7 Project Management Skills for a Successful Resume

Being a Project Manager is no walk in the park. In a role with such responsibility and accountability, you need the wherewithal to juggle many skills at any one time.

• Is the project management team fulfilled and happy? 

• If not, how can you change that? 

• Is the project on track to hit the set deadline and achieve all objectives while remaining within the set budget? 

• Are you engaging enough with key stakeholders to keep them up-to-date and fully informed of progress?

It’s a minefield of tasks, situations to manage, and people to keep sweet.

So, how do you go about showing that you have the perfect attributes of a Project Manager by conveying these skills on your resume? And what are the main skills of project management?

Here at ZipJob, we have the answers you need. This article will detail the 7 definitive project management skills required for a successful resume so that anyone picking up your job-search document will be impressed by your clarity, project management experience, and articulate nature.

And that’s not all.

There’s advice on how to improve those skills, along with excellent examples of how to add these 7 project management skills to your resume — examples that you can tailor to your own specific requirements. 

The top 7 project management skills

Let’s lay it on the line here — these are the top 7 skills you need to make it in project management. Some are soft skills, and some are hard skills, as you need a combination of both to make it. 

1. Leadership

You’re the head of the project management team; therefore, you need to lead it. There are many different styles of leadership — from the hands on, all guns blazing type of leader to the more laid-back one. And with almost 40% of project teams made up of between 6 and 10 members, leadership is a crucial element. 

There’s a fine line between having enough team members with whom to share responsibilities but not so many people that the focus gets lost or the personal touch of team engagement goes awry.

Being a solid leader requires stamina, personable traits, and the ability to guide your team through challenges and rough patches, which will inevitably arise. But it’s also so much more than that. 

You need an X factor — that attribute you can’t necessarily learn or put your finger on — that inspires others to want to achieve.

Learning to be a great leader comes with practice, as well as growing and developing your project management expertise.

How to improve your leadership skills

Think about those leaders you admire. Emulate those traits they display that you covet. Other practical solutions are taking relevant courses, practicing disciplines, learning from failures, and seeking out a mentor for further support and advice.

Project management skills examples – how to add leadership to your resume

You can’t just put “Excellent leader” on your resume and think that will suffice. It won’t. Anyone can write that. You have got to quantify why. 

Use the examples below to guide you on how to add your leadership qualities to your resume.

2. Organization

We all knew this would be on here, didn’t we? It might seem like a cliché, but being organized and driving that through to the rest of the team is vital when moving forward with a project, whatever type it is. Being organized includes many associated sub-skills, from planning the project in detail and time management to seeing the bigger picture. While you’ve got to be organized yourself, the team is relying on you for guidance as well.

How to improve your organizational skills

A simple yet effective idea is to make sure that your and the team's calendars are updated regularly so everyone can keep track of vital milestones and tasks. It also provides a way to see when people are on vacation and identify any possible resourcing issues before they become a problem.

While cell phones are ubiquitous in the workplace, don’t be afraid to turn off notifications and tune out so you can give your full attention to a particular activity.

Project management skill examples – how to add organization to your resume

• Transform a dysfunctional matrix into a customer-centric acceptance through an organizational redesign that embraces Lean manufacturing and gives a voice to the customer.

• Lead comprehensive continuous improvement initiatives that enhance organizational growth.

• Develop and implement systems and processes that ensure effective tracking and management of all contractual obligations across the group.

• Regularly update workstream leads with the latest forecasts while highlighting risks and opportunities.

3. Communication

The key here is tailoring your communication style depending on who you’re conversing with. It’s also about portraying your message in a clear and concise way while keeping everyone on board and without rubbing people up the wrong way.

While there are many ways to do this, email is still the most popular way of communicating with colleagues and stakeholders, with 55% of those surveyed citing it as their top choice.

How to improve your communication skills

Engage in active listening and then ask pertinent questions. That way, the person you’re communicating with will know that you’ve taken their points on board and are interested enough to want to know more.

Provide action-orientated and specific feedback to improve team performance, providing a clear path of where to go next by articulating effectively and efficiently. 

Project management skills examples – how to add effective communication to your resume

• Pave the way for the opening of new business channels with wholesale due to superior negotiation.

• Increase customer satisfaction rating by 10% by introducing improved ways of working with team communication.

• Cultivate productive working relationships with buyers to expand the client database by 17%.

• Instigate a social event and catch-up session, encouraging increased interaction and connection between staff members with very positive feedback.

4. Resolving Problems

Channeling your analytical and critical thinking skills, as well as applying lateral and pragmatic approaches, will help resolve problems. This is also a good time to show flexibility and demonstrate how well you adapt to anything that is thrown at you during the scope of a project.

How to improve your problem-solving skills

Face any mistakes you make during a problem-solving activity and learn from these.

Take time away from work to solve puzzles and brain games in order to sharpen your mind.

Don’t panic and run around like a headless chicken! Instead, remain calm and focused, using breathing techniques if this helps.

Project management skills examples – how to add problem resolution to your resume

• Successfully conquer challenges, including difficult ground and excessive floatation problems, to complete a 3.3km tunnel at a depth of 50m.

• Overcome numerous conflicts with subcontractors to maintain client satisfaction by remaining flexible while steering projects forward.

• Identify the only viable solution to fixing major issues related to the delivery of hardware following the failure of 4 out of 7 units during testing.

• Master conflict situations to achieve safe working conditions, saving the company from potential breaches of legislation, accidents, loss of reputation, and increased insurance premiums.

5. Collaboration

This is all about pulling together as a team by being a team player and acting as the team leader. You need to balance leadership with working in a cohesive manner that springs the project in the right direction.

How to improve your collaborative skills

Don’t be afraid to share your ideas about a project, no matter how silly they might seem. You never know; it could spark a conversation that leads to resolving something.

Learn to trust each other. This is invaluable as, without trust in a team, there’s nothing. It means trusting that individual members will complete their tasks on time without having to breathe down their necks.

Project management skills examples – how to add collaboration to your resume

• Pull together as a team to increase production levels by 42%.

• Motivate the team through change, including 40% company headcount cuts and triple workload over 12 months, without any resignations.

• Mentor new Project Managers, ensuring they had the right training and access to processes, tools, and techniques required to hit the ground running.

• Introduce rewards, including Employee of the Year Award, and effective development/training programs to incentivize staff and enhance team performance.

6. Adaptability

Admire your detailed and well-thought-out plan while you can. It won’t stay like that for long! Nothing is ever straightforward, so to be an outstanding Project Manager, you must be adaptable and flexible. Plans might change because you see the direction that the project is taking isn’t going to work or for reasons outside your control, such as a change in requirements from a client.

Whatever the reason, you need to adapt to these changes, and fast, but without losing sight of the entire plan or having to start all over again.

How to improve your adaptability skills

Thoroughly assess any changes in the environment before acting on them. This will give you the time to think through your next course of action before taking what could be seen as a hasty decision.

Adopt agile and flexible thinking so you can see things from another point of view.

Don’t be afraid of change — it’s a given, so embrace it and learn from it.

Project management skills examples – how to add adaptability to your resume

7. Strategic Planning

As part of the organizational side of being a Project Manager, strategic planning is a process by which businesses identify project goals, then pinpoint the strategies needed to achieve the goals and the systems required to track and evaluate progress.

How to improve your planning skills

Lists are always helpful, where you can see what needs to be done in a day, so create a list of tasks, then prioritize and assign them to relevant members of the team.

Simplify the task allocation and tracking by utilizing task management software.

If it’s helpful, break down the tasks into more manageable chunks, compile an action plan, and identify the resources needed to complete it all.

Project management skills examples – how to add strategic planning to your resume

• Decrease product lead time from 39 days to 14 by enhancing strategic planning and sales qualities.

• Establish new HR practices to ensure the business has key personnel and succession plans in place to meet future needs and objectives.

• Drive forward on the project management lifecycle from design and build to the opening of five new stores.

• Explain the impact of strategic decisions on company finances and prepare scenarios on a new booking system, the impact of currency movements on annual profit, and airline failures.

Go for it!

Now that you have the knowledge of how to spruce up project management skills on your resume, it’s time to gather all your well-honed attributes together and incorporate them into your job-search documents using the guidelines above.

Delve into ZipJob’s free resume review tool for more advice and tips on how to improve your resume from the get-go. It will help focus the mind on either where you’re going wrong or where you can improve for a better chance of securing an interview.

Recommended reading:

• 99+ Essential Keywords and Phrases for Impactful Resumes

• Utilizing the STAR Method in Resume Writing

• Describing Yourself in a Resume: Effective Strategies