Continuing Your Professional Development – It’s Not Just About Training Courses

Posted on | March 10, 2010 | Author: | jont | No Comments

As we continue into the third month of what promises to be another challenging year, I offer you a call to action! It is generally recognised that the current downturn has had a significant impact on employers spending in terms of training and education and this looks set to continue for some time to come. As the spring kicks in it is a great time to consider your commitment to your profession and kick-start your ongoing professional development.

Continued professional development is not just about attending training courses, it is your opportunity to maximise your potential for the future.

Continued professional development is not just about attending training courses, it is your opportunity to maximise your potential for the future. Whether you plan to stick with your current company for the foreseeable future, or to jump to a new challenge as the market picks up CPD is there for the taking. Talking to many project management practitioners I still find it surprising how many people collect the “me too” training courses and list them on their CV and think that is it as far as development goes. In a competitive market such as we have today, “tick in the box” qualifications are important to get through the first selection gate but then the good recruiters will dig deeper about how you maintain and build your professional currency.

So what can you do? A great starting place is to make sure that you are maximising your corporate and / or individual memberships of project management professional bodies. For example the APM have many free events run by their branches and special interest groups (SIG’s) which cover current hot issues in the field. SIG’s are a great way to develop additional knowledge on an area of interest such as “Benefits Management” with other like minded people. Many events have CPD points associated with attendance but more importantly offer you the chance to network with fellow practitioners and get a view as to what is happening in other people’s domains. The PMI also offer such events as do other bodies associated with the delivery of project management services.
Share your knowledge: Inevitably within any organisation there will be a diverse range of project related people working across the various functions, some may be more focused on finance, others on project controls and some in strategy to name a few. All these roles will involve different levels of skills and knowledge, why not instigate a knowledge-share group, sit down with your manager and discuss the benefits of scheduled meetings where the project teams can share best practice. Outside of the workplace why not offer your services as a public speaker? There is always demand for people who have a story to tell and an experience to share.

Online resources: Make use of the many online resources available to you, the company budget may not extend to visiting events that charge - however most of these groups tend to post the presentations online after their event. A great example is the PPSO SIG (Programme and Project Office Support Special Interest Group) which is always keen to share its presentations to a wider audience. Other online tools such as LinkedIn or Twitter are great tools for contacting authors, presenters and like minded practitioners to share successes, challenges and even failures. Again like the face to face examples, these tools offer broad as well as focussed (SIG) opportunities to interact with the wider community.

As we move into the era of “project management – the profession” CPD will become much higher in profile, not only from professional bodies but also hiring organisations, so why not get ahead of the game! Don’t be afraid to share your own experiences with like minded professionals. The unmentioned plus side of all this being it may well open the door to that next opportunity as much recruitment at the moment is happening through these formal and informal networking groups. Remember “people buy people”!

jont is the Managing Director of Arras People, the Project Management Recruitment Specialists