To build and develop PMO is a unique type of challenge. Normally, companies understand the need for a project management office after creating a certain number of offices or having achieved a certain scale. The process becomes important at the scaling phase, for the following reasons: to apply a unified approach within the company, to reduce unnecessary expenses (temporary, resource-related, etc), as well as to introduce comprehensive and clear management processes for both internal management and external customers. PMO is where all the processes including project coordination, project collection, movement of the information related to the project, monitoring, budgeting, coordination of all the engaged parties, and standardising take place.
It frequently happens that there is lack of free specialists within the company who know how to build a PMO from scratch. In such a case, it is essential to engage external specialists who could do it fast, accurately, and most importantly, without having to disrupt your main specialists from their project work.
How PMO building from E5 works:
The specific steps on PMO building will differ depending on the scale of the methods being used by teams and the level of your project/scrum managers:
- Go decision. We identify the importance for the company to implement PMO, and get buy-in from C-level management.
- We audit the existing teams and their roles by interviewing project managers, pinpoint all the bottlenecks in the current development processes, select the best methodology for the current teams’ aims e.g. (expected aims, Agile, etc)
- We coordinate the new process, the order, and frequency of the meetings, new approaches and standards of running the business with a team. We also develop checklists, templates, and identify project key measures and ways of reporting.
- We prepare and launch the new process. We regularly hold PMO meetings and analyse results.
- Inspect & Adapt. We continuously upgrade and improve the process.
As a result of PMO implementation, you get:
- General approaches and practices on project management;
- Transparent processes;
- Unified reporting forms;
- Awareness of the state of any company’s project, as well as its risks and potential problems.
The entire preparation process for the transformation can take only 1-3 months in case the task has been prioritised by the management and the recourses are available.
