The slowdown in infrastructure investment by economic giants the US and China, and exacerbated by the trade war between the two is causing projects to get deferred, delayed or cancelled altogether.
While some project controls professionals are concerned about their ability to consistently generate revenue during the slowdown, others will use the downtime strategically.
Savvy planners know the global economy swings back and forth between high and low growth periods on average, every ten years. As such, they plan their career development around this cycle. When projects are plentiful, these planners get to work, proving their abilities and strengthening relationships. During the slow down they leverage the gaps between projects to bolster their skills, experience and training.
Unsurprisingly, when work is abundant, professional development initiatives become a lower priority. While a common practice, it is inadvisable to allow credentials to stagnate in a slower economy. Senior planners in competition for opportunities with a new generation of incoming planning professionals, may find themselves overlooked in favour of those with more up to date technical skills and training.
The best training programs to invest in during a slower economy possess three characteristics:
Widely adopted technology.
It would be fruitless to allocate resources to becoming adept at using a tool no one has heard of. When assessing professional development training for a career boost, ensure the training has high adoption rates across targeted industries and companies.
Proven ability to deliver value.
As resource allocation comes under tighter scrutiny, many non critical expenditures will be eliminated. Preference will be given to methods proven to provide ROI.
In demand, yet uncommon skill set.
Specialized training in a skill set that is in demand, but rarely found among your peers is a shrewd way to quickly bolster a CV.
TILOS linear scheduling software training provides a competitive advantage for project professionals.
A tool that meets the three criteria for a good investment in professional development is TILOS.
TILOS, the linear project scheduling and planning tool, was in use for over two decades in the linear planning space before being acquired by construction giant TRIMBLE. Adopted by some of the globe’s largest energy and infrastructure organizations, TILOS has an impressive track record of performance in both the private and public sectors.
Seamlessly integrating with P6 and MS Project, as well as projects manually created in Excel, TILOS is valued for its ability to eliminate black holes and provide 100% transparency to what work has been done where along the baseline. In advance of project ramp up and commencement, TILOS also helps forecast clashes and other issues that have the potential to derail the project timeline and budget.
Although TILOS has widespread adoption globally, it’s still a relatively uncommon skill set for project planners to possess. Often, a project owner company will require the use of TILOS on a project. Then, contractors, engineers and planning companies will source specialized consultants like Petroglyph Projects USA to train their teams and assist with implementation and project ramp up.
The project professionals that possess expertise in the use of TILOS generally flourish in their careers. Developing a reputation for bringing derailed projects back on track keeps them busy, no matter what the economy is doing.
When it comes to large projects with multi millions at stake, project planners with expertise using TILOS will not find themselves without plentiful work.
