How to Write a Project Manager CV or Resume (With CV Examples)

In this guide, we provide advice and step-by-step guidance on how to write the perfect project manager CV or resume. This guide covers all aspects of the CV and resume writing process for project management, including:

- Project management skills to focus on and how to demonstrate them on your CV

- How to ensure your project management experience comes across in the most effective way

- The best way to present your projects

- The best way to format your project management CV

- Two-page project manager CV samples

As a project manager, your curriculum vitae or resume is one of your most important marking tools. In most cases, it will be your first - and possibly only - chance to make a positive impression on hiring managers.

A good project management CV should demonstrate your ability to realise plans by delivering projects in line with specifications, standards and expectations. It should also demonstrate your ability to manage all stages of project life-cycle, from initiation to closure.

Alongside this, it needs to convince hiring managers that you are a more effective project manager than your competition.

It needs to stand out from the crowd.

Don’t worry about whether you’re writing a project manager CV or a project manager resume. Depending on the country you live in, it may be called either. But the goal is the same: to impress the hiring manager and get you job interviews.

In this guide, we’ll provide you with all the information you need to prepare a high-quality, impressive document, whether it’s a CV or a resume.

Project management is one of the fastest growing industries. In fact, the project management industry is growing at such a rate that there may be shortage of project managers in the future.

This was pointed out in the Project Management Institute’s Job Growth Report, which claimed that a staggering 2,100,000 new project managers will be required in the United States by 2027.

This is a huge number.

Even more project managers will be required in other countries, such as China and India.

These statistics are based on the United States only.

Source: Project Management Institute.

Despite this, it’s more important than ever to ensure your project management CV is as strong as possible. This is because, despite the expected shortage of project managers in the future, a huge number of companies are unable to successfully deliver projects.

In fact, according to a study conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers, only 2.5% of projects are successfully completed.

With such a large number of project failures, whether it be the failure of entire projects or the failure to deliver 100% of projects, employers need to know how you can deliver project success.

They need to know that you have the skills, experience and knowledge to deliver on plans and overcome roadblocks. Good project managers can directly reduce costs and improve efficiency.

You need to show that you are capable of providing this level of value.

There is no better way of demonstrating your ability to do this than in your CV. In this guide, we will show you how to do exactly that.

There are a number of specific areas of expertise that will prove valuable to different employers. For example, certain employers may want project managers with experience using certain project management methodologies.

This is why it is important to ensure that your CV is tailored specifically to the job you are applying for.

Skills that are often expected of project managers include:

Change management, business transformation, risk management, stakeholder management, budget management, project planning, governance and proficiency with project documentation.

If you have know-how in these key areas, ensure it comes across in the skills section of your CV.

Other areas of expertise that may be relevant include specific project management methodologies, such as Agile methodologies or Lean methodologies.

Ensure your skills section demonstrates your knowledge of the different principles, frameworks and processes used to provide structure to project delivery.

While it is important to bring attention to your key skills, don’t make the mistake of adding too many skills.

The skills section should not be exhaustive.

Cramming your skills section with a huge number of skills results in the most important skills being difficult to locate. Ideally, you should select between 8 and 10 skills that are most important and relevant to the position you are applying for.

So how do you decide which skills to leave out?

The most effective way of identifying the key skills that employers are looking for is to locate and study the job description for the position you want to apply for.

The job description will include a list of the skills that the company expects in candidates.

Use this list of required skills to tailor your CV’s skills section to the position.

However, avoid copying the job description’s skills onto your CV word for word. Recruiters know the content of job descriptions and they will be aware that you have simply copied the content.

This may lead them to question whether you actually possess these skills. Instead, draw attention to a number of the job description’s key skills in your skills section.

The key skills section is not the only part of your CV where you should show off your skills. You will have the opportunity to demonstrate further skills in your CV’s career section, where you will be able to provide tangible examples of times you have utilised the skills.

For example, if you’re skilled in budget management, you can detail the value of the budgets you have managed during your time in project management.

Showcasing certain soft skills is equally important to ensure you make a powerful impression on hiring managers. For project managers, possessing these soft skills is vital in order to deliver projects to high standards, maintain efficiency and achieve project objectives.

As with the previously mentioned hard skills, don’t make the mistake of detailing every soft skill in your arsenal or every skill that is expected of project managers.

If you do this, not only will your CV be excessively long and cluttered, but it will also look like a skills handbook from the Project Management Institute.

Instead, you want the skills in your CV to appear as if you have included them organically, rather than stuffing everything you can into two pages.

But which soft skills are most important for project management roles?

Here, we have detailed the most important soft skills for project managers.

Leadership is arguably the most important soft skills for project management jobs. Although, leadership is not necessarily just a soft skill.

Leadership ties into the many skills that employers expect from projects managers; stakeholder management, business transformation, project planning – all of these skills require robust leadership capabilities.

As a project manager, leadership is all about inspiring project teams to come on-board with your visions and add value to the project by effectively playing their role. It’s about aligning project teams with project objectives.

As such, it’s vital that your CV demonstrates your leadership proficiency. But how can you demonstrate your leadership skills in your CV?

The first and easiest way to do this is to show results.

As the benefits of great leadership are great results, showing your achievements will demonstrate your ability to lead as a project manager.

Here is an example. If you state that you successfully delivered a project two-weeks ahead of schedule, despite challenges faced, this shows that you were able to pull your team together to overcome challenges and achieve your objective.

Remember, to ensure you come across as an effective leader, you don’t need to write huge paragraphs about leadership. You need to show how you have demonstrated your leadership qualities through results.

Alongside this, show that you performed daily tasks as a leader. For example, if you mentored and trained colleagues to improve their capabilities, ensure this comes across in your CV. If you led meetings with team members to identify improvement areas, ensure this comes across in your CV.

According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), 1 in 5 projects are unsuccessful as a result of poor communication.

To ensure this doesn't happen, project leaders needs to be able to communicate clearly about expectations and goals, as well as responsibilities and performance. They also need to be able to articulate project visions to team members to ensure stakeholders are on board with project objectives.

To maintain efficiency and ensure projects run smoothly, strong communication skills are crucial. Poor communication will usually result in poor project performance. As such, it's very important to effectively convey your communication skills in your CV.

A good project management CV should outline how you have shown your ability to articulate project visions and communicate goals to team members.

So how do you go about doing this?

Think about that the times that you have used your communication skills to influence or liaise with those involved in projects, from the outset to completion. How did you engage with your colleagues and stakeholders?

It's impossible to go through the full project life-cycle without communicating with a wide range of professionals, so identify your most significant moments of communication during your projects and draw attention to these on your CV.

This could be as simple as communicating project timelines and milestones to team members.

Here is an example of how we demonstrated this individual’s communication skills as a project manager:

'Developed transparency by introducing weekly meetings with key stakeholders to confer on roadblocks and outline the necessary solutions that were to be implemented'.

To make your communication skills shine on your project management CV, try to identify your achievements that have been brought about by your communication skills.

For example, did your influencing of key stakeholders enable you to adjust certain project priorities in order to meet deadlines? Highlighting this achievement would indicate that your communication skills are strong enough to add value to projects.

Another aspect of communication that is highly valuable for project managers is active listening. Project management isn’t just about telling people what to do.

Some of the most successful project managers are great active listeners, who listen to their team members and stakeholders to develop a stronger knowledge of requirements and problems.

How can you demonstrate your active listening skills on your CV?

Write about the times you have engaged with team members, whether through meetings or otherwise. Then show how you listened to their input and acted on it. Showing how you acted on input from your team members is a very effective way of drawing attention to your active listening skills.

Here is an example:

'Implemented daily virtual meetings between various teams after obtaining feedback from colleagues on the weak channels of communication between global teams'.

In the example above, the individual shows that he/she listened to the issues that team members presented, before acting on it by introducing a new process to improve performance.

Communication is a broad skill, encompassing collaboration, an ability to provide feedback and non-verbal communication. Of course, you can’t list all of these or provide tangible examples of times you have demonstrated every aspect of the communication skill set.

But try to identify times that you have utilised your communication skills to improve project performance, then bring this across in your CV.

An important thing to remember when detailing your soft skills is to show, rather than tell. Rather than telling the reader that you possess communication skills, show how you have utilised your communication skills.

Project managers are required to negotiate on a regular basis, whether it be negotiating contracts or negotiating the resolution of conflicts.

They must also negotiate with stakeholders to establish scope requirements, time parameters, costs, and so forth.

Effective, efficient negotiation benefits projects by mitigating risk, safeguarding project goals, developing trust, resolving conflict and providing a greater platform for the overall success of projects.

Showcasing your ability to negotiate on your CV will improve its effectiveness and show hiring managers that you’re an even more capable project manager.

But before we discuss how to demonstrate your negotiation skills in your CV, it’s important to understand what makes a good negotiator. What are the key concepts of negotiation in project management?

Emotional control, communication, active listening, planning and research are all key for successful negotiators.

These are the key qualities that you can draw out while highlighting your negotiation experiences.

How do you show your negotiation skills on your CV?

The best way to show your ability to negotiate is to describe your successful negotiations, breaking the negotiation process up into three parts: conflict, engagement, result.

Identify your negotiation achievements and start writing about them. For example, let’s assume you were project managing a relocation of your employer’s premises to a different site.

You might have encountered a problem with the unrealistic timescales that had been suggested. This is the first aspect of the negotiation process, the conflict.

Let’s say you then brought teams together to identify the required timescales, before presenting the results of your finding to the key stakeholders. This is the engagement aspect of the process, where you show how you communicated with the necessary individuals involved to work towards a beneficial conclusion.

Then, let’s assume that you convinced the key stakeholders to alter the timescales, by presenting researched information regarding project expectations. As a result, you were successful in your negotiation. This is the result of the process.

Use this three-step process – conflict, engagement, result – to ensure you effectively articulate your negotiation achievements in your CV.

However, it’s more effective to write about these three steps in reverse – result, engagement, conflict. This way you’re writing in the style of an achiever, focusing first on your achievement.

So how would this look on your CV?

Here is an example of how we used the conflict, engagement, result process on a project manager’s CV.

'Prompted key stakeholders to extend project timescales after identifying excessive costs involved in adhering to existing timescales, despite stakeholder’s initial reluctance to alter timescales'.

According to a paper published by the Project Management Institute, there are two key forms of negotiation: win-lose and win-win.

Win-lose is the type of negotiation where one party achieves their desired outcome and the other doesn’t. Win-win is the type of negotiation that involves more of a collaborative approach to reach positive outcomes than cannot be improved further.

When you’re writing about your negotiation experiences in your CV, think about whether you employed the win-win or the win-lose approach. Try to showcase your experience using at least one approach. If you can demonstrate your experiences using both approaches, even better.

While project managers oversea the key aspects of projects, such as project execution and project closure, they also need to be able to strike a balance between focusing on overall project goals and the smaller details.

These small details may be minor in relation to other aspects of project processes, but they are they kind of details great project managers deal with efficiently on a daily basis.

Effective project managers don’t miss the wood for the trees.

They focus on achieving overall project objectives, but they also possess the attention-to-detail to identify potential risks and provide resolutions to minor issues that could potentially cause projects to derail.

So, now that you know that attention-to-detail is an important project management skill, how do you go about showing it on your CV?

The best way to demonstrate your attention-to-detail skills doesn’t require you to even mention attention-to-detail. You can show your attention-to-detail by presenting recruiters or hiring managers with a professionally-written, polished CV that doesn’t contain any mistakes, spelling errors or grammatical issues.

As the CV is often the first impression recruiters will get of you, a professional, polished CV can create an instant image of an organised individual with great attention-to-detail.

If you submit a cluttered CV with mistakes, looking sloppy and unattractive, you might create a poor first impression, an impression of someone who doesn’t pay attention to the small details.

This is not the way you want to go, so ensure your CV is professional, well-presented and void of mistakes.

Another way of showing your attention-to-detail on your CV is to list your achievements related to precision.

For example, someone with excellent attention-to-detail might write about how they achieved high levels of accuracy while estimating the necessary resources required for projects. Or maybe they would show off a high success rate related to audits.

When showcasing such achievements, it’s always beneficial to use specific numbers and statistics if possible.

Another simple way of showing your attention-to-detail is to write about tasks that require concentration. As an example, you could write about analysing invoices to identify errors.

Use these tips to show off your attention-to-detail on your CV and it will ensure you come across as a conscientious, diligent individual who cares about the minor details.

As a project leader, you need to make correct, swift decisions for the benefit of the project and the project team. The majority of great leaders, whether operating in project management or other professions, have one thing in common: they are all excellent decision-makers. Poor decision-making results in poor performance.

Project management CVs should show that you are an effective decision-maker.

When you’re preparing to describe your decision-making qualities in your new CV, it’s a good idea to remember that decision-making is made up of various other skills. Skills that good decision-makers often possess include analytical acumen, active listening and problem analysis. Rather than explaining that you are a good decision-maker in your CV, it would be much more effective to show that have demonstrated the qualities of good decision-makers.

For example, if you described a time that you identified a problem, acted on it and implemented new changes that delivered a positive outcome, this would demonstrate your decision-making capabilities.

As a project manager, you likely utilise your decision-making skills on a daily basis. You will probably have a good idea of the best achievements to use in relation to your decision-making skills. But if you’re struggling to describe your decision-making skills, follow our three-step template: identifying problems, generating solutions and implementing corrective actions.

As mentioned earlier, if you’re describing your achievements it’s more effective to follow this three-step process in reverse. Start by describing the corrective action you implemented, followed by the solution you identified and the problem you faced.

Here is an example:

'Overhauled the internal reporting system with a new, streamlined version, which reduced annual costs by 100k, after identifying the inefficiencies with the information management aspect of the system'.

Note that this achievement doesn’t directly mention decision-making. This isn't a problem. Hiring managers are experienced at identifying skills through achievements.

Another way to draw attention to your decision-making skills is to describe accomplishments that were achieved within deadlines.

Achieving objectives despite the demands of strict time limits requires good decision-making. So, describing such achievements in your CV will show hiring managers that you’re a sound decision-maker.

Here is an example:

'Achieved the objective of generating a cost saving of 20k within 2 months by making the decision to negotiate a new, more cost-effective supplier contract'.

In the example above, the time factor plays a big role in highlighting the individual’s decision-making skills. It shows that the person was able to reach beneficial decisions under pressure. It also shows that his/her decision-making is good enough to add significant value.

Identify times that you have achieved goals within timescales, and use these examples to make a more powerful impact and exhibit your decision-making qualities.

Now it’s time to include your career history. This is the section where you detail your employment and describe your project activities and achievements.

Here at CV Nation, we have reviewed hundreds of project management CVs, and we come across many issues with the presentation of project manager's career history. This is usually because they have worked on multiple projects within one role.

Many project managers make the mistake of including all of their career history in one chunk of text.

This may be acceptable in certain cases, but if your role has involved you working on 5 different key projects that you want to describe, you need to understand how to present this in the most effective way.

So how do you go navigate all these different projects in your CV.

The way to approach writing your project management career history when you're dealing with multiple projects is to split your role’s content up into individual projects.

For example, include your responsibility and achievements for the first project under the heading of the project name. Then follow the same process for the other projects.

Of course, you may not have worked on a large number of different projects, so this may not apply to you.

List your career history in reverse chronological order, starting with the most recent position held and working backwards. As with other CVs, include your job title, company name, location of employment and the dates of employment.

Then provide some initial context, describing the company or the project, as well as the overall objectives of the role. This might include the size of the project, the nature of the project and the project budget. This information provides valuable context regarding the size and scope of the project.

Then include your key responsibilities and achievements

Try to write about responsibilities that showcase the value you add as a project manager and ensure you come across as achiever. For example:

‘Mitigated site incidents by 29% by implementing health & safety workshops for Construction teams’.

This example describes the project manager’s focus on health & safety while showing off an achievement, which provides tangible evidence of his proficiency in this area. Also, notice the use of numbers in this description.

Numbers, data and statistics greatly improve the effectiveness of project management CVs.

The numbers stand out on the page and offer an even stronger form of evidence to back up descriptions. Sometimes recruiters may even ignore achievements if they are not quantified, so it’s important to include numbers to showcase your capabilities as a project manager.

Numbers, data and statistics are even more beneficial for project manager CVs than they are for CVs in many other professions. Project manager’s ultimate goal is to deliver projects to high standards and within time parameters and requirements.

What better way is there to show off your ability to do this than by using numbers?

Here is an example:

'Delivered the project 4 weeks ahead of schedule, which resulted in a cost saving of 40k'.

In this example, the use of numbers ensures the claim is much more specific than simply stating that the project was delivered ahead of schedule. When numbers are included in this way, it almost provides your statements with a guarantee as you’re being so specific.

To use numbers, data and statistics effectively in your CV, analyse your project documentation. Look at the targets that you worked to and find out what you achieved against those targets.

For example, if you were set a target of reducing costs by 10%, find out the total expenditure numbers and identify the percentage you reduced costs by.

Another way of locating such achievements if you don’t have access to such information is to ask previous colleagues for project evaluation reports. These may provide you with a long list of achievements to boast of in your new CV. Of course, ensure this information isn't confidential before requesting it.

To see how a project manager’s full career history should be presented, take a look at our sample project manager CV in this guide.

After adding your career history to your CV, include your education and training details.

Start with your degree or your highest form of education. You should also include any additional information with your degree, if it is relevant in any way to project management.

For example, you may want to include your dissertation title or modules completed. If your degree is in a project management related field, including the modules of your degree can be a good way of showing off valued skills.

If you’re a graduate seeking an entry level role in project management, with no project management experience, education should be the focal point of your CV. In this case, you should use your education to showcase skills and knowledge gained, which you can utilise as a project manager.

For example, if you graduated with a degree in management, including modules related budget management shows your knowledge of key project management processes. For further advice on how to write an effective graduate CV, take a look at this article we produced on the topic.

Include any project management qualifications you have obtained, such as Prince2, as well as any other relevant training you have completed.

If you’ve attended any project management workshops, ensure to include those too.

The final step involves providing any other relevant information that you haven’t already included, such as language skills, licences and clearances.

Software proficiency is one of the most important pieces of additional information to include. If you're adept with any project management software packages, detail them here.

Additionally, if you're a member of any associations or organisations related to project management, this is the place to highlight it.

As you’re reaching the end of our guide, we’ve decided to provide you with a few bonus tips to ensure your CV makes an even stronger impact.

Include your job title – Project Manager –at the top of your CV. This will ensure it is easy for the HR department to identify you operate in project management and categorise your CV. Make the text larger than the body text and ensure the text is in bold so it stands out.

As you will see in the project manager CV sample in the guide, the headline stands out and ensures the hiring manager can quickly see the role that the candidate specialises in.

Include a brief headline below your job title and above your professional profile. The headline should be no more than 15 words. The aim of this headline is to give a quick, brief outline of your capabilities as a project manager.

Here is an example: “Project Manager with 8 years’ experience leading multi-million-pound projects across 4 countries”.

With this headline, the individual’s key qualities have been showcased: his project management capabilities, his experience managing large-scale projects and his experience managing projects on a global scale.

When this powerful headline is inserted at the top of the project manager's CV, it is the first piece of information that comes to the attention of the reader. As such, it makes a powerful impact and impresses the reader.

Identify your key project management qualities and communicate this in your headline. Take a look at the project manager CV sample in this guide to see how we made the project manager stand out with a strong headline.

Your project management CV should be two-pages long. Some people recommend one-page CVs, but this won’t give you enough space to effectively demonstrate your experiences. If necessary, you can extend your CV to three-pages, but no more than that.

Technology has become a significant part of the modern-day job market. Many HR departments use Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) to scan and filter CVs based on specific keywords. As such, it’s important to ensure your CV is prepared in line with the requirements of ATS and contains the necessary keywords to ensure you pass through the system.

ATS ranks candidate’s CVs based on keywords related to skills, company names, years of experience and universities/schools attended.

As such, you need to ensure you include the relevant keywords, including specific skills. These include project management, project implementation, project delivery, risk management, quality control and stakeholder management.

However, don’t unnaturally fill your CV with buzzwords. We review many CVs here at CV Nation that have been populated with an excessive number of keywords.

This makes the writing seem unnatural and it won’t help your application. Instead, identify the buzzwords that you need to include and ensure they come across in a natural fashion, rather than shoehorning them into your CV.

As a project manager, you will probably already have a broad knowledge of the most important skills that recruiters expect in employees. To ensure your CV doesn’t get stopped by the bots, write about these skills in your CV.

Your CV should be broken up into six sections: contact details, professional profile (personal statement), key skills, professional experience, education and additional information. Ensure these sections are clearly separated by professional borders and use adequate spacing.

View our in-depth guide on CV format, which includes 12 CV examples.

Aim for margin sizes of between 2 and 2.5 cm (0.78” and 0.98” if you’re in the United States). The margins shouldn’t be too wide or too narrow.

Ensure the sections of your CV are uniform and consistent. For example, if you decide to use 12 pt. size for the professional profile’s section heading, ensure to use the same size on all section headings.

Don’t use large blocks of text. Large blocks of text make for an unpleasant reading experience and they make the key information difficult to locate. Recruiters won’t usually have time to skim through big blocks of text. Make the key information easy to identify by using bullet points.

Additionally, make sure your page transitions are neat. Ensure there are no single words or small sentences trailing over onto the second page. This looks untidy and unprofessional.

To fix page transition issues, you may have to alter the margin size. Decreasing the size of the bottom margin will enable you to include more content on the first page before the page transition.

Write your CV in Microsoft Word. It’s one of the best word processors on the market and it’s fully compatible with Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS). Certain files, other than Microsoft Word files, are not compatible with ATS.

For more detailed assistance with formatting your CV, view our in-depth guide on how to write a CV.

Use a font that is easy to read and professional in appearance, such as Calibri, Times New Roman or Arial. Select a font size between 10 and 12. Any smaller than 10 will prove too difficult to read, and any larger than 12 will not look professional.

Of course, the font size can change in line with how much content you are working with, but stay between these guidelines.

As previously mentioned, you should include a link to your LinkedIn profile at the top of your CV, with your contact details.

LinkedIn is one of the most effective tools for professionals, with huge numbers of recruiters using the platform to source and recruit talent. And what better way for you to stand out as a project manager than linking to an optimised LinkedIn profile that highlights the key projects you have successfully delivered.

LinkedIn is a great tool for project managers because it offers the opportunity to highlight specific projects on your profile.

To add a project to your LinkedIn profile, click the ‘Me’ icon and then click ‘View Profile’. Select ‘Accomplishments’ from the ‘Add Profile’ section on the right, before clicking the ‘Add’ icon next to ‘Projects’. Then provide some engaging information about two or three of your key projects. Ensure these details show how you achieved success in project management.

If your LinkedIn profile has an enticing headline and summary, adding some of these projects will provide great value by showcasing your ability to excel as a project manager.

Hopefully you have found this guide helpful in preparing the perfect project management CV.

Remember to proofread your CV to ensure it is void of mistakes that may make your document look unprofessional. View CV Nation's proofreading services.

As indicated earlier in this guide, project management is a growing industry. Investing time and effort in creating a strong project management CV can pay dividends in the long run. Use the tips and advice provided in this guide to make the most of the opportunities that are expected to present themselves in the coming years.

View 20 of the most common project management job interview questions and how to answer them. Or check out our three great project management cover letter examples.

If you feel you could benefit from further assistance with your CV, feel free to check out our comprehensive guide on how to write a CV.