Achieving APM chartership through consultancy work

The Chartered Project Professional (ChPP) standard is a benchmark that demonstrates attainment of a defined level of professional practice, technical knowledge, and ethical behaviour. To apply you must meet the required criteria and be able to evidence experience of delivering projects, programmes, portfolios (P3M) or a key control or enabling function. You must also have up-to-date knowledge of current practices and methods within the profession and be able to evidence your development as a project professional through continuing professional development (CPD).

Undertaking consultancy work with clients is a great way of not only helping solve problems for businesses, but it also provides an opportunity to support your own wider ambitions. It is a fantastic way to enhance knowledge and experience, and obtain credible evidence to meet the requirements of the chartered standard. Here are the ways in which you can align your consultancy work to achieve chartership:

Professional practice

There are nine mandatory competencies plus a choice of either budgeting and cost control, or financial management, along with two elective competency areas that you need to provide evidence for when applying for the chartered standard. One approach to help with this is to draw upon your experiences in helping clients improve their project controls. Perhaps you have undertaken maturity assessments of their capabilities, improved management approaches to risks or scheduling, or helped to evolve an organisation’s PMO’s control function. Uplifting a client’s capability in project controls is an invaluable exercise as they align well to the professional competencies needed for chartership. Reviewing and improving controls will allow you to immerse yourself in the basics of project practice allowing you to re-familiarise yourself with competencies such as quality management, resource management, and governance; just some of the competencies you need to have professional practice in for chartership.

Technical knowledge

As part of consultancy work, you may often be asked to help restructure or introduce P3M tools and processes into a client’s organisation. Crafting and developing risk registers, benefit maps, or change control methods for example, will build your technical experience in the fundamentals of project management. It will also enable you to build more evidence of understanding the technicalities of chartership competencies as you’ll be able to cite real life examples of where you’ve actively developed and used your technical knowledge of project management. Aside from moulding project management tools like risk registers, you may also come across organisations who are stuck in unproductive ways of working. Clients who may still rely on costing and tracking projects through comparative or parametric estimates will enjoy real value when you demonstrate other advanced methods of costing and forecasting such as earned value management. Through doing this, you’ll help yourself relearn additional technical methods within project management whilst helping your client.

Continuing professional development

Finally, you must be able to demonstrate continuing professional development and again, your consultancy work can help with this. Conducting knowledge sharing with clients on project management practices, mentoring junior project practitioners within your own consultancy teams, and undertaking further P3M qualifications for yourself can all count towards CPD. It is also important to continually review and update your CPD log to maintain chartership once attained.

Helping clients and helping yourself

Consultancy work not only helps clients but can also help you by providing the necessary skills, competencies, and evidence needed for chartership. It was important for me to gain chartership, not only for my own personal credibility and recognised growth as a project professional, but to improve and help me in my consulting work benefitting my current and future clients.