Here is a video and its transcript about the most in-demand roles and jobs expected related to consulting and program management in 2019, 2020, and beyond. The most in-demand skills are also discussed in the video.

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— Transcript —

Hello…This is another episode to get you up to speed on the latest trends, insights, and best practices related to the area of consulting , leadership, and project and program management.

Today, I will be talking about the consulting and management roles and jobs that most likely will be in high demand in the year 2019 and even in the year 2019 and the skills that you will need to stay relevant in this very fast-changing market. Before I begin, please ensure that you subscribe to my channel for more episodes that I record on these topics related to consulting, leadership, and project and program management. You can also connect with me on Linkedin to learn from my experiences in the area of consulting and management.

Linkedin recently announced a list of top promising jobs for this year. You may or may not know but as Linkedin runs the largest network of business and technology professionals, they use that data to glean useful insights about what’s hot and trending in the professional services marketplace. So, based on that recently released information and based on my experiences in the industry, I would like to share three key points with you.

First, let’s get back to that list, which shows that a number of management and consulting related jobs are on that list of in demand and promising jobs for 2019, 2020 and beyond. And in my view, this won’t change much in 2019 as well due to the large scale transformation programs that are going on in the industry. So, if you are an experienced program manager or engagement manager with the right skills or working to become one, there is potentially a great demand for your role in the current job market. The important thing you should note here is that not only you should have good consulting and management skills and you should have that mindset but you should also have skills in other technology areas where you can apply those consulting and management skills. I cover those technology areas a bit later in this episode.

So, among the in demand and promising jobs that Linkedin had identified, the following pertains to consulting and management:

  1. Program manager
  2. Technical Program Manager
  3. Engagement Manager
  4. Product Manager
  5. Sales Director
  6. Customer Success Manager
  7. Enterprise Account Manager

Most of these jobs and roles are kind of related and the reason I say that is because most of these jobs usually build on the same foundation of knowledge and soft skills that people should have to become successful in those roles. I will cover those skills and roles a bit later in this presentation.

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The second point that I would like to point out is that to be a successful consultant and manager, you must also have skills in certain specialized areas where you could apply your skills of a consultant and manager. So, to work as a successful program manager in leading cloud migration projects and programs, for example, you must have certain technical knowledge in the area of cloud and distributed computing. So, let’s review those skills. The following are currently in high demand in the technology industry and if you are a program manager with knowledge on the following, you could see great opportunities for yourself:

  1. Cloud and Distributed Computing
  2. Middleware and Integration Software
  3. Web Architecture and Development
  4. User Interface Design
  5. Big Data and Analytics
  6. Online and Mobile Marketing
  7. Mobile and IoT Development
  8. Network and Information Security
  9. Artificial Intelligence Applications

So, the message here is that good consultants and managers in these areas should have little difficulty in finding good career opportunities.

The third and final point is that consultants and managers must have certain essential skills for them to be successful. Although there are a number of those skills, today I would like to cover three of those skills that consultants and managers must cultivate to be successful. This is based on industry insights as well as is based on my experience working as a consultant and manager working for the top organizations in the industry for the past many years. So, here are the three skills of the many others that you must have.

  • The first skill is about being able to think strategically – This is very important as all successful consultants and managers have the capability to think strategically. So, what does it mean to think strategically? People who think strategically always maintain an overall perspective of things that they are working on and ensure that their assignment’s or project or program’s outcomes and objectives are aligned to that overall picture. So, for example, an entrepreneur who works tirelessly to work on a product or service to make his or her business successful, never lets go of the overall picture of the market, the competition, and how their business is going to operate in that larger ecosystem. Another attribute of strategic thinking is to be able to constantly apply lessons learned and insights that one learns along their journey to success and to use those to adjust ones day to day tactics. So, consultants and managers must always have this ability to think strategically about all their projects, programs, and assignments that they are working on.
  • The second skill or quality is about having the ability to lead. A successful consultant or a manager – be that a project or program manager or some other type of manager must possess strong leadership skills. This is because as a consultant and manager one interacts with a large team of professionals and executives and has to not only deliver tangible business benefits but during that course has to use a lot of other soft skills such as team building, influencing, and so on to be able to deliver the program and its benefits to the organization. So, if you are a consultant or a manager, take the time to constantly assess your leadership skills and work on them as you will always need them to deliver real results.
  • The third skill that I would like to highlight is that all consultants and managers must be fast learners. That’s because whether you are consulting or managing teams, the people around you will count on you to lead them through the resolution of their problems and challenges. And in doing so, you will be constantly forced to learn new technologies, skills, and methods so you can be there when those people are relying on you for that guidance. As a result, being a fast learner is not just a nice to have but an essential skill for your success.

So, that’s it for today. Hope you have learned something from this session and that you can use these insights to become successful as a consultant and a senior manager. Make sure that you sign-up at CorpExcellence.com to be able to watch more of such learning videos.

— End

 

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