Most of my project management experience is with projects that are about 25-30 hours each with very similar tasks and deliverables. I asked the PMI chatbot how to record these and was told that each project needs to be an individual entry on the application. I would need to enter over 75 individual projects if this is the case, and most of the entries would be nearly identical aside from the dates. Is there a better way for me to enter this experience? (Or, if it needs to be individual, is there a tool where I can import this experience in from a .csv or .xlsx file?) Saving Changes...
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten AssociatesNew Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
Meghan, this sounds more like you're managing operational or repeatable work rather than distinct, standalone projects. If each effort is only 25–30 hours and the tasks/deliverables are nearly identical, PMI may view this as operational work unless you frame it correctly.
That said, it's not reasonable, or necessary, to record 75 nearly identical entries. Instead, you should group them together in your application as a program or series of similar projects, provided they shared the same objectives, client, or workflow. PMI allows grouping in cases like this, especially when the work follows a repeatable pattern and you're performing the same role.
In your application, summarize the group as a single entry and clearly explain that it represents a series of similar small-scale projects. Be sure to include the total time frame, your cumulative hours, a brief description of your responsibilities across all projects, and how you applied project management processes across Initiating, Planning, Executing, Monitoring/Controlling, and Closing. Make sure to keep your descriptions aligned with PMI’s 5 project management domains.
Also, note that PMI doesn't currently support importing entries from Excel or CSV files, so everything needs to be entered manually.
Hope this helps - Good Luck!
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1 reply by Meghan Blanton
Jun 06, 2025 1:39 PM
Meghan Blanton
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This is great feedback, thank you, Rami.
In this instance I do believe it's project work instead of operational. I provided photography services where timeline, scope, photography requirements, and budget were unique to each client's event. However, in a high level description I feel like all of the tasks completed are still worded the same. For example, "(IN) Conducted discovery consultation to assess client vision, style preferences, and timeline needs" would be the same for each project even though the results of that discovery are different.
Is there a good way to frame this so it is clear it's project and not operational work?
Meghan, this sounds more like you're managing operational or repeatable work rather than distinct, standalone projects. If each effort is only 25–30 hours and the tasks/deliverables are nearly identical, PMI may view this as operational work unless you frame it correctly.
That said, it's not reasonable, or necessary, to record 75 nearly identical entries. Instead, you should group them together in your application as a program or series of similar projects, provided they shared the same objectives, client, or workflow. PMI allows grouping in cases like this, especially when the work follows a repeatable pattern and you're performing the same role.
In your application, summarize the group as a single entry and clearly explain that it represents a series of similar small-scale projects. Be sure to include the total time frame, your cumulative hours, a brief description of your responsibilities across all projects, and how you applied project management processes across Initiating, Planning, Executing, Monitoring/Controlling, and Closing. Make sure to keep your descriptions aligned with PMI’s 5 project management domains.
Also, note that PMI doesn't currently support importing entries from Excel or CSV files, so everything needs to be entered manually.
Hope this helps - Good Luck!
This is great feedback, thank you, Rami.
In this instance I do believe it's project work instead of operational. I provided photography services where timeline, scope, photography requirements, and budget were unique to each client's event. However, in a high level description I feel like all of the tasks completed are still worded the same. For example, "(IN) Conducted discovery consultation to assess client vision, style preferences, and timeline needs" would be the same for each project even though the results of that discovery are different.
Is there a good way to frame this so it is clear it's project and not operational work?
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1 reply by Rami Kaibni
Jun 06, 2025 1:49 PM
Rami Kaibni
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The best way to frame your experience is to align it with the five domains, PM terminology and tasks!
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten AssociatesNew Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
Jun 06, 2025 1:39 PM
Replying to Meghan Blanton
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This is great feedback, thank you, Rami.
In this instance I do believe it's project work instead of operational. I provided photography services where timeline, scope, photography requirements, and budget were unique to each client's event. However, in a high level description I feel like all of the tasks completed are still worded the same. For example, "(IN) Conducted discovery consultation to assess client vision, style preferences, and timeline needs" would be the same for each project even though the results of that discovery are different.
Is there a good way to frame this so it is clear it's project and not operational work?
The best way to frame your experience is to align it with the five domains, PM terminology and tasks! Saving Changes...
In case your application does get audited, you should try to change up the descriptions of what you did on each project - emphasize certain key processes in one and different ones in another.
Also, remember that the experience needs to be non-overlapping in terms of months of project management experience. In other words, if you worked on two projects in June 2024, you would only claim one month (not two).
Kiron Saving Changes...
Con O DonovanProject Manager| Foxit SoftwareDublin, Ireland
If I can jump in here please?
My projects fit the traditional model (I am relieved to say) but I tend to manage several at a time. I understand that I cannot list overlapping projects but this leaves me with a question:
Taking 2025 so far, as an example: I have been managing 4 projects. They all overlap (a lot) but each probably only represents, on average say, 25% of my time. If I list one project will this count as 8 months experience are as 25% of 8 months?
ie Will the hours worked be the determination or the months?
Or could I bundle related projects into a program? In my case it would be reasonable to consider some of them to be closely related with significant overlaps on Stakeholder and Resource domains.
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