Category Archives: project management recruitment

guest blogger, Happy work environment, Project Management, project management recruitment

Hiring IT Consultants – What Are The Benefits?

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With economic pressures bearing down on both large and small firms, the pressure to change the way in which things are done is mounting. Times are changing and the way in which a modern business works is constantly evolving and moving forward, especially when it comes to technology. So why does it now make more sense to hire IT consultants for projects instead of using your in-house tech department?

IT Consultants

Expand Your Base

Some business owners may be sceptical about the idea of hiring consultants to come in from outside their company and essentially ‘tell them how to do things’. However, this view can sometimes be ego-driven and is often proved not to be the case. Consultants hold their positions because they know what they’re doing. Besides which, it can often be crucially beneficial to projects, especially creative work, marketing, or system planning/redesign, to have a fresh opinion from the outside. Consultants are there to help you and your business, not just to come in and get paid to tell you the time with your own watch.

Even if your internal staff have come up with amazing ideas and possess a vast understanding of your business and how it works, the consultant can bring proven, tried and tested methods to the table and re-work these into successful ways to help your particular project. They have used these methods before and have learnt what works and what doesn’t, as well as how and why these methods have proven to be successful. Working together, you could come up with something twice as good as you could on your own.

Cost Savings

Most importantly for many businesses, it costs a lot less to call in consultants as and when you need them instead of paying to maintain an entire department. This is especially true for SMEs who lack an IT team entirely, but is also true for those who wish to keep a small team in-house but expand capability for larger one-off projects. As well as saving on salaries, employers are able to avoid paying secondary and hidden costs such as pension contributions, payroll taxes, and sick pay.

Gain Skills As You Require Them

As we all know, IT is something that can be hard to keep up with. New technologies are released constantly, and with these come new methods of working. This leads us to another reason as to why IT consultants could be the best choice for your your business – managers need not worry about having to get too involved in the IT project and can utilise valuable time elsewhere in the company. You don’t need to train an external consultant as they already have the skills and knowledge that businesses need; some skills that may not currently exist in-house.

Another perk is that IT consultants only need to be hired and brought in when a big project is coming up, offering businesses more flexibility and giving them a little extra money to play around with. This extra revenue could mark the difference in being able to really push the limits of the company and can make that extra room needed for sustainable growth.

Katie Barnes writes for Penman, a specialist Cloud Computing IT consultancy based in London.

Hiring Manager, project management recruitment, Project Management Teams

Project Manager Recruitment

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Recruitment is an interesting topic and certainly becomes quite complex when you are looking for a specific skill-set such as project management – PM covers a multitude of areas and can often be deceptive in the job titles assigned to roles. The reason it can become difficult to source the right candidate can be because emphasis is placed on a person who currently performs the role, yes it is true. A lot of hiring managers will look to replace “Dave” or “Sarah” when they are moving on, often asking Dave or Sarah to list everything they do in their role to assist in creating a job description. Suddenly a fairly straightforward role starts to take on a rather long “wish list” and expectations are very high, this combined with applying a starter salary for that role means it becomes increasingly difficult to find the ideal candidate for the role.

Understandably if you have a star employee who is progressing or moving on, you will want to replace them seamlessly but naturally as someone has been in a position for some time they will lend strengths to their role which goes above and beyond the job description, over time they are generally rewarded and may take rather large pay increments for having additional responsibility.  Then when you are back at square one you are actually looking for an employee which does not exist especially at the lower salary pay band.

Standing out in the crowdTo escape this trap, it makes sense to meet with Dave or Sarah and talk through key responsibilities and think about what the core role actually involves and identify what the “would like to haves” are without biasing your recruitment.

The beauty of human nature is that we are all made differently and all have natural abilities in differing areas, therefore a new person on the team could actually bring a fresh dynamic which could really draw out skills from others who haven’t had the opportunity to shine. It is with this thought in mind I always encouraged an open mind from hiring managers to seeing candidates with varying backgrounds. Especially those who were adamant they required someone from a specific industry, the skill-set for a PM professional is transferable and as long as there is no need for the technical knowhow then there is no reason why they wouldn’t be able to perform the role. A PM in the traditional sense does not get embroiled in the product or service as this can greatly affect delivery, slowing down the process. All organisations and industries work differently and taking someone with a different perspective can really add a lot to a project environment. Asking questions often overlooked through complacency and always following methods which have previously worked – but isn’t project management all about change? Shouldn’t we be constantly looking for new and improved approaches as all projects are different (if not, they are business as usual).

CV Tips, Project management CV, project management recruitment, project management resume

Underperforming Project Manager CVs

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Our CV is a personal thing, in that we take it personally when we receive no feedback or rejection for jobs. After all we have spent hours of blood, sweat, and tears putting together a document which talks through our life’s work and it reads great to us so why don’t others get it? Lots of reasons I am afraid, it is difficult for you to be objective when you have spent so much time creating it and you understand what the jobs involved. To others though it can be a mix of lists and terminology which they have never come across before, and when they have literally hundreds of CVs to review they will not spend extra time trying to decipher or pick up the phone to ask you to clarify. Let’s take a look at some of the reasons a CV may be underperforming:

  • Gaps in the CV – naturally there will always be a gap or two in a CV, it is (thankfully) not the law that you must go from one role to the next without a break. But you do need to address the gaps, if you were travelling, then fine add in a line.
  • Nondescript profiles – this is very common on a CV, your profile needs to tell the reviewer what it is you do rather than telling them that you are motivated and have good time management – a given for a project professional surely!
  • failure or successLess is not more – often the more senior the PM Professional the less information they add to the CV. Big mistake, huge! As you will be a high earner and the role will demand a lot more, you need to address this and demonstrate your worth. Work hard to really drill down what your role involves and don’t be shy when talking through the project lifecycle – employers do want to see this, especially reviewers who may have a tick list which will inevitably involve a number of competencies based around the project lifecycle.
  • Poor grammar and spelling – yes, we’ve said this over and over but still this is prominent in a lot of CVs. Think about how others will view this, if you cannot construct a document which makes sense and is spelt correctly what type of communications will you be sending out to customers and internal staff!?
  • Structure – PM is all about structure, no matter how ad hoc you perceive yourself to be. Structure is important for success and demonstrating this on your CV with an easy to read, flowing document is a must.
  • Internal terminology – easy to use this especially if you have been a organisation for a while. However it makes little sense to people outside the business.

If you are applying for roles and not getting responses, equally if you have your CV in databases for recruitment agencies and online and no calls – it is time to go back to the drawing board and work on your CV.

We offer a free CV review for UK and EU residents at The CV Righter, you will receive honest constructive feedback and gain a better understanding of how your CV is viewed by a recruiter.

LinkedIn, PMO CV, Project management CV, project management recruitment, project management resume

The rise of LinkedIn endorsements – Project Manager Skills Lists

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We have seen LinkedIn evolving over the years and one feature which seems to becoming rather popular is the skill endorsement function. It is very easy to endorse our connections for various skills by “ticking a box” which is displayed in a list on our profiles. Quite an interesting function but does it really add value to your profile, because it is so easy to endorse others and those who have Skills listbeen endorsed may feel compelled to return the favour – which in essence isn’t a bad thing but if you are being endorsed for skills which others haven’t seen you demonstrate then the whole concept falls apart. It isn’t this aspect which I wish to address today; it is the perceived value of a list of skills on your profile which often takes the place of a CV for those interested in gaining a new role. I was talking with a client the other week that had a comprehensive list of skills on his CV, when I pointed out that it is not the best use of limited space on the CV and lists don’t help hiring managers – he questioned (quite rightly) why. I completely understand the need for adding in keywords but with no context the reviewer cannot see where/when/how they were used, therefore they should be integrated into the role remits with further detail on what that skill means in that role. When I pushed back with my client and asked why he was so keen to keep the list, he said that he had a lot of endorsements for skills on LinkedIn and felt that this must be the trend moving forward. I suggested a link to his LinkedIn profile on the top of his CV might be a more valuable way of offering up additional information to hiring managers, after all if you are to place a link to your profile there should be extra information there not just a carbon copy of your CV. With LinkedIn profiles it is a good opportunity to talk through further information and tempt in those recruiting through the website and then when they make contact you will have a CV which can back up the information provided – so it works both ways!