As I matured in my role, progressing to senior project manager, I built on my experience. The scopes of work in my control naturally evolved in both size and complexity, soon I found myself coordinating global resources to deliver large programs of work. It was at this point I discovered my other passion, process excellence and the drive to introduce standards and workflows into my project management. I quickly realised to be effective I needed structure and efficiency in my approach. Luckily this is where 6 Sigma and formal methodologies came into play. I got myself black belt trained and soon became the subject matter expert in Method 1, our project delivery methodology at the time. Having the opportunity to establish and nurture our teams’ project delivery processes was invaluable and I certainly learnt a lot along the way!
At this point, I was still naive with respect to the possibilities of Freelancer workforces but this would shortly change.
Once again opportunity came knocking and I had the option to break away from my comfort zone and start my own business. Taking this step was not without risk and frankly at times pretty frightening but with courage, determination and of course support from my business partner, who happened to be my wife, we were successful. It took 6 months, all of my knowledge and experience from my 11 years at Caterpillar but we had a successful Healthcare business. Moving into an industry sector I knew nothing about was a challenge, but it taught me to leverage experts to build on my own skills. Collaboration was the key to success and it was at this point I started to realise the amazing potential of the Freelance workforce.
Things were going well and I started to find myself with free time, I was soon approached by a previous colleague, Tim Davies, who offered me the chance to lead a global program of work for an Enterprise client but utilising remote Freelancers. I was intrigued, having only heard about such models I had to get involved and learn more! I found myself in an amazing new role, working from home, able to spend time with my family and handsomely rewarded for the results I produced, indeed I had to pinch myself but this new way of working really was something else! Soon I was leading multiple programs of work for several fortune 500 clients and loving it, the best part was seeing the results, significant cost savings and consistently reduced time to hire. I expanded my knowledge immensely, delivering projects in new sectors and meeting some incredible talent along the way. It didn’t take long before I was approached for a permanent role as an Enterprise Engagement manager. I jumped at the chance to further my knowledge in this new way of working. For the next year and a half, I supported the deployment of a remote talent solution into multiple Enterprise client’s businesses around the world.
During this role, I gained valuable insight into the client’s needs and pain points related to remote delivery models. I started to imagine the evolution and what could come next, how could we make this even better and support the inevitable massive scale to come? So again, I took a deep breath and changed direction leaving my role as an Engagement Manager. This was not a decision I took lightly, arguably this was the best job in my career so far but the excitement of what could be was too strong a motivator.
Partnering with Tim, we took our first step on the bold journey to change the way we work forever, starting our company Projekt Rising. Our vision is to introduce a new intelligence to project management, enabling the repeatable delivery of any project by the best teams located anywhere in the world. We understand the model today, we know the weaknesses and we know how it can be better. I am genuinely excited about what is to come and look forward to sharing more with the world shortly.
As we move forward we are looking for select clients to join us on our adventure. If you would like to know more or have a project you think would be a good fit, please get in touch to see how we can help.