speedysongperson
PMO 101
The Complete Guide to Setup, Manage and Run a PMO
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PMO - The Change Agent?
Whenever change comes, people resist. In case we need to move into the Digital wave or appreciate the new technology, people find this scary and that’s where PMO can play a critical role as a ‘Change Agent’. People don’t love change. They don’t like change to happen ‘to them’ instead ‘with them’.
It’s not about managing the change. It’s about enabling change. The PMO appreciates business, Market, challenges of the market, valuable as it will be. A PMO is the person who has access to the strategies, ideas and is sitting in the middle of senior leadership and the rest of the organization helping them in what it requires them to do, also executing with them.
It’s interesting that many of the business leaders like to talk about change and how important it is unless it happens to them.
People have been saying ‘Fail Fast’ and not with help from the PMO. If the organization sees that they can fail fast and learn from the lessons, they would opt for it more and more.
There’s a personal leadership that PMO can help talk to the stakeholders explaining that we have been living in the VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity) world and we have to change and that too with speed.
The VUCA world has always been there, when I was in my first job around 20 years ago, then also VUCA was there. Also, people resisting to change have also been there. Knowing scenarios like COVID and other volatile situations, companies need to be shock-proof to make right decisions swiftly.
Organizations are now asking - Can I respond with Speed? Can I create Choice?Can I use the right tool?, Do I have people who are ambidextrous, people who have gymnastics in their mindset .i.e. People who understand structure, technique at the same time can be flexible, fast and they can be empathetic.
PMO has to have a gymnastic mindset so that the rest of the organization can take the benefits. The Benefits are in terms of speed, being able to respond to shock (shock of COVID, riots, elections in states), sensory organization that is coming and taking care of the VUCA world by leveraging the technology and empowering skills.
#pmo#program#project#change#changemanagement#structure#geometry#effort#vuca#vu cao dam#volatility#financial#completely#ambilms
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Is PMO (Project Management Office) obsolete?
As someone increasingly automated the world doesn’t mean the PMO is obsolete. This is not the end of the road for PMO. This technology enhancement is not a threat to PMO.
Technology has helped free up a lot of tasks as most of the tasks that traditional PMO used to have codified, systemized. This change has actually broadened PMOs horizon as codified systems handle mundane tasks.
This has led to thinking about how PMO can create value, how we get return on investment in this program. When you come to softer aspects .i.e. engaging with people, working with teams, resolving conflicts, problem solving with teams, empathy, influencing, leadership, better conversation, change management, cajole people to get results are possible by humans not the technology.
We can automate more repetitive tasks and more free time PMOs have to add value. End of the day it’s the people skills, help take the right decisions, critique whether it’s the right thing to do or not, influence decisions, handling of risks and issues and no way PMOs road ending in fact it’s starting knowing we will have so much of data, the PMO will help translate the data into information and that too knowledge and knowledge turn into decision ultimately leading to moving organization’s profit numbers.
PMOs need to come out of creating documents, schedule and need to focus upon true outcomes. Once PMO sees outcomes that they have been producing, they will be inspired, motivated and the traditional PMO activities will automatically fall off.
If I take a typical Organization analogy, where salespeople visit the customer and promise the fancy stuff to get it delivered in the next few weeks. They come back to the office and put pressure on the delivery teams. On top of it the finance people also come and ask delivery teams to deliver it within less cost so they can generate revenue and profit margins as well.
Now the poor delivery teams have got the constraints of time, scoping, cost and that’s where the PMO teams come handy bringing the value, the structuring, understanding the core elements at delivery, business and finance side and committing to the promises made by finance and sales folks.
Without PMO, you can’t make any promises to customers. Without them, you can’t make any money as you need projects to run on-time, on-budget.
As PMO delivers, that gives credibility to Sales and Finance people, so Sales people can make another promise to the customer. Sadly, It’s the most underappreciated profession as most people do not realize what goes into it.
What is important for PMO is to be more vocal and show value by talking in terms of the CFO’s language, the language of the Marketing and Sales Language.
It's too much expected though as PMO leaders mature they need to keep tap on the strategic thinking more than the tactical stuff as tactical activities need to be taken care of by automation and technology.
PMOs need to have business acumen and that’s not possible when organizations hire junior project/ program managers only to do the coordination activity. PMOs need to be senior leaders who appreciate and understand CFO, Marketing head, Sales head thinking and direct the conversations accordingly and deliver.
PMOs need to understand the business they are in and understand the pain points to make the biggest impact.
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Mistakes by Leaders in Hiring PMO/Project Management Professionals
PMO’s people management skills come handy dealing with the people/stakeholders.
One of the common mistakes leaders/ org does is that they hire junior project coordinators whose only job is to go to people's desks and follow-up and ask if they have done the work or not. Well, for this activity you don’t need people with a project background.
Project Manager knows, the teams added what sort of product solution, questioned the design, architecture and gave her point of view. The project manager needs to be seasoned and require domain knowledge so other teams see the value coming from it.
This is from the hard skills perspective and the project manager also carries the soft skills .i.e. Leadership aspects. These skills leaders shouldn’t expect from junior project personnel.
#mistakes#project#program#organization#professionals#knowledge#app#project manager#product design#exteriors#mindset
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Must Have Skills needed for People in PMO/Project management
Soft skills, Empathy, Collaboration, Leadership is going to continue though it’s important they excel in problem solving, flexible and adaptable, remote working, thinking outside the box.
Business leaders are asking more from the PMO. To step into a business leader's role.
PMO Leaders need to think from a Business Leader’s perspective, Business Acumen, Change Agent. Also, requires personal growth skills viz. Listening, Self-Awareness, Clarity of Organizational and personal goals.
PMO Leaders need to focus on outcomes instead muddled into the process completely. If you feel you will not achieve the outcome, then you need to ‘let go’ of the activity. Need to be laser-focused on outcomes.
#future#skills#people#@management#project#project management#pmo#program#acumen#businessacumen#leadership#business leadership#personal#growth#organization
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Happy to add 25 posts !!
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Value adds of PMO - Case 4
One of the PMO leaders sees PMO work is far simpler. What they require is the right strategy. In his words, Its Foundation - > Automation - > Innovation.
Project managers need to focus on writing a good schedule. If you have a good schedule, everything works out really well.
The Project managers need to focus on one thing and one thing really well, and then switch to the next thing even if it is a small peanut butter project, that’s ok too though focus on one thing and one thing really well.
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Value Adds of PMO - Case 3
The new PMO Leader joined and realized every person is standing in every meeting, which means when do these people get time to do the work.
He divided the meetings into 3 folds - One as Top Leaders meet (which is once in 15 Days only), with sharing status and highlighting risk, which is not solved by operating and tactical meetings.
2nd meeting with operating managers where key issues are in discussion and solving of risks/ issues. The frequency is weekly.
3rd meeting tactical where day-to-day projects' tasks are in discussion. The frequency is daily or alternate day.
Just by doing this, productivity improves multi-fold and most important is ‘right people doing their own activities’. This also brought the sense of ownership within teams and level of trust increases.
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Value Adds of PMO - Case 2
PMO manager joined the organization and found teams were taking part in multiple three hour meetings to create a project plan. With the new template he introduced, it now only takes three meetings. ‘By focusing on the resource use, he reduced time by 80%’
Many times PMO makes mistakes, that time is the most important driver. Actually, it's the resources.
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Value Adds of PMO - Case 1
I heard one leader saying, when he arrived, the organization was chaotic. There were many project managers though:
they didn’t have repeatable processes.
Every project leader measures his / her progress in his / her own way based on personal experience.
The leaders establish:
formal project planning process
implementation processes for all projects,
created standardized methodologies.
rules and regulations,
developed a charter,
Roadmaps for improvements that included key performance indicators
Implemented tools to measure overall portfolio progress
Created centralized database for project information
Enable the PMO staff to run reports (Automate reports)
Resulted:
95% of the projects over which his staff has control meet their schedule goals
Schedules controlled by 3rd party vendors are less consistent
Also ruined in control of scope creep and cost overruns
Added more projects to people portfolio because of structured processes (more work with fewer resources streamlined)
Such measures show clearly that PMO functions add value to the Organization.
#project#planning#implementation#methodologies#rules#regulations#charter#roadmaps#improvements#perfoemance#indicators#pmo#staff#projects#schedule#scope#cost#overruns#processes#functions
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Superpower of PMO
Well, after talking to the multiple PMO leaders, one thing that came out from them as well as the expectations from the functional leaders is that they expect PMO to help influence teams and the Org.
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Automate/ Optimize PMO Activities
Automate to the fullest, including the meetings setup, follow-up emails, and all other tactical tasks. The PMO team is not a coordinator team, though they are the ones who are affecting the organizational projects by adding value.
Use tools that can help you automate. Each PMO member needs to understand they do not value other stakeholders because they are running meetings, stakeholders value PMO team because they are facilitating outcomes.
Stop doing everything that is not giving the outcomes. Redefine your value more from leadership components instead of the task management workforce.
You need to streamline, optimize, Automate the activities that are not providing any value to your business. PMO needs to enable teams to enjoy their work as they have received the frameworks, tools, techniques and ways of bottlenecking some of the stuck areas and making people more effectively.
#pmo#program#project#program management#automation#optimization#activities#value#components#outcomes#leadership#task management#tools#people
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What makes PMO the World Class?
Simplicity is better than Complexity - We need to understand what is working and what is not. You need to have clarity. Keep your systems under the light openness and that’s what your teams and stakeholders will see.
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PMO Hiring
After interviewing the multiple PMO leaders who have set up PMOs more than a dozen times in the different organizations, one thing comes out in common is that every Organization is different and so someone will also customize the PMO Setup basis of the Organization.
What works in one place may not work for others. As a PMO Leader, you need to hire the right people that match the organization’s mindset. Bring the diversity in people instead of bringing the old people with an old organization’s mindset and difficulty to change.
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PMO Tools
I don’t know what I want. Can a tool help us define that?
If you don’t know what you want, then you better don’t buy the tool.
Softwares don’t fail us, We fail the Softwares. We need to clear what we want, accordingly you buy the tools depending on the features the tools have.
When you buy a tool doesn’t mean you are done with the problems. Problems will keep appearing and tools will help you solve per the features the tool has.
You can’t declare a success that PMO is set up once you have implemented the tool. Tool is a vehicle to deliver information. There are other frameworks, artefacts, thought leadership expected from PMO as well.
It’s a continuous evaluation. It is not continuous improvement as continuous improvement comes as incremental improvements on the same foundation though continuous evaluation requires complete rethinking and going back to the drawing board especially when you see external factors affecting the business e.g. COVID or business priorities changes, etc.
PMO needs to exhibit more organizational agility. Organisations need to be faster, leaner, adaptable to the risks/ issues, external factors.
Everybody loves change unless it’s happening to them.
#pmo#tools#problems#leadersip#artefacts#improvement#incremental#covid#business priorities#organizations#faster#leaner#change#change management#strategic#organization
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PMO Key Stakeholders
PMO has two crucial sets of customers:
1. Project Manager & teams
Training and skill development of PM / Project Teams is a significant part of the PMO strategy design.
2. Sponsors / Upper Managers and stakeholders
Neglecting one or both creates a poor environment for the PMO. Stakeholders can make or break the projects. Gathering support from the key stakeholders and decision makers significantly increases the PMO’s success rate.
We need to educate leaders that their job is not over after assigning the pmo/ project manager funding though there's a need for continuous engagement with the sponsors in hearing their point of view or change of schedule/ cost or major risks to mitigate.
#project manager#stakeholders#upper management#pmo#change#schedule#cost#risks#success#sponsor#program#strategic#organization#project
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PMO Tracked Project Process Metrics
PMO goals and metrics need to align with the broader goals of the business. PMO tracks:
The business impact of new product, Initiative
The effectiveness of development activities
Metric that predicts or expects future results based on the recent or aggregate performance
PMO address specific problems that the Organization is facing to be relevant
Whether an organization has:
Trouble meeting schedules
Staying on budget
Or managing unanticipated risks
These issues should set the framework for PMO charter and to be a primary measure of progress.
Like CMM Level for Software Development, PMO also needs to have a roadmap divided into:
Level 1 - Initial, Level 2 - Repeatable, Level 3 - Defined, Level 4 - Managed, Level 5 - Optimizing.
Adequate communication to management is essential to ensure issues, risk response plans, and someone manages consistent escalations through the program. The reporting to management can include:
Schedule variances affecting program performance and milestones
Risk management plans requiring senior management decisions or endorsement
Program scope changes requests that impact resource plans and/ or cost
#schedule#variance#project#program#pmo#performance#plans#risk management#scope changes#requests#resource#budget#organization#strategic#business
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Powerful PMO Teams
A team is not a group of people who work together. A team is a group of people who trust each other - Simon Sinek
PMO is a team that other teams need to trust. If not, PMO Leaders and team members need to build the confidence and trust factor with the other teams.
PMO Team keeps the other teams transparent with the Org Strategies. It’s exceptionally important for the multiple teams to understand what are the CEO's Top priorities and basis that the functional teams need to build their vision and roadmap accordingly.
The functional leadership is seeking a view from the PMO. PMO acts as an ‘Internal Communication’ department with the power of influencing both sides not just passing the details to functional teams though also sharing the CEO's office view as well to the functional teams. It's a sturdy bridge between CEO / Senior Leadership and the rest of the Org.
This is just not possible, when the factor of trust is not there between the teams and in the Org. The team is a group of people with a common purpose and shared objectives who trust each other and work together to achieve the objectives.
Trust is so very important in creating a safe workplace for the team to feel valued. It has to start with the leaders.
Leaders show trust by showing their support and by listening to the team. The pillars of trust and support will resonate throughout the organisation and undoubtedly you will have a powerful team. Everyone will work towards the good for all and not for their own benefit or self-recognition. "Teamwork works".
Leaders need to ensure that team members have all the resources, guidance to ensure they are producing the results. Team members feel that they have the backing of their manager. Leadership is all about people.
Leadership is about managing outcomes, managing workflows, not just hitting the ‘send’ button on an email asking the team to do things.
The recommendation for the leaders is to hire smart, talented people, invest in them. Leaders need to define, live and celebrate the values. Make your team accountable, keep things transparent and accountability drives itself.
The foundation to a successful team is trust built through honest communication, collaborative behaviours and respect for all however so many leaders don’t trust their teams, they don’t delegate enough or do not hire people different to themselves as they see the fear of losing control.
A leader’s purpose is to empower each team member based on their own individuality to build the best collective viewpoint! It’s a such a great thing to have women and men from different cultures, who think differently, who have different opinions, who have different heritages, who can see things not in the same way but share the common goals, common values and ethics, when a leader can build that, it is building of strong team.
Many leaders you may hear saying ‘Trust but Verify’, which I feel is counterintuitive. You can never build trust if you are verifying or questioning the team's efforts. It just doesn’t work.
Well, I am not saying give the task to the team and leave it to them completely. You definitely require governance/ frameworks/ processes to ensure that the work is ongoing and communication with leaders also happens.
What I am referring to is that if you have a mindset of verifying every aspect of a task, then it's the same as ‘distrust and verify’.
As a PMO, you need to know your Brand and truly you need to be an expert in your brand. Few questions you need to ask yourself:
What is it you bring to the table?
What are the skills where you absolutely will be a rockstar? That perhaps no one can argue about it and no one else can sit on that seat where you are the expert.
What do you rock at?
PMO Teams need to take time and invest in themselves. It’s not good to always be doing the fire fighting though they need to take a PAUSE and understand what skills to be developed to help fulfill Organizational priorities.
There is a question asked in multiple forums that if PMO is developing the skills into either Product, Design, Operations or any other functional elements. If the answer is yes, then is it not that overlapping of responsibilities between two teams.
Organization requires overlapping of responsibilities as long as Org’s define the boundaries. We have several models and one of them is RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed). Now using this model, PMO can plan a role of either Responsible or Consulted or Informed if not Accountable.
The PMO team requires us to automate and streamline the repeated processes that are time-consuming. Using tools can help reduce the time taken by PMO in tactical tasks so they can spend time on strategic activities.
Every communication PMO members are part of, they need to add the value and outcomes. If not, then don't attend the meeting.
Many times a question comes, that does PMO require unlearning and ReLearn. Well, my take is that unlearning something is very difficult, you need to learn new stuff of course. Somewhere or the other, the skill you learned will use, knowing that we are living in a volatile and uncertain world where we don’t know what may happen and when. It’s the building blocks that will help you in solving business problems.
Leverage people in your team as per their strengths. Many times, we let them work upon areas which they are not comfortable with, good at the approach that needs to be completely reversed and let them work on their strengths and further build it.
Some people I call ‘Constructors’ who are good at selling ideas, convincing, highly extroverts who enjoy being part of meetings and sharing their point of view. Quite Vocal, then give similar tasks to them and there are other sets of people who I call in ‘Maintainers’ who like to build the reports, prefer sitting on a backend activity and don’t like to come into limelight and market their work.
We need both groups. Both are equally important, its PMO leader needs to understand what is the team member’s strength and further build that.
#project#program#pmo#strategic#execution#constructors#team management#teams#learning#support#communication#worflow
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