 |
 |
|
|
|
204.0 Process Overview |
 |
PMOStep contains information to help establish a Project Management Office (PMO)
and determine the products and services the PMO will offer. Once the PMO is
established, there is a description of a holistic approach to deploy project
management processes within an organization. The important services are then
covered in greater detail. Templates are also provided within PMOStep to
save a PMO time and effort. The general PMOStep Process is as follows:
Definition
The definition process is done first. There are many kinds of PMOs, so you
must first go through a process to determine what type of PMO makes most
sense for your organization. This section explains the process of
determining the PMO mission, vision, clients, products, services, etc. This
information provides the foundation for everything that the PMO subsequently
does. This process gives you the information you need to know what you
should be doing, who your clients are, what your products and services will
be, etc. If you have an existing PMO, but are struggling, this would also be
the place to revisit. Many times, a PMO will charge off with an aggressive
idea of what they need to do, even though their clients and sponsors never
validated the underlying assumptions.
Roles
A successful PMO relies on people who are performing in one or more roles.
Roles are useful to ensure that members of the PMO understand what is
expected of them. Roles also can ensure that all of the obligations and
responsibilities of the PMO are covered. This keeps the PMO from the
uncomfortable position of not knowing who is covering what areas. Roles help
ensure that no PMO obligations are dropped and that multiple people are not
unknowingly doing the same jobs. This section describes a number of roles
within the PMO. A very large PMO could end up filling most or all of these
roles, although certainly one person could serve more than one role. Smaller
PMOs may not need to fill all of the roles.
Deployment
This section describes how
you would go about deploying project management in an organization. The
larger your organization, the more structured and rigorous your deployment
approach needs to be. PMOStep assumes that you are implementing project
management in a large organization with multiple departments or sites. If
your deployment is less complex, you may be able to use less of this process
or combine some activities to do multiple things as once. Getting your
organization or company to become better project managers requires more than
just training. You need to take into account many other areas to
successfully upgrade project management skills. Whenever you change how
people do their jobs, you will find some level of resistance. Therefore, you
need to use techniques that facilitate organizational change management.
This section contains a holistic approach to implementing project management
methodology within an organization.
Reporting
One service that is typically associated with a PMO is common, roll-up
reporting on the state of all the projects being executed within the
organization at that time. This service might also extend to keeping metrics
on historical projects so that you can track how successfully projects are
being executed over time. In the same way, the PMO may be asked to track the
backlog of projects that have not begun to provide your management
stakeholders with a complete, portfolio-wide view of all active, pending and
historical projects. It is possible, in fact, that the main purpose of your
PMO might be to provide this type of consolidated reporting, although most
PMOs have other responsibilities in addition to this.
Methodology Management
Methodology refers to the processes, procedures, templates, best practices,
standards, guidelines, policies, etc. that you use to perform certain
aspects of work. All of these "methods" that you use to manage projects
become part of your project management methodology. The methodology provides
the framework that your project managers use to manage the work. It must
also be adaptable to meet the changing needs of the business, and it must
add value to the projects that utilize it. In addition, as new technologies
and methods emerge to better the project management process, the methodology
should evolve to reflect those improvements.
Project management methodology should be viewed as a product. The processes,
templates, training, etc. that make up the methodology are some of the
specific deliverables that are produced as a part of this “product”. These
deliverables and the product in general, need to be supported and improved
over time.
Training
Training is one of the
premiere services offered by PMOs. In fact, in many organizations, the
primary role of the PMO is to offer project management training to the
staff. However, there is a lot to consider when rolling out a training
program. Like many of the services offered, training must be considered
holistically, along with any other services that the PMO is offering. If you
have the resources, and if your pool of project managers has the need, you
will want to put classes together to create an overall curriculum. The
curriculum can include internal classes, vendor classes, computer based
training, etc.
Coaching
|
Coaching refers to working with
individual project managers or project teams to transfer knowledge and
teach new skills. This is usually done in-person, but can also occur
over the phone or through emails. Coaching is different than training
in that training implies a formal teacher-pupil relationship and the
formal instruction of material. Coaching is less structured and
usually involves talking through situations that affect the trainee
and describing or demonstrating how project management processes and
techniques can assist. In general, the coach should be a subject
matter expert on project management and must be able to transfer his
or her knowledge effectively to others.
|
 |
Project Audits
The PMO is asked to perform the difficult job of changing the organizational
culture regarding how to manage projects. This involves a holistic approach
addressing people, process and technology considerations. Many of the
services provided by the PMO, such as coaching and training, are designed to
build capability and increase skill levels. Project audits are one way for
the PMO to validate that the project teams are utilizing the appropriate
project management processes. If a project manager chooses to take advantage
of the audit results, the audit can be great opportunities for learning.
Repository
One of the value
propositions for deploying common project management processes is the
ability to reuse processes, procedures, templates, etc. This reuse also
extends to the level of actually being able to reuse specific documentation
from prior projects. However, the ability to reuse documentation does not
come about by magic. If project managers want to see whether there might be
pre-existing material that would help them, they are not going to be
expected to contact every other project manager. To facilitate process and
document reuse, the PMO needs to establish and manage a document repository.
Metrics Collection
The PMO must collect metrics that show how effective the PMO is at
delivering services, and how well the organization is adopting the new
processes. The PMO must also attempt to collect metrics that show how the
organization is benefiting from the services of the PMO. If the PMO does not
attempt to track and quantify some of these benefits, the organization will
have no idea what value has been provided. In general, the metrics
associated with project management value are also indirectly indicative of
the value of the PMO. If the value of project management is unknown, then
the value of the PMO will also likely be unknown. On the other hand, if the
value of project management can be proven over time, then the value of the
PMO (which is building project management capability) will also have been
validated.
Organization Assessments
Despite the best-laid plans, it is not a
given that new project management processes will become embedded in the
organization. The people in the PMO have a lot of touchpoints with project
managers and team members throughout the organization. They can use these
touchpoints to gather feedback on how well the processes are being
integrated. However, this is not going to provide a full picture of what is
going on. The PMO should look at the organization on a periodic basis and
perform an assessment as to how well the project management processes are
becoming integrated into the work routine. These assessments are compared to
the prior assessments to gain a sense for the progress made. This
information is especially interesting to the sponsor and other management
stakeholders who want to understand how the deployment is going.
Other
Responsibilities
There are many other optional areas where the PMO can provide value. This
section looks at a number of additional PMO services. These services can be
initiated at any time during the deployment process, or they can be started
once the initial deployment is complete and the PMO is in a more mature
support role.
|
|
|
