A Project Manager's CV

I had a CV come across my desk this week, which was given to me by a very reliable source.  The CV on first impressions looked quite good, with over 16 years of Project Management experience, all in the Investment Banking industry.

I looked at it in a little more details today and realized there was very little detail within the CV.  It made me wonder what level of detail we should go into on a CV.  My thoughts are that there should be enough information for each work placement to give an outline of what you have been working on, but leaving out enough detail to be a feeder for a discussion in the interview.

As a PM, I would suggest you explain the basics of any project you have managed, along with the timescales, budgets, project team size and any technology used, replaced or removed.  Again, I would suggest this is at a high level as to not give away any confidentiality and to keep enough information back for interview questions.

In addition, I would highlight any particular issues or risks that were dealt with successfully along with any management reporting levels, SLAs, third party vendor communications etc... All of this I would see as secondary to the actual project details listed in the paragraph above.

The CV in question only came with the secondary information.  I understand it was from an investment banking background, but there is still a certain amount of detail you can add to a CV without it breaking any confidentiality agreements... or am I wrong?

Interview questions

A few weeks ago I went t a very interesting interview. The role was ideal and one that I would be a perfect match for the Project Manager role. (At the time of writing, I am still waiting in anticipation for the result and hoping for a second interview.)

I was interviewed by two people, one being the Head of Project Management and the other was Head of Systems. Both very nice people and the interview was friendly and relaxed. We shared some jokes discussed a few things off topic, however some of the questions were very interesting, so I thought I would share them.

Describe your best day

I started by saying "..with my family, on the beach, in the sunshine, with a cold beer in hand...", but then I thought I had better relate my answer to the job at hand, so I mentioned my ideal working day.

I like to start the day reviewing progress from overnight/yesterday and to ensure we are completing tasks according to plan. This only takes a few minutes, as it is more of a fact finding, rather than actioning. The second task is to have a mini team meeting to find out if there are any pressing issues from the team. The next part of the day usually involves the project planning side of my role and then keeping on top of the issues and reporting that I need to do, which varies according to the day of the week.

Describe your Worst day

I don't really have a definition of my worst day, but I don't like it when people fail to listen and when people do not accept something.


For example, in a recent project we were given a design for a solution and I had to implement it. Simple, in principle, but in practise the solution was not fit for purpose in the environment where we were working. The solution came from a different company, with a different environment and different working practises. For many week wee had to document and track all of our issues and communicate with the solution providers to prove that their solution was not working in reality. Finally, all of the issues we were having started to happen that their company, so the started to believe us.

Other questions included

What is your best asset? Communication, team building and morale boosting

What do you most enjoy about Project Management? Communication, team work / building, delegation, monitoring

What do you least like about Project Management? Simple one work answer - Budgets