX types roles come up and if you can get a fluid correspondence flowing – ask if you can meet for coffee. It’s playing the long game but it is more likely to harvest positive feedback and a way-in at a level you deserve to be at too (whilst gaining some valuable insider information which you can use to strengthen your application).

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

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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

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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.

CV Tips, CV Writing, Job Applications, Project Management, Project management CV, project management resume

Employment history – CV tips

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The main component of your CV should be the careers history – this is the section which allows you to really sell your skills and abilities. You should look to tackle this by summarising your role and then bullet pointing your remit, ensuring you contextualise the information. It is important for you as the writer to create a mental image for the reader to really get a grasp of what it is you actually do, job titles can be very misleading and I do not condone changing these in your CV so it is important to make sure you are making your description of the role as true to form as possible.

Here’s an example of a role and remit which is not ideal:

Project Coordinator                                                                                            

Duties: worked successfully within a project team that developed the best scheduling practices to meet client project plans easing project monitoring and control, making tracking of critical paths effective and preventive measures applied to them reducing lead times.

  • Working as part of a team within a fast-paced environment, focusing on delivering work to a high standard of client satisfaction
  • Assisting in planning, scheduling, resource requirements in compliance with industry, company and regulatory standards
  • Responsible for coordinating on site contractors/ subcontractors overseeing activities during the project execution phase

This description is weak as it reads like a job description, we get no real feel for the size of team, types of projects, what methods are used and generally it demonstrates a lack of real understanding for the role.

Now here’s an example which works:

Project Coordinator

Overseeing and coordinating the day to day running of multiple interdependent IT change projects by supporting project managers and senior managers. Responsible for monitoring and updating all project documentation and MI reporting

  • Reporting directly to the Senior Project Manager and supporting a team of 5 PMs in delivering interdependent projects
  • Providing an interface between the technical teams (3rd party suppliers) and senior management (internal), being the first point of contact for the provision of information on projects.
  • Ensuring that relevant management information is captured, analysed and presented via powerpoint presentations at monthly senior management meetings

These are snippets of job histories; you should look to include further information about what you do with more bullet points. Ideally you would look to perform a skills audit on yourself, list out everything you do along the project lifecycle and start to package these into relevant groups then start to formulate your bullets, ensuring you keep some context (types of projects, size of teams etc.)

Once you have written your most recent role, work backwards adopting the same formula but ensuring you do not just copy and paste details. Repetition is not good in CVs; if roles are very similar then you may decide to talk about different aspects of each role to provide some variety to the reader and also to cover all your competencies. Ideally you would look to have a “master” copy of your CV including everything you have done – you can then strip out irrelevant pieces of information to tailor your CV to specific roles, making applications a little easier for yourself and ensuring you are sending a CV which meets the role criteria.

Making Your CV Project You