Background of the Project Support Office

Early in the life cycle of any process, there are always the early adopters who stumble onto it and are eager to give it a chance. Their enthusiasm may prove to be contagious, and soon others begin using the process, too. At some point, senior management begins to take notice because the various ways of understanding of the process is creating problems. Not everyone understands the process the same way, and there are many levels of expertise with the tool — while some misuse it, others don't take its use seriously.

If this sounds like the history of project management in your organization, you have plenty of company. Senior management instinctively knew they needed to do something about the problem, and the first reaction was to send people away for some project management training. Usually the choice of training was made by the appropriate middle manager. There was no coordination or integration across business units. Every business unit was doing their own thing (Maturity Level 1) with little thought of standardization or enterprise-wide process design and implementation. This by itself didn't result in much improvement.

As a further attempt to solve the problem, senior management introduced some standards and common metrics found in project management. A project management process was crafted and introduced with a lot of fanfare. All were expected to use it. Some did, some didn't (Maturity Level 2). Some still held on to their old ways and managed projects the way they had been doing it all along. While all of this was going on, projects continued to be executed. There were often so many projects under way simultaneously and so much confusion that management recognized that the problem had not gone away. More dramatic action was needed. There was no way to manage across projects within the organization because of redundancy, wasted resources, and the lack of managed standards, and there was no leadership in making project management an asset to the organization. Effective project management was a recognized need in the organization, but most organizations were a long way away from satisfying that need. Senior management held high expectations that by having a standardized project management methodology, the success rate of projects would increase. Considerable effort was spent getting a methodology designed, documented, and installed, but somehow it had little impact on project success rates. In fact, it was a big disappointment. Senior management realized that having a methodology wasn't sufficient. Something more was needed, and soon that something appeared: the Project Support Office (PSO). Project Management Office (PMO) is the name commonly given this organization, but I prefer PSO. The PSO created an opportunity to put an organizational entity in place that ensured compliance (prerequisite to attaining Maturity Level 3). Project success would surely follow. Indeed, the PSO functions like an insurance policy to protect the adoption and spread of the methodology.

There are at least four reasons why an organization would choose to implement a PSO. They are as follows:

• As the organization grows in the number and complexity of the projects in its portfolio, it must adopt formal procedures for managing the volume and diversity of projects. To do this, the organization establishes the procedures that are followed for initiating, proposing, approving, and managing projects. These procedures are discussed in Chapter 14. This is a critical part of Maturity Level 3 and the prerequisite to achieving Maturity Level 4.
• With increased volume comes a need for more qualified project managers. Those who would like to become project managers will need to be identified and trained. Those who are already project managers will need additional training to deal effectively with the increased project complexity. The PSO that I am recommending is the depository of the organization's skills inventory of current and developing project managers. Because managers using the PSO are aware of the types and complexity of current and forthcoming projects, the PSO is the entity that is best prepared to identify the training needs of project managers and their teams. The HR department is the primary beneficiary of this information.
• A lack of standards and policies leads to increased inefficiencies and compromises productivity. The increasing failure rate of projects is testimony to that fact. Through the establishment and enforcement of standards and practices, the PSO can have a positive impact on efficiency and productivity. Chapter 16 discusses prevention and intervention strategies for so-called “distressed projects.”
• The increased complexity and number of projects places a greater demand on resources. It is no secret that the scarcity of information technology (IT) professionals has become a barrier to project success. The same can be said about the need for more and better qualified business analysts (BAs). By paying attention to the demand for skilled project teams and the inventory of skilled team members, the PSO can maintain the proper balance through training. That requires a close collaboration between the PSO and HR regarding the training function.