Dedicated Microsoft Project Planner / Scheduler

I am a PRINCE2 Certified, dedicated Microsoft Project Planner / Scheduler.

I have over twelve years’ experience as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) in Microsoft Project (MSP) working within Portfolio (PPM), Programme and Project PMO environments, for Government Departments and in the Private sector.

I have worked across several sectors; IT, Construction, Manufacture, Aviation, Health Care, and Financial Services. Across a wide range of programme types; Change, Transformation, Infrastructure, Integration, Data Migration, HR, SAP, Procurement, Testing, Rollout and Deployment programmes. Either in a Prince2 or Agile environment. Thus, my Microsoft Project planning skills are transferable across all industry sectors.

I am a flexible, pro-active team member. I have excellent organisational skills and able to prioritise my own workload; I am self-motivated and able to work autonomously. I can keep my composure whilst working under pressure and to tight deadlines. I am well organised and take a methodical approach, with a focus on delivery. I able to operate in a strong team environment and able to liaise with colleagues and stakeholders of all levels. I provide support and motivation to others in the team. I have excellent communication and interpersonal skills with an ability to interact effectively at all levels within and outside an organisation.

OVERVIEW OF MY ROLE AS A PLANNER / SCHEDULER
My principle role is to provide a hands-on approach to assist the plan owners to produce their (end-to-end) individual Microsoft Project plans and develop stakeholder relationships, be it internal or external of the organisation structure.

Providing support to the PMO by constantly considering the “bigger picture” approach to the programmes long term planning.

My initial task is to produce and manage; logic driven, fully resourced, costed and cross project inter-dependencies plans. These plans will be eventually handed over to the plan owners for ownership. Constantly providing support / mentoring the plan owners on the use of MSP at our regular weekly update sessions.

Building a working relationship with the key stakeholders, be it internal or external of the organisation structure.

I have found that most my clients have little or no planning processes and quality standards established. Which introduces risk into the Projects. This leaves the managers under a great deal of stress and unable to meet their deliverable requirements.

My role is to take control of the situation; work alongside the plan owners to develop, maintain and advise on improvements to their schedules to allow the Managers to deliver their key deliverables on time and to budget. I try to take a pragmatic and flexible approach whilst maintaining and enforcing necessary standards.

This is a challenging process, as most organisations and managers do not like change. I have learnt to balance the introduction of new ideas and practices because of the reluctance to change. This is achieved by knowledge sharing, demonstration, training, identifying requirements and building relationships with the key people.