You are a PMP, Congratulations. Now, what.. next?

You have passed your PMP Exam, indeed a sheer milestone you achieved in your career and in your professional certification journey. Your hard work finally paid off. But now what? How can you leverage this globally highly recognized prestigious certification in your profession and in your career ahead?

First thing first. Celebrate your success and say “thank you” to your mentors, coaches, your network, and of course your family without whom you cannot be where you are now.

Second. Sell, Sell and Sell. Update your CV, your #linkedin profile, and share within your network and other professional networks. It might sound harsh but true is you have to sell yourself. You are the product, you know yourself better than anyone else and you should be the best marketer ever to sell yourself. You have spent money, effort and proved yourself, what are you capable of. Now take your chances and explore every bit of opportunities. But you know opportunities will not always come by at doorsteps, you need to step up to open the doors for yourself.

Third. Selling should start with your own organization. Earning #certification is one thing but implementing project management practices within your own way of working and in the organization is another thing. Needless to say, this is the most difficult part. People often show frustrations that his/her organization is not recognizing them and certification is not adding any value to their career ladder inside the organization. Unless otherwise, you can show management that your #pmpcertification is adding value to the organization, it will not create any difference in the mindset of the management. Start with baby steps, if needed, take advice from your network, mentors and show your management the “value of good project management”. The “value” to the organization will bring ‘value’ to your career. So start now, bring the change, you are the change leader.

Fourth. Network, Network, and Network. Someone said it rightly, “no network”, means “no work”. You don’t know where the opportunity may bubble up. Show up yourself, participate, share, contribute to your network. This will certainly be going to pay off today or tomorrow.

Fifth. PMI is a great organization to work within different volunteer capacities through local chapters and global level opportunities. Nowadays, volunteer activities are considered in high regard and show your commitment to the community and society as a whole. It will certainly give you an edge. And, again you never know, wherefrom some great opportunities might appear. Don’t wait. Visit https://vrms.pmi.org/ now:

and update your volunteer profile, select your interest area, and don’t forget to enable email notifications shown below:

Sixth. You know, leaders never stop learning. As a #pmp certified Project Leader you have to keep striving to learn new toolkits, methods, techniques, knowledge and become a go-getters person in your domain.

Seventh. You might wonder, what else, Mr. #shahidreza going to write. Personally, I believe knowledge grows through dissemination. Share your thoughts and ideas in the comments so that we can all grow together and make our world a beautiful place to live.