Career in Project Management - Part 1 of 5: Opening, Experience and Study

In this podcast, Ricardo begins a special series of five episodes on a career in project management. In this series, he will address the perspectives of those who are at the beginning, going through a transition, or are looking to expand their horizons. See also the related presentation.

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Episode transcript

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Hello everyone. Welcome to the five minutes PM podcast today. I like to discuss a very polemic and a very interesting term. It's about Career and Career in Project Management. This is one of the topics that I received most of my emails and the context that people make with me through social networks. And it's okay. How do I start? I want to work in project management. I'm passionate about project management. What's the first step. What's the second step. What should I do? So I decided to record a series of them.

The podcast is based on a speech that I gave to PMI in Brazil. What about Career so out, we'll be talking a little bit about how you can manage your career and how you can make some advancements in your career. Well, of course, everything I'm telling you, it's basic on my own experience. I'm very happy I'm I had quite good success in what I do. And it's very important that when you hear my voice here in this podcast, you will understand, and contextualize this through your own life.

So I'm not being given you a receipt by receipt that is everything you should follow So is just to open your mind and tailor some ideas to your own benefit. So the first thing I did to explain is that not that is equal. So I create the three subgroups to share with you the first supergroup. It's the message. I will talk to those starting their careers, who are considered on this group is the people that are, are recently graduated.

So I'm starting my professional experience and I won't work in project management. So I'm not transitioning. I'm starting. This is probably my first or my second job. You know, the part in the universe he is. So I want to, all my CV up to now is pretty much university studies. This is the first group. The second group is the career transition is dos with Experience with professional experience, not Project Management professional experience, but yeah, some Experience and this is people who want to engage in the project management field.

So for example, I'm a software developer. You want to become a project manager. I'm a civil engineer and I want to become a project manager. So I'm looking for new opportunities. So for example, I lost my job and I'm looking for a new job on the project management site. The term group is increasing and opening new horizons. Okay? For this group, this group is already composed of project managers, but they want more, they want new challenges.

They want to change areas. They want to have bigger responsibilities. They want to leverage their careers. So I'll be talking in each of the aspects to these three different groups. And in order to do that, I created a schema with 10 dimensions of a project management career. And this is basic on 10 topics that are, we'll be discussing with you on the service. The topics are experienced, the relationship Study planning, flexibility, South knowledge, dynamism, persistence, focus, and ethics.

In these 10 topics, I will be covering what I think is important in each of them. And I'll be sharing advice. The three groups that I already told you about, the first one I want to share with you and start today is the Experience. So we need to understand what is experienced in project management. Competence comes from the real experience and it's very important that you understand that despite requiring 4,500 is not considered Experience it's a certification like prints to certification adds value to the experience, but does not replace Experience I guess what is Experience Experience is the practical experience with the Project you need to leave, you know, it's very hard for me to explain how is a kiss just by writing?

What is a key? So if you have never given a case before, so you need to look for challenges, you need to learn from your own mistakes and you need to learn fast and you need to show your life, your experience. So many people say, Oh, I have never managed a nuclear power plant. So I don't have Rio. Experience forget this. You need to start. The experience for them is more projects. Okay? More projects. You are a new home to renew your house to prepare for your new holiday trip.

So it's very important that you show towards your experience. In my opinion, the dos are starting to the Career. Forget the money again, forget the money. Look for the opportunity. And many of you say are Ricardo you are telling this because you don't need to pay your bills. If you have too many bills, reduce your bills, don't put the money as your top priority. When you are starting your career, you will make the wrong choices, become a volunteer.

Look for nice things thinks that will aggregate in your professional life. For those who are transitioning careers, solid, defy your own experience. I'm sure even if you have never worked, in formal project management, you are, I've already done things related to project work, stakeholder management, scope management, cost management. So you need to adapt these Experiences to the opportunities that you face in the market for the third group, those who are opening for new horizons, to make a strategic exchange.

Maybe you can lose in the short run, but this does not mean that we will lose forever to look for a new experience. For example, for me, this is very important, I left the consultancy business to work in humanitarian development, to get this new experience, to get this new understanding. And this will turn me into a more powerful consultant in the future or a professional in the future. So this is how you can amplify your horizons.

The second is Study is sturdy is something that you need to have. Okay? Lack of knowledge is not a VU to and many people say, Oh, I finished my school, but I didn't due to match. It was very easy. Don't be out of that because you should not be proud of that. The study is one of the biggest and most solid roots of any career. I think out of the box and do not study what I already know.

So Study new things. Don't, overstudy something that you don't need anymore. If you are starting your own, Career goes to the base. I understand what is a Project BMP brings to look for studies outside your home country. Study Edo homes. If you are not a native speaker of English, Study English. If you already Study Spanish, Chinese, hopefully, fire your horizon through languages. If you are transitioning your Career use the vape time to recycle yourself.

Think about new terms, new credentials, new schools using this massive online open course. He was like Coursera to amplify your knowledge. You are looking for new horizons, leave the conventional area search for new certifications like for example, I'm doing certified cost professional from AAC. So open your horizon. Don't change everything. But open instead of only looking at project management, what about correlated areas like Greece, procurement like communications.

So this is what we understand as a Study next week. We'll talk more about focus and other topics, but this will be in a nutshell podcasts because this podcast is almost 10 minutes. So I just apologize for being too long, but I want just to set the stage for next week in our five minutes PM. Podcast.

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Career in Project Management - Part 1 of 5: Opening, Experience and Study

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