CV Development for PMO Professionals
Module Two – Personal Stocktaking
Hi, welcome back.
It makes sense that if we’re creating a document all about ourselves – our careers to date, the skills and experience gained along the way – there’s going to be a lot of information to share.
The trick with creating a great CV is knowing what information to put in and perhaps more importantly, what to keep out.
Before we can do that, we should take the time to understand exactly what it is we have got to share in the CV. Of course, everyone’s experiences are different; you will have gain different skills at different parts of your career – some might be still relevant, others less so.
We’re also conscious that we’re trying to create a CV to help us land a particular job – we don’t have to include everything we have ever done to the CV. The CV just becomes cluttered and difficult to read when we add irrelevant or out-of-date information.
In this session, we’re going to look at how to start thinking about what it is that you have.
Get lots of blank sheets and in this session we share some helpful documents for you to download and help you start thinking about you and your career to date.
Let’s get started.
Rethinking Your Skills
We created a webinar to help you get started thinking about what it is you have to offer the marketplace.
Take a look before taking a look at the documents we have to help you with your thinking:
Personal Stocktaking
The Personal Stocktaking Template
We’re going to look at four different documents to help us think about our skills and experience to date.
The first is the personal stocktaking document.
It’s a one-page form and it’s available to [download here]
We’re using the form to help us reflect on what it is we actually have to offer the marketplace and we will use the thoughts we capture here to help us to create the CV.
Find a nice quiet space, grab a few pieces of paper and give yourself an hour or so to spend on the questions, jotting down your thoughts as you work through.
You should use extra sheets of paper to make notes based on each section.
Some people prefer to jot down bullet points just by brainstorming, others prefer to think about their work year-by-year and make notes based on that.
Whichever works the best for you.
Next we’re going to revisit your own jottings with two further documents.
These documents are available to help you think further about the different areas of PMO where you have gained your skills and experience.
There are two different documents, one is aimed at those in PMO Management and the second, if you’re working within the PMO.
It can be useful to download and view both of them regardless of your current situation or role.
[PMO Management] and [Working Within a PMO]
Download the documents.
After taking a look through these documents and added any additional thoughts that have sprung to mind, there’s one more thing we can share with you.
The Many Roads of PMO
There are so many different aspects of the PMO role and this document helps you think further about the skills and experience you have gained so far by just letting your eyes wander down the streets and see if you pick up anymore insights.
Thinking About the PMO Role
It’s also useful to think about your skills and experience against the different PMO services which are provided in an organisation. A more comprehensive list is provided in the P3O manual (Portfolio, Programme and Project Offices) in Appendix F – Functions and Services.
By the end of this session, you will have made lots of notes and given yourself the chance to step back for a moment and really think about what it is you’re offering the marketplace and hiring organisation.
In the next session, we’ll be using these notes to help us form the beginnings of the CV – the personal summary.
Make sure you use the Learner Forum for any questions you have