Newbie PM looking to enter NW Market

**partimer** · 11 January 2005, 13:16

re: Newbie PM looking to enter NW Market

I think you asking on a contracting board about moving into contracting is like asking in MacDoodles "Are burgers tasty ?". Prepare for some very bias opinions.

Jobserve will answer most of your questions so do a quick search.
What's more interesting as a point of discussion is your 10-20 year contracting career.

I can honestly say that contracting has changed vastly in my time. I see it continuing to evolve. In 2 decades you will have a few recessions and slumps. It's up to you how you survive them.

If you were around 2001-3 then you would know that a lot of contractors were culled.
The good years have to cover the lean years. Trouble is, you never know when you will be warming the bench and so it's up to you and your business skills.

It's human nature that you spend what you have. You may earn more but you suddenly start going out more, more expensive holidays, more expensive car, etc. Contracting in itself probably won't be a route to making you a millionaire.

You'll also probably meet somebody, have kids, etc. in that 2 decades. You will not want to be living 4 days in a B&B and miss your 1st child gurgle their first word (or miss other milestones in your kids life). If you think the NW is going to keep you in contract, it probably won't. You may even end up contracting in Europe.

The past is no measure of the future but I look back and see the boom of the 80s ("loads-of-money"). The recession of the early 90s (surprised if any contractor wasn't made homeless in the UK). The boom of the dot con (recover what you lost in the recession). Then the slump of 2001-3 (back to square one).

Kind of shows you the ups and downs of contracting doesn't it ?
Being just a PM contractor won't be enough. You're really got to think like a business. I've owned shops, had on going support contracts, etc., etc. It's the only way to survive, in my opinion.

I still think you better off as a contractor due to the freedom but in the future things aren't going be as rosey. Outsourcing will see to it that rates will be lower. The attacks from Gordon Clown will make it less profitable, etc.

One final point.
My dad use to work in a place where there was an army of secretaries typing out documents. Now a days, everybody is suppose to produce their own documents.
My youngest is being taught at school to produce websites and they're functional (not award winners in any way). Our technical skills are currently high value. In the future they'll probably be office YTS people doing our thing.
That's just the way it is ...

PS - MBA are meaningless in the contracting world. It will do no harm but I've never heard any agent ask about my Masters.

**BlasterBates** · 11 January 2005, 13:31

Re: re: Newbie PM looking to enter NW Market

..an MBA in the contract market is next to useless, the MBA is more for permie jobs, so forget that.

As for contract PM jobs there are a lot less of them around than techies, though there are quite a few senior "hands-on" roles, that require in depth technical knowledge. Usually the permies do PM. (That should be a reason for going contracting to avoid the political goo). Another possibility is to work as a consultant on project methodology, QA, requirements management etc. But you need the theoretical background as well as experience.

**rtjward** · 12 January 2005, 09:31

Re: re: Newbie PM looking to enter NW Market

Thanks for the replies, some interesting thoughts/views for me to mull over.

I should have mentioned that I have already done some research as it were, on Jobserve for example as well as asking a number of permy friends who are currently working in the NW what their orgs situation with contractors is, and also speaking with a number of contracting friends.

I have to say that I am approaching this realistically and taking into account changes that are most definitely likely to occur in the future i.e. marriage/children etc etc. I sort of took these things as a given, but equally something that I obviously need to take into consideration. I do have number of contracting friends that have been contracting for 1 - 10 years and have worked through these life-style changes.

I agree that you have to look at this like a business, and that is exactly how I would be approaching this. For example, my long-term goal is to build a portfolio of buy-to-let properties, I'm on my first now and looking to purchase a second shortly. So, I'm not just looking at contracting alone to provide me with a substantial living over and above a permy salary for me (and my future family) to live on.

In terms of PM roles in the NW, I've monitored this over the past few years in the sense of noticing whether my friends/colleagues are in/out of work, as the majority of them will only work in the NW. On the whole the majority (the good ones) have stayed in work, and are the sorts of people who through networking are likely to stay in work. On saying that though, when the going has been tough, there have been occasions when they've all had to take a reduction in rate, but this meant that they could stay within the NW.

Re: MBA - Again, I side with the view posted and as per my original post had thought this would be the case.

Once again, thanks for the view.

R.

**ooermissesnodont** · 12 January 2005, 10:57

Re: re: Newbie PM looking to enter NW Market

Here is my ha'penny worth.

There is work in the North west just not so much. One third of PM jobs advertised on JS are in LONDON..

Rates vary a great deal £150 to £700 a day, So the roles must vary and responsibilities accordingly. It is not always apparent from an advert .

Sometimes you are there to take on a role no one else wants so it can be tough.

MBA - Well if you have time. But there are other things you can do

Prince 2 - more PM jobs are asking for it. Not everyone uses it fully and some that claim to hardly do at all. But it may be useful for getting work in local govt, aerospace etc. Try not to fall asleep reading the first page of the beautifully produced manual.

APM/ISEB/PMI - flavours of PM qualifications.

CMI - ( or is it CIM?) a fairly demanding qualification but ....

OU PM course
OU Risk management course

etc etc.

I have contracted for 7 years as a PM and support the previous comments. Don't assume you will work 52 weeks a year. Some years you might but don't count on it.

You will be out of work sometimes, no income, tax bills coming up, VAT to pay and wondering if you made the right decision.

Well I had 11 years in my last permie job before they made me redundant. I gave up the Idea of a high flying career, despite have a 1st class honours degree and the opportunity to study higher.

I have paid off my mortgage, have some savings and had some good holidays and bought myself a nice guitar a couple of weeks ago.

But you will have to prepare yourself for a different approach to work.

If you decide to go contracting...Become Prince2. Despite its failings it seems to get you work. And there seems to be a lot of Local Govt jobs about.

Good luck!

ooer

**Martin Underwood** · 12 January 2005, 11:55

MBA

I'm going to stick my neck out and disagree with the concensus regarding the MBA.

Several MBA grads I know work in the freelance sector. Indeed, doing the MBA was their gateway into contracting. However, rather than simply contracting as a PM or an analyst or whatever, they used the tools of the MBA to sell themselves as consultants to projects who can offer the following skills:
Risk analysis
Strategic analysis
Organisational change
Knowledge management

In other words, the MBA can be useful to allow you to broaden the scope of your contracting career, particularly if you currently work at PM level.

As a previous poster pointed out, there are very few contracts out there at the purely PM level. Broadening your skills base into a portfolio of skills that are beneficial to the management of projects will be beneficial to you. However, don't expect jobs to land on a plate: the other aspect of an MBA is the networking side (you get to meet many people in fairly influential positions).

Finally:
"my long-term goal is to build a portfolio of buy-to-let properties"
Oh dear! risk/yield, etc... hasn't the bottom fallen out of this market?

**nobody here but us chickens** · 13 January 2005, 17:09

Re: MBA

I think Martin makes an interesting point there. I would say that a good mba is in effect a retraining exercise, and you should treat it as such - moving into consultancy. I would suggest though that it would be best followed up with a spell in one of the management consultancies or in a perm role before branching into business consultancy.

**Martin Underwood** · 13 January 2005, 17:57

MBA schools

Another thought (and following on from the similar thread in the General forum):

There is a lot more to choosing the right school than simply going for the best. Look at their syllabuses and the types of careers / organisations their alumni go for after graduation.

For example, LBS is a fine management school, but its syllabus is very much geared towards those that work in the Finance industry, or those that are currently accountants wanting to take the traditional FD, CFO.. etc.. route to the top.

Places like Ashridge and Henley (also extremely good schools), on the other hand, are perfectly suited towards people wanting to add value to SME organisations, etc.

A "good" MBA is more than just getting the letters after your name from a top-named school. It is about reskilling yourself with the tools necessary to run businesses; but you must think about the type of business you want to be in afterwards.

Finally: Open University? forget it, unless you're some middle manager at somewhere like BT!

**rtjward** · 14 January 2005, 10:49

Re: MBA schools

Some interesting views here.

Although I may be at danger of contradicting and earlier posting of mine, I tend to side with the view that having an MBA (if done in the right way) would allow you to raise your level beyond that of being branded as a ‘Contractor’, to a ‘Consultant’. I know a lot of good friends of mine like to call themselves ‘Consultants’ when actually they’re not in the same ball-park. I also have friends who are actually consultants, but in permy positions; the way that they (consultants) operate and approach matters is totally different to that of someone who has not had the relevant business training, it’s almost a mind-set.

In terms of choosing a business school – Again, I totally agree that this is important, and it has taken me just over 12 months to decide on my chosen business school. I would say whether you like it or not, if you’re wanting your MBA to have an impact then you’ve got to have a balance between the right syllabus (for you and your chosen career path) but also the rating/s of the business school both in academia and industry need to be up there i.e. top 10/15. For example, it’s no good doing your MBA at Leeds just because it’s got a cracking syllabus.

As a final thought on the MBA matter - I think if you want to do an MBA to aid your professional progression, then you can’t do it half-heartedly and just look at the cheapest business schools. You have to take the view that it’s going to be a worth while investment and thus you will get a good return on that investment.

I do feel though that the return on an MBA investment would be greater within permy employment. It’s back to a decision between corporate and contractor lifestyles.

Finally – This isn’t the right board to get into this discussion (and the above is already probably a little off-subject) so I’ll keep this short: In terms of buy-to-let, there is still money to be made here (it’s how you make and how quickly you make it that’s changed), and will be whether the economy is in a recession or not. Many people when buy-to-let is mentioned will always say “is now really a good time to buy?”, those people will never end up buying and should ask themselves “when is a good time to buy?” as there is never an ‘ideal’.

Newbie PM looking to enter NW Market