-
When Reality Hits - Project Managers Roll With It
February 11, 2012
-
When IT Is Your Company’s “Piggy Bank”
February 10, 2012
-
4 Key Things a Project Manager Must Do
February 10, 2012
-
Essential Project Management
February 10, 2012
-
8 Traits of Top Project Managers - Part 1
February 9, 2012
-
Agile Project Management - Engaging Your Customer!
February 9, 2012
-
9 Tips to Avoid Traps in Project Planning
February 9, 2012
-
Why Projects Succeed - Executive Sponsorship
February 8, 2012
-
On Customer Participation in Agile Projects
February 8, 2012
-
A Project Charter for Lazy Teams
February 8, 2012
Influencing the Organization - How to Grow a PMO
November 29, 2007 | Author: PM Hut | Filed under: Project Management Office
Influencing the Organization - How to Grow a PMO
By Karl Fischer - Global Knowledge Instructor
When I was young and experiencing the frustrations of learning to ride my new grown-up bike after graduating from my three-wheeler, my mother used to tell me “beginnings are always hard.” Besides the frustration, we are the most vulnerable when we first begin to learn. The ‘beginning’ of anything is an uncomfortable place to be.
As we progress through life we make decisions about ‘beginnings’. If we choose to keep learning, and therefore to stay vulnerable and uncomfortable, it normally means that we have had some success in choosing to learn (I did learn to ride my ‘grown-up’ bike!).
Organizations are no different than we are. If an organization chooses to continue to learn, once it has grown up, it implies that the organization is choosing to remain vulnerable and uncomfortable in order to achieve a sought after goal. For an organization to stay alive however, learning is not optional. Peter Senge, in his book, The Fifth Discipline, 1 makes the following statement, “In the long run, the only sustainable source of competitive advantage is your organization’s ability to learn faster than its competition.”
Returning to my early bicycle experience, there were factors that influenced my learning: peer pressure, examples, and guidelines. Peer pressure was certainly a strong element but along with that came the example of watching other kids do it and the pointers I was given by my friends. I took the pointers from my friends because I trusted them.
Organizations are no different than we are; if the organization is open to learning, then it is open to influence. Organizations are open to influence because they feel pressure (from the market, their competitors, and their own industry). And they look for pointers and examples from people that they first of all trust. Therefore, building trust is a prerequisite to exerting influence.
Establishing a Project Management Office is one way of influencing the organization. The PMO has, in its seed, the ability to create strategic alignment among projects which can significantly enhance the ability of the organization to reach its goals. Now, there is no end of books and articles about the framework of a Project Management Office: what it needs to accomplish first, what services it needs to offer, who needs to be involved, etc. There is not much literature however on the foundation needed to begin to build the PMO.
Trust and confidence, which are the beginnings of the foundation, take time to build and that is where influence begins. Joan Knutson, in her recent book, ‘Succeeding in Project-Driven Organizations’, has a chapter on Project Management Office development.2 In the beginning of the chapter she gives an overview of the development of a PMO from a Consultative role into what is ultimately a Managing role. One of her most significant observations is that, whatever the implementation plan is for the PMO, it must be underpinned by the growth in the following factors:
- Continual gains in credibility
- Building of expertise
- Increase in responsibility
- Growth in self-confidence
(Sounds like learning to ride a bicycle, to me!)
No matter what you do to start, the above things need to happen in order for you to influence the organization. And for influence to begin to take effect, you must match your efforts to the heartbeat of the organization.
The heartbeat of an organization is discovered by listening. A recent conversation with a colleague illustrates this listening process very well. Tim is a senior project manager attached to a PMO in a major telecommunications company. He was describing the beginning of the PMO in his firm. He said, “Well, we started about 6 years ago. The first effort was a project management organization that resided in the engineering department. We had discovered that the engineers were having trouble managing the projects themselves. Specifically, we found that, while engineers were very good at engineering things they weren’t quite as good at managing the execution of their designs in the field. That is the discipline of project management, where you are creating a distinct scope and managing people to deliverables. We decided that we had the need to make a special effort at managing projects and so we established a small project management group within engineering to focus on these issues.”
“Do you mean that they were missing deadlines?” I asked.
Tim clarified, “They were primarily having trouble keeping schedules and, for us that translates into lost opportunity. We are a very fast moving business. If we miss a window of opportunity, the competition’s got it.”
Confirming Tim’s statement, I queried, “So it was begun inside of the engineering department. How did it evolve?”
Tim answered, “The engineers became members of the project team but they weren’t responsible for project management activities, like driving schedules and execution for instance. However, we discovered that when the project management effort was residing in the engineering department, it was hard to focus on project management issues which were being caused by process issues or people issues within engineering itself. So eventually we pulled the project management effort outside of Engineering into a separate project management organization. We discovered that it worked better externally.”
“So, what’s your relationship with the engineers?” I asked.
“Pretty good, actually!” was Tim’s response. “They see the value and the results of our work and our contribution. The project management effort makes us better at hitting schedules. And the engineering effort makes us end up with a better quality product.”
In the above story Tim’s group was listening to the heartbeat of the engineers; their need for better management of schedules and coordination. This caused the birth of the project management effort, and ultimately the PMO. Influencing the organization is often an evolution, not a revolution. Influencing the organization takes a plan based on continual gains in credibility, building expertise, increase in responsibility and growth in self-confidence. Sounds like learning to ride a bicycle!
1) Senge, Peter M., The Fifth Discipline, Currency Doubleday 1944. First line from inside the front book jacket.
2) Knutson, Joan, Succeeding in Project-Driven Organizations, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2001, p.432.
This article was originally published in Global Knowledge’s Business Brief e-newsletter. Global Knowledge delivers comprehensive hands-on project management, business process, and professional skills training. Visit our online Knowledge Center at www.globalknowledge.com/business for free white papers, webinars, and more.
© Copyright 2007, Global Knowledge. All rights reserved.
Related Articles
- Building Your PMO – People, Process, Tools – Part II – Process - The PMO as a Professional Services Organization
- Building Your PMO – People, Process, Tools – Part II – Process - The PMO as a Professional Services Organization (cont.)
- Organizational Structures In Project Management
- Authorized to Manage – in a Projectized Organization
- Which Type of Project Management Organization Is Right For You?
No comments yet.
feel free to leave a comment
Comment Guidelines: Basic XHTML is allowed (a href, strong, em, code). All line breaks and paragraphs are automatically generated. Off-topic or inappropriate comments will be edited or deleted. Email addresses will never be published. Keep it PG-13 people!
XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>
All fields marked with " * " are required.
- Agile Project Management
- Ask the Hut
- Certification
- Change Management
- Communications Management
- Computer Based Information Systems
- Concepts
- Corporate Transformation
- Cost Management
- Critical Chain Project Management
- Delegation
- History
- HR Management
- Implementing Project Management
- Integration Management
- Lessons Learned
- Management
- Miscellaneous
- People Issues
- PMBOK
- PRINCE2
- Procurement Management
- Program Management
- Project Lifecycle Phases
- Project Management Advantages
- Project Management Advantages
- Project Management as a Career
- Project Management Best Practices
- Project Management Charts
- Project Management Definitions
- Project Management Ethics
- Project Management for Beginners
- Project Management Guides
- Project Management Musings
- Project Management Office
- Project Management Proposals
- Project Management Templates
- Project Portfolio Management
- Project Workforce Management
- Quality Management
- Requirements Management
- Risk Management
- Scheduling
- Scope Management
- SCRUM
- Soft Management
- Time Management
- Training
- Uncategorized