New Year thought – PMO Skills for Life

PMO skills will serve you for life and can be the basis for a long and successful career as they are transferable into many different fields. So add finding out more about this career opportunity to your New Year’s resolution list this year and you will not be disappointed.

All my wanderings around t’internet of late and my experiences with PMO contracting has led to the conclusion that PMO is definitely one of the places to be career wise. You don’t have to do much Google searching to see that it is on the up. The State of the PMO report 2012 states that 87% of companies now have an internal Project Management Office (PMO); many have also started to outsource the service, many use contractors such as myself and there are also as many permanent roles up for grabs.

Click to access State_of_the_PMO_2012_Research_Report.pdf

http://www.esi-intl.co.uk/blogs/pmoperspectives/index.php/2012/12/all-i-want-for-christmas-is-a-pmo/

The salary is also very good and even better if one is prepared to be a contractor and the prospects for an exciting career are excellent. Starting a career in PMO could literally lead you anywhere both internally within a company and in terms of travel opportunity the UK, New Zealand, America and Australia are all hot on PMO skills at the moment and it is an exciting sector to be working in.

If you are unsure what a PMO exactly is please see some of my previous blogs here:

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/04/26/a-pmo-role-my-experience/

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/03/06/pmo-as-a-career-different-types-of-pmo/

Given the above, I started to consider the problems that many youths are facing today coming out of University and not being able to secure a job and thought maybe I could help. I know how to get these PMO jobs and I know how to show these young people how to do the job well and more importantly get repeated jobs. I progressed to thinking that younger youths of leaving school age could also benefit from some work based, hands on training in Project Management, I could base it on their own career / life plans and show them how to make MS Project Plans, Track Finance, assess risk and issues and create business cases and other PRINCE2 based documentation that will be transferable skills within any career in my opinion. Dreams of a chain of after school franchises race through my mind 🙂 All funding offers very welcome 🙂

The government currently pay a number of companies to receive people that have been out of work, give them training to find a job and get them off benefits and I reckon I could do this service and achieve results because the demand for these skills is there.

I just need to figure out how to set it all up – any guidance welcome – watch this space …….

In the meantime I have cobbled together a quick overview for my next blog – 3 steps to a successful PMO career (See Parts 1,2 & 3).

Step 1 – http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/12/30/3-steps-for-a-successful-pmo-career-step-1-get-qualified/

PMO Documentation and Tools examples

Here are a few example PMO documents and tools that I have used and like.

I am not saying they are the best available and as with all examples and templates will require significant tailoring to suit your requirements, they are provided for illustration only. They are a good starting point and I hope they help. Enjoy …. 🙂

Example Meeting Actions & Minutes Log

Example RAID (Risk, Issue, Assumption & Dependancy Log

Example PID (ppt)

Example Highlight Report

Example Governance Slide Deck

Example Finance and Resource Tracker

As and when I get time I intend to share more example tools that I use and recommend.

PMO as a career – my experience

PMO as a career – my experience.

Interesting Link of the Day – Free Tickets to ‘The Future of Contracting’

http://thefutureofcontracting.eventbrite.com/

Future Consortium
Friday, February 1, 2013 from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM (GMT)
London, United Kingdom

People per Hour Website

I have blogged about this site before but now it is even better so I must insist now that you go and have a look at some of the things people can do for you in an hour – its eye opening 🙂

It may also prompt you to think of the services that you can provide through this excellent site.

http://www.peopleperhour.com

MY PMO Bot Empire Plans

Ahhhhh the answer to my working at home dilemma! Hallelujah!
So many times this year I have wished I could be in two or three places at the same time!

See my previous blog turned rant about my desires to work from home on a more permanent basis and make use to the max all of the facilitating technology available to us in this day and age.

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/10/28/contracting-lessons-learned-be-more-assertive-and-make-your-time-work-for-you/

and then imagine my glee at the following prospect 🙂

http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2012/12/23/employees-are-beaming-into-work-using-telepresence-robots/

Watch out for me all you contractors I am gonna get me a few of these robots and get all the PMO contracts going in and around London (and then the world) with Information Ferret PMO Bots on client site and me sat in my shed (and then a beach) controlling them all – ahhh bliss 🙂

@ $16,00O a piece (which I do think is very cheap considering the potential) maybe I will consider creating my own:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20031960-1.html 🙂

Any orders?

Any funding?

There are also cheaper versions which I am definitely going to look into ASAP:

http://www.doublerobotics.com ($1,999)
http://www.vigocom.com (Approx. £1,500)

Interesting Link of the Day: Anywhere workers

Whippeeee – pick me pick me!!!!

This article says that “More than half (57%) of millennials surveyed plan to at least double their spending on online workers in 2013, while 82% believe within the next 10 years many businesses will be built completely with virtual teams of online workers”.

Love it:

“The market is heading toward independent contracting”
“People with the old employee mindset will suffer. The entrepreneurial and self-driven will prosper.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jennagoudreau/2012/10/19/the-best-paying-jobs-you-can-do-from-anywhere/

Interesting Link of the Day – 1 Page Plan for a PMO

I love simplicity and think this is great – there are some great articles on the rest of the site also so have a browse.

Click to access One-Page-Plan-for-PMO.pdf

Hints and Tips: Useful PowerPoint Shortcuts

My old Boss taught me these 🙂

End Slide Show “Esc”

Jump to Slide “Slide #” + “Enter”

Toggle Screen Black “B”

Toggle Screen White “W”

Pause Show “S”

Show/Hide Pointer “A”

Change Arrow to Pen “Ctrl” + “P”

Change Pen to Arrow “Ctrl” + “A”

Erase Markings “E”

PRINCE2 Groupon Offer (Ended)

How timely considering my recent blogs.

This is a good deal I reckon:

http://www.groupon.co.uk/deals/london/Knowledge-Train/14786044?nlp=&CID=UK_CRM_1_0_0_366&a=9

Made me laugh so I thought I would share

http://www.psgnovelties.com/Project_Management_Humor.html

2012 Favourite Books

They are not as adventurous this year 😦

http://www.thelazyprojectmanager.com – Peter Taylor – Brilliant (FYI: A sequel – The Lazy Project Manager and the Project from Hell is free on Kindle at the moment).

How to make Money Trading – Lex Van Dam

Making Cards in a weekend – Jain Suckling

Reading Lolita in Tehran – Azar Nafisi

I also like this and will be keeping my eye on it:

http://www.pmbookclub.com/

See my list from last year if you are interested:

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/04/07/2011-favourite-books/

3 Steps to a Successful PMO Career: Step 3 Get a Job

3. Get a job

To get your first contract / perm job you should be searching on

http://www.jobserve.com
http://www.CWJobs.com
http://www.Seek.com.au

You can choose whether to look at permanent or contract work or both.

Put in IT as the industry and PMO as a key word, if you have no experience yet use keywords such as PMO Admin / Coordinator or Project / Programme Support – apply for as many as possible. It is extremely unlikely that you will get one close to home, unless you live in London where there are ample roles and Reading, Bristol, Swindon, Edinburgh, Leeds seem to also be hotspots, do be prepared to move where the work is – do not restrict your search to a certain area if possible to give you the widest choice for getting into the career.

Make friends with the recruitment consultants, recruit them on LinkedIn and eventually the jobs will start coming to you without you having to even look. Identify relevant recruiters by making a note of who has advertised a job and go and register on their sites as well. Upload your CV wherever you can to enable the most exposure.

The banks pay the best so if you can get a PMO Admin / Coordinator or Project support role in a bank on a low wage that’s a very good starting point. If not, try again next time. The main industries that you will find PMO jobs include councils, government agencies, service management companies such as Fujitsi, Atos, Serco, Logica, Oil and Gas companies, Utilities, Mobile Phone providers, Call Centres, Insurance companies and as mentioned banks. I have seen a lot of retail supermarkets advertising for PMO skills recently also. I started as a Project Admin Support in a local council (Matlock = Beautiful) and given their structured PRINCE2 approach and constant streams of new initiatives I would recommend this to anyone as a starting point / apprenticeship.

I offer a PMO Job Search Coaching Service if you are interested drop me an email

Once you have the first position, I can guarantee, unless you never turn up to work, are rude, or don’t even try to meet deadlines you will never look back and within a year or so your wage will have doubled – as a contractor this is. Then the sky is the limit really – the rest is down to you.

Make the most of every opportunity, complete any training you come across, pick the brains of everyone you meet – planners, technical people, suppliers and try and get them to show you how to work as many of the tools they use as possible – SharePoint, Clarity, MS Project are all good ones – there will be plenty of opportunity for you to get into these areas.

Tip: A smile and hint of enthusiasm goes a long way

You can remain as a PMO if this suits you – it suits me because I get to do all the Programme / Project Management activity but do not have the responsibility for delivery which suits me just fine. The PMO is responsible for supporting the project through its life cycle and coordinating required activity and I will do my upmost to make it a success but the buck does not stop with me. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink!

For those who are interested there will also be opportunity to apply for and work on Project management roles, do this also if possible to gain the experience – look for junior and deputy PM roles in the first instance, but do look at senior PM and PMO salaries just to get an idea of where I am leading you to (especially Contracting salaries). PMO Manager Salaries are good, PMO Director and Consultancy perm jobs are even better and sometimes can compare to contracting wages.

If you do decide to investigate the contracting route please look at my other blogs on this topic as I have explained a lot about how to manage this and the financial aspects and options for Limited or Umbrella company etc. If you have any further questions I’d be happy to help and will start to create a FAQs list to update this blog.

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/03/13/hints-and-tips-on-contracting-jobs-and-getting-them/

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/03/12/contractor-perm-dilemma-part-1/

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/03/13/hints-and-tips-contracting-financials-and-insuring-your-product-you/

http://informationferret.co.uk/2012/04/07/contracting-umbrella-vs-limited-company/

Also, if you do use the advice provided above I would love to know how it all turns out and see examples of your activity.

info@informationferret.co.uk

Final thought

A good way to promote yourself in business or just to keep the family updated on your movements and progress is to set up a blog. There are many free tools out there to help you set this up and I would recommend you do; it is a useful skill to have not only technically but also creating, planning and managing your blog content are all transferable skills that can be added to your CV. Use of these tools demonstrates an ability to keep up with and utilise fast moving technology trends and make you seem more attractive to an employer. I use mine in the hope that it will promote my services to the right kind of employers and establish me as a credible player in the PMO market.

Thats all folks … Good Luck