Category Archives: CV Writing

CV Tips, CV Writing, Project Management, Project management CV, Project Management Lessons Learned, Stakeholders

Stakeholder communications – lessons learned

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Stakeholders play a huge role in projects and effective communication is key to success, working closely with the team to ensure we are all singing from the same song sheet.

So why do so many not talk about their stakeholders in their CV? Your CV is the first piece of communication a hiring manager sees from you, by omitting detail about arguably one of the most important aspects of your role from the CV you are selling yourself short.

Let’s take a look at the fundamentals of stakeholder engagement:

  • Establishing who your stakeholders are – once engaging in a new project it is important to understand who your stakeholders are and list them in order of importance to the project.
  • Create a communications plan – work with your stakeholders to schedule in regular contact, understand their other commitments and set up a style which fits with this.
  • Honesty – don’t hide major issues from your stakeholders, talk about them and provide tangible solutions. You aren’t doing anyone any favours by keeping them in the dark, being upfront but constructive is essential.

Stakeholders

Adding this kind of detail alongside some context such as stakeholder locations, involvement and difficulties (yes we have all dealt with tricky customers), you can really start adding value to your CV. It is the anomalies and how you manage them which really start to set you apart from your peers in the field.

I have seen far too many CVs which place all the emphasis on the projects and none on how you work – yes, we want to know what the projects are but remember the CV is about you so we also want to see how you work. Simply listing a string of skills just doesn’t cut it with employers, actually adding in detail about what this means in your role is where you really add value. Forgetting the stakeholders is not giving the right impression and this is the first impression, so work on creating a CV which is inclusive and really tells the reader about you.

CV Tips, CV Writing, PMO, PMO CV, Project management CV

When a PMO CV can be too good

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I have been working with a new client who is a PMO guru – she has an impressive portfolio of contract positions in a variety of industries and is highly regarded in her field. When I was first presented with her CV for a review I was pleased to tell her that her CV says all the right things although it was missing some key facts, and as a recruiter I would be delighted to receive her CV. However I also stated that her CV was a little too good, as a recruiter passing on CVs to potential clients my fear was that it is just too good. Now at this point you may ask how can a CV be too good – well you need to think about who will be screening CVs when you apply for roles, as a project management specialist I can understand the terminology, but a great deal of clients would struggle to get their heads around it. Also when you apply for roles you may not be sending your CV to a PMO specialist – there are a great deal of recruiters with no specialist knowledge in the project management field and also HR representatives alike.

My suggestion was to add in the key areas missing in the CV and break down the information supplied into a more reader friendly piece of information. Not dumb it down but use plain English with a good level of keywords put into context within the CV.

Don't make it too complex

Assuming the reader will know what it is you are trying to say is one of the biggest mistakes professionals can make when writing CVs – by sitting on the other side of the table you can start to think about how you communicate with non-project personnel, perhaps in a work environment. Therefore you are demonstrating on your CV an ability to be able to turn complex pieces of work into easy to digest information.

Working with my client has been very interesting – we agreed a plan of action and worked together to clearly promote her experience and skill-set so she has a balance of what is expected recruitment wise and what she wants to say.

This is a clear example of a client recognising she needs to do something right with her CV and accepting that change is the order of the day – that’s a great project person, taking a pragmatic approach to ensuring she comes across in the right light.

CV Tips, CV Writing, PMO, Project Management, Project management CV, The CV Righter, The Lazy Project Manager

Your CV resembles a Jenga game

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I really enjoyed reading Peter Taylor’s (The Lazy Project Manager) blog about our services and particularly like his reference to CVs being like a game of Jenga towards the end of the game. This is a fantastic analogy and is so true of CVs being sent to me for review.

For those unaware of the game, basically it starts off as a tower of wooden bricks each layer placed across the next in opposite directions – the aim of the game is to take bricks out from the lower layers and add to the top of the pile without knocking the tower over. So as the game progresses the tower becomes unstable on the lower levels as gaps appear, the higher levels become top heavy with bricks which leads to eventual demise of the tower.

Jenga

How very perceptive of Peter to describe a CV like this – as we work through assignments and change jobs we often add in detail to the CV but begin to lose consistency, we leave gaps further down the page, add in more and more detail working towards the top leaving the CV unbalanced and often lacking relevant information.

It is always good practice to revisit your CV on occasion regardless of whether you are thinking of making a career move or not – as it only became too apparent for a recent client of mine who had treated his CV like a game of Jenga then found himself made redundant. When I reviewed his CV it looked disjointed and in need of a great deal of work, he had made attempts to rework it but in doing so had managed to make it look very disjointed. When we talked through his feedback I teased out a number of interesting areas of work which he had failed to address in the CV and it quickly became apparent that he needed a sounding board to talk through his experiences enabling him to really draw out the kind of content which would see his CV placed on the top of the pile with recruiters.

As he had left it so long before working on the CV, he had forgotten a great deal of information and regretted not keeping on top of it. Also he now had an immediate requirement to get his CV out to recruiters and apply for roles as he was out of work – adding significant pressure to his already stressful circumstances.

After offering up key advice to him, he decided to have a go at rewriting his CV himself due to financial constraints, however after attempting to do this over the weekend he came back to me on the Monday asking if I could provide the CV writing service proposed.

Although it was not an ideal situation for him financially he had concluded that an investment in his CV would yield a much greater response from employers than he was currently receiving. So we worked together to really get to the crux of his core skill base and draw out achievements which demonstrate his ability to go above and beyond the call of duty – really emphasising his value to organisations.

The lesson to be learned here is that you should always have an up to date CV – don’t leave it until you are pushed to have to do something!

photo credit: Herman Rhoids via photopin cc

CV Tips, CV Writing, PMO CV, Project management CV, project management resume

Tweaking your CV for project management jobs

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If you have a good, strong CV then you are in a great position to apply for new roles – however there is such a solid emphasis placed on matching candidates up for jobs with a requirement of 90%+ ticking of boxes. As your CV shouldn’t exceed 3 pages, it can be difficult to be able to place all your experience in there. This is where tweaking comes in, now it is not about drawing out a tiny fraction of your experience for a role which is predominantly looking for someone with a clear focus on something. For example if the role is a project manager for implementation of desk top rolls outs and your core experience is new product development but you have a small amount of exposure in a previous life to desk top roll outs. As clearly there are people with the right experience level who can fit the bill.

Tweaking is about highlighting specific areas deemed as most important to the hiring manager – such as stringent reporting, you may have covered this lightly in your CV but if it is listed high up in the job description then this skill is clearly an area which the employer deems are very important to that role – therefore you should look to draw out detail about your reporting in your CV. Looking at what kind of reports you generate, who you present them to, how often, and in what format these take.

Choosing the right combination to create the best picture
Choosing the right combination to create the best picture

Achievements are another area which can be tweaked for applications, again focussing on particular examples which may be relevant to the position – this is where you can be a little clever too. By researching a business (this only tends to work for direct employer roles as recruiters aren’t keen to divulge enough information on businesses to be able to know who they are) and looking at what else they are doing such as major change, and incorporating an achievement relevant to their change. Although not directly relevant to the role you are applying for it can highlight your exposure to specific scenarios which the business is currently undergoing. If the project management function is undergoing changes such as new structures or implementing a PMO then you may have some exposure to working with PMOs / heads of projects to support implementation. Something which you haven’t necessarily covered in your CV as you are focusing on delivery – it’s these little extra pieces of information which can really set you apart from your peers and put you in a shortlist for interview.

Always scrutinise the job description / advert and see where the emphasis lays with competencies; they are usually in order of importance. Make sure you read through the list of requirements and can tick the boxes, then put your CV next to the description and make sure your CV have the required emphasis on each competency. Clear communication is the order of the day and let’s face it – that is the key to effective project management, demonstrating what you say you are good at from the first point in the application process will stand you in good stead.