One CV challenge you might face as a project manager is effectively demonstrating your unique skills and experience on a resume. Our guide can provide targeted tips to articulate your project successes, leadership qualities, and relevant competencies in a way that stands out to prospective employers.
- Create an attention-grabbing header that integrates keywords and includes all vital information;
- Add strong action verbs and skills in your experience section, and get inspired by real-world professionals;
- List your education and relevant certification to fill in the gaps in your career history;
- Integrate both hard and soft skills all through your CV.
Discover more industry-specific guides to help you apply for any role in the links below:
Formatting your project manager CV to meet the role expectations
Staring at the blank page for hours on end, you still have no idea how you should start your professional project manager CV. Should you include more colours, two columns, and which sections? What you should remember about your CV format is this - ensure it's minimalistic and doesn't go over the top with fancy fonts and many colours. Instead, focus on writing consistent content that actually answers the job requirements. But, how about the design itself :- Use the reverse chronological order to showcase your experience, starting with your most recent role;
- Include your contact details (email address, phone number, and location) - and potentially your professional photo - in the header;
- Must-have CV sections include summary or objective, experience, education, and skills: curate the ones that fit your profile;
- Your professional project manager CV should be between one-to-two pages long: select the longer format if you have more experience.
A little bit more about your actual CV design, ensure you're using:
- plenty of serif or sans serif font (e.g. Montserrat, Exo 2, Volkhov) as they are Applicant Tracker System (ATS) compliant. Avoid the likes of Arial and Times New Roman because most candidates' CVs are in this typography.
When submitting your CV, are you still not sure what format it should be? Despite the myth that has been circling around, most modern ATS systems are perfectly capable of reading PDFs. This format is an excellent choice as it keeps all of your information intact.
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For certain fields, consider including infographics or visual elements to represent skills or achievements, but ensure they are simple, professional, and enhance rather than clutter the information.
The top sections on a project manager CV
- Contact Information is a must to allow recruiters to reach you.
- Professional Summary showcases your overall experience.
- Project Management Experience details your relevant job history.
- Key Skills section highlights your project management abilities.
- Relevant Education and Certifications demonstrate formal expertise.
What recruiters value on your CV:
- Highlight your experience with specific methodologies such as Agile, PRINCE2, or Waterfall, demonstrating your flexibility and capability to adapt to different project management frameworks.
- Quantify your achievements with concrete data, such as budgets managed, percentage of projects delivered on time, and cost savings realised through effective project management.
- Emphasise leadership and team management skills by detailing how you've built, led, and motivated project teams, possibly mentioning any cross-functional collaborations or conflict resolution.
- Include your proficiency with project management tools and software like MS Project, Asana, or JIRA, showcasing your ability to navigate complex project planning and tracking systems.
- Address risk management by giving examples of how you've successfully identified, assessed, and mitigated risks in past projects to assure stakeholders and demonstrate foresight.
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What information should you include in your project manager CV header?
The CV header is potentially the section that recruiters would refer to the most, as it should include your:
- Contact details - your professional (non-work) email address and phone number;
- Professional photograph - if you're applying hinting at the value you bring as a professional.
Many professionals often struggle with writing their project manager CV headline. That's why in the next section of this guide, we've curated examples of how you can optimise this space to pass any form of assessment.
Examples of good CV headlines for project manager:
- Project Manager | Agile & Waterfall Methodologies | PMP Certified | 5 Years of Influencing Change
- Senior Project Lead | IT Infrastructure & Deployment | PRINCE2 Practitioner | 10+ Years Experience
- Associate Project Coordinator | Digital Transformation Specialist | Lean Six Sigma | 3 Years Progressive Experience
- Project Director | Strategic Planning & Execution | MBA | Certified ScrumMaster | 15 Years Leadership
- Project Consultant | Risk Management Expertise | PMI-ACP | International Projects | 8 Years Driving Success
- Technical Project Manager | Software Development Lifecycle | ITIL Foundation | 6 Years Delivering Solutions
Opting between a project manager CV summary or objective
Within the top one third of your project manager CV, you have the opportunity to briefly summarise your best achievements or present your professional goals and dreams. Those two functions are met by either the CV summary or the objective.
- The summary is three-to-five sentences long and should narrate your best successes, while answering key requirements for the role. Select up to three skills which you can feature in your summary. Always aim to present what the actual outcomes were of using your particular skill set. The summary is an excellent choice for more experienced professionals.
- The objective is more focused on showcasing your unique value as a candidate and defining your dreams and ambitions. Think about highlighting how this current opportunity would answer your career vision. Also, about how you could help your potential employers grow. The objective matches the needs of less experienced candidates, who need to prove their skill set and, in particular, their soft skills.
Still not sure about how to write your CV opening statement? Use some best industry examples as inspiration:
CV summaries for a project manager job:
- Highly adept Senior Project Manager with a sterling 12-year tenure guiding large-scale IT projects to successful completion. Possesses a masterful grasp of Agile methodologies and project lifecycle management tools. Celebrated for delivering a high-profile ERP system integration within budget, yielding a 20% increase in operational efficiency.
- Resourceful Project Manager with a specialisation in construction and infrastructure, bringing 8 years of on-site project leadership and a robust portfolio of completed builds including a landmark shopping centre. Excellent command of risk management and MS Project, noted for completing projects 15% quicker than industry standards without compromising quality.
- Experienced Marketing Manager transitioning into Project Management, leveraging an 8-year track record of orchestrating successful campaigns and product launches. Acutely familiar with cross-functional team leadership and a demonstrated history of improving turnaround times by 25%. Committed to achieving operational excellence in project execution.
- Finance Professional pivoting to a Project Management career, equipped with a solid 10-year background in budgeting and strategic financial planning. Adept in data analysis and complex problem-solving, eager to apply transferable organisational skills to drive projects to timely and cost-effective completions.
- Motivated recent graduate with a Master's in Project Management eager to apply academic knowledge and fresh perspective to managing compelling projects. Enthusiastic about employing modern project management software and methodologies to achieve tangible outcomes and exceed client expectations.
- Aspiring Project Manager with a Bachelor's in Business Administration, passionate about embarking on a career in project management. Ardent learner ready to harness exceptional communication and team coordination abilities to foster project success and contribute positively to achieving strategic goals.
More detailed look into your work history: best advice on writing your project manager CV experience section
The CV experience is a space not just to merely list your past roles and responsibilities. It is the CV real estate within which you could detail your greatest accomplishments and skills, while matching the job requirements. Here's what to have in your experience section:
- Prove you have what the job wants with your unique skill set and past successes;
- Start each bullet with a strong, action verb, and continue with the outcome of your responsibility;
- Use any awards, nominations, and recognitions you've received as solid proof of your skill set and expertise;
- align your experience with the role responsibilities and duties.
For more help on how to write your CV experience section, check out the next section of our guide:
Best practices for your CV's work experience section
- Managed a portfolio of projects valued at £5M+, demonstrating strong financial acumen in budget planning and cost control, consistently delivering within 10% of budget targets.
- Implemented Agile methodologies across 15+ teams, resulting in a 20% increase in project delivery speed and improved team member satisfaction through more effective communication and processes.
- Successfully negotiated contracts with external vendors and suppliers that led to cost savings of 8% per project, whilst maintaining quality standards and project timelines.
- Led cross-functional teams of up to 25 members, fostering a collaborative environment that leveraged diverse skillsets and boosted project efficiency by 15%.
- Directed the deployment of a company-wide project management software, enhancing project tracking and reporting capabilities, thereby reducing manual tracking time by 30%.
- Developed and delivered comprehensive project documentation, ensuring that all projects met ISO 9001:2015 compliance requirements and passed all audits with no major findings.
- Guided projects through every phase of the project lifecycle, from initiation to closure, with a personal record of delivering 95% of projects to scope, on time, and on budget.
- Established a formal risk management process that decreased project risks by 25%, successfully identifying and mitigating potential issues before they impacted the project schedule or outcomes.
- Conducted regular project reviews and post-implementation evaluations, leading to the adoption of best practices that enhanced future project efficiency by 10%.
- Led a £4 million infrastructure project, enhancing the data centre capabilities for increased operational resilience and security standards for global financial services.
- Negotiated with 15+ vendors for better pricing on project materials and outsourcing, attaining a reduction in anticipated budget expenditure by 10%.
- Implemented an agile project management approach, improving project milestone completion rate by 20%, significantly accelerating product time-to-market.
- Oversaw the transition of IT services to a new cloud-based platform, affecting 2000+ users across the organisation, delivering the project 2 months ahead of schedule.
- Developed and executed a comprehensive risk management plan that decreased project risks by 25%, safeguarding project timelines and budgets.
- Cultivated a high-performing project team, achieving a 95% team retention rate throughout the project lifecycle and receiving commendation for team leadership.
- Directed a cross-functional team in the delivery of a new SaaS platform, which acquired 30,000 users within the first year of launch.
- Managed project budget of £2.5 million, ensuring optimal allocation of resources to maximise return on investment and meet financial objectives.
- Enhanced communication processes with stakeholders through bi-weekly updates and interactive dashboards, increasing stakeholder satisfaction by 35%.
- Successfully coordinated a marketing campaign project for a major FMCG client, resulting in a 45% increase in brand visibility and market penetration.
- Established a standardized project reporting system across the company, enabling a reduction in reporting time by 40% and enhancing project transparency.
- Facilitated the incorporation of sustainability into project criteria, leading to a 15% improvement in the company's sustainability measures within two years.
- Headed the launch of a new mobile application that garnered 500,000 downloads within six months, significantly outperforming initial KPIs by 150%.
- Coordinated with cross-cultural teams across Europe and Asia to ensure alignment with project objectives, maintaining 90% adherence to scheduled milestones.
- Implemented a continuous improvement program that identified key operational inefficiencies, slashing project costs by 12% while maintaining high-quality standards.
- Masterminded a large-scale software migration for a telecommunications network, affecting over 10,000 end-points, achieving 30% less downtime than industry average.
- Engineered a project reporting protocol that reduced miscommunications and errors by 20%, ensuring smoother project execution and stakeholder engagement.
- Instigated a supplier quality improvement initiative, leading to a 15% improvement in supplier performance and subsequently enhancing project delivery timelines.
- Managed the construction of a £12 million office complex, ensuring the project was completed 1 month ahead of the 2-year deadline and under budget by 5%.
- Conducted value engineering exercises with project architects and engineers to deliver 10% cost savings while upholding design integrity and functionality.
- Fostered a safety-first ethos, substantially reducing the number of safety incidents during the project tenure by 30%, subsequently receiving an industry safety award.
- Championed a multinational product launch over a period of 18 months, coordinating teams in 5 countries, that generated £55 million in sales in the first year.
- Steered a project recovery plan for a struggling product development, realigning team efforts and cutting excess costs by 20%, consequently meeting the initial project scope.
- Implemented a stakeholder engagement framework that improved cross-department collaborations and fortified internal relations, reflected by a 40% uptick in positive feedback from project teams.
Writing your CV without professional experience for your first job or when switching industries
There comes a day, when applying for a job, you happen to have no relevant experience, whatsoever. Yet, you're keen on putting your name in the hat. What should you do? Candidates who part-time experience , internships, and volunteer work.
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Describe how each job helped you grow or learn something new, showing a continuous development path in your career.
Describing your unique skill set using both hard skills and soft skills
Your project manager CV provides you with the perfect opportunity to spotlight your talents, and at the same time - to pass any form of assessment. Focusing on your skill set across different CV sections is the way to go, as this would provide you with an opportunity to quantify your achievements and successes. There's one common, very simple mistake, which candidates tend to make at this stage. Short on time, they tend to hurry and mess up the spelling of some of the key technologies, skills, and keywords. Copy and paste the particular skill directly from the job requirement to your CV to pass the Applicant Tracker System (ATS) assessment. Now, your CV skills are divided into:
- Technical or hard skills, describing your comfort level with technologies (software and hardware). List your aptitude by curating your certifications, on the work success in the experience section, and technical projects. Use the dedicated skills section to provide recruiters with up to twelve technologies, that match the job requirements, and you're capable of using.
- People or soft skills provide you with an excellent background to communicate, work within a team, solve problems. Don't just copy-paste that you're a "leader" or excel at "analysis". Instead, provide tangible metrics that define your success inusing the particular skill within the strengths, achievements, summary/ objective sections.
Top skills for your project manager CV:
Project Lifecycle Management
Budgeting and Cost Control
Risk Management
Agile and Scrum Methodologies
Quality Assurance
Contract Negotiation and Management
Resource Allocation
Scope and Change Management
Project Planning and Scheduling
Performance Monitoring
Leadership
Communication
Team Management
Problem-Solving
Adaptability
Time Management
Decision Making
Critical Thinking
Stakeholder Management
Conflict Resolution
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Order your skills based on the relevance to the role you're applying for, ensuring the most pertinent skills catch the employer's attention first.
CV education and certificates: your academic background as proof of your skill set
A common misconception about your project manager CV education is that you only need it, if you have less professional experience. That is completely false. The CV education section serves to back up your technical (and sometimes personal) capabilities, fill in gaps in your work history, and show you have the initial industry background and know-how. When creating your education section:
- List your degrees in the reverse chronological order, starting with the most recent (and relevant) ones first;
- Include your degree and university names, start and graduation dates. It's optional to also denote you received a "First-Class Honours" for diplomas that are more relevant to the role;
- Curate your relevant university coursework, projects, or thesis work if you happen to have less professional expertise and need to integrate more job keywords and skills.
Your professional qualifications don't need to stop at your academic background. It's advisable to also select up to three of your most noteworthy (and relevant) industry certificates and feature them in a dedicated section. Once more, include the certificate name, the institution that issued it out, and the date you obtained it on. You could feature both hard skills and soft skills certificates, as in the examples below:
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If there's a noticeable gap in your skillset for the role you're applying for, mention any steps you're taking to acquire these skills, such as online courses or self-study.
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Key takeaways
Write your professional project manager CV by studying and understanding what the role expectations are. You should next:
- Focus on tailoring your content to answer specific requirements by integrating advert keywords through various CV sections;
- Balance your technical know-how with your personal skills to showcase what the unique value would be of working with you;
- Ensure your CV grammar and spelling (especially of your key information and contact details) is correct;
- Write a CV summary, if your experience is relevant, and an objective, if your career ambitions are more impressive;
- Use active language by including strong, action verbs across your experience, summary/objective, achievements sections.
