PMO Learner \ Which Course is Right for Me, PRINCE2?

We receive questions from learners every day so we thought why not share those with other learners and hopefully they can help you in your PMO career.

“Hi, I am currently looking for new roles and a lot of the time they require some kind of PMO® or PRINCE2® qualification, I would want to conduct initial training to allow me to apply for the roles and this would be on an individual basis and conducted privately to better myself rather than through my company.”

With a quick question back, we established that it’s programme related and the learner has programme management and PMO experience.

The two courses that immediately spring to mind is Managing Successful Programmes (MSP®) and Portfolio, Programme and Project Offices (P3O®).

My advice is not to pursue PRINCE2 because the MSP will be more useful to the learner and would also be fine on the CV in place of PRINCE2®.

The problem a lot of the time in the recruitment process is the obsession with PRINCE2® – it’s like hiring organisations have become fixated on having something on the job ad that screams project management – mainly to help with the screening process rather than PRINCE2® being an actually need within the organisation.

The interesting thing about it is PRINCE2® is old hat now anyway – if you were going to do something to stand out in a competitive employment market you wouldn’t choose PRINCE2 because, well, everyone has it! It’s also a bit behind the times now too because many organisations have a hybrid approach to managing projects – a waterfall approach with Agile thrown in is where it’s at in project management right now.

Programme Management

Back to our learner, if you’re working at a programme level and have been for a while and just need the badge to add to your CV for screening purposes – Managing Successful Programmes (MSP) is the way to go.

You can do both the Foundation and Practitioner levels of MSP® as a trusted reseller of Aspire Europe.

We offer both courses with eLearning with both exams.

Carrying out the course via eLearning also suits this learner’s pocket too – they’re funding the course themselves so eLearning is a good option.

PMO

On the PMO side, this learner has had limited experience so it makes sense to start at the P3O® Foundation level and because it’s new to them, our virtual classroom course with live instructor and other learners alongside gives them better support throughout the training.

We offer P3O® courses through virtual classrooms and public courses (pandemic permitting!)

Right now, in the middle of the pandemic, people are concerned about what’s coming next, what the future holds – will their jobs be safe or not? We saw the same back in 2008 -2011 with the recession – many project management practitioners had neglected their development and when it came to looking for work, many were surprised by the need to have the accreditation badges on their CVs. Whether we like it or not, organisations find it easier to screen and shortlist job candidates based on keywords and qualifications. You have to decide whether you’re going to play the game or not.

Got a question for us? Get in touch, we’re pretty straight-talking but always give the advice we think you need rather than pushing our own courses unnecessarily.

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