Business Driven PMO Setup: Practical Insights, Techniques and Case Examples for Ensuring Success

Description

Extending upon the many traditional program/project management office (PMO) books that present theoretical concepts and knowledge, Business Driven PMO Setup presents practical experiences and wisdom for those responsible for, belonging to, and served by a PMO. This book is rooted in the shared experiences and business settings of all PMOs and it is organized to provide the reader with actionable solutions to the problems and execution difficulties that PMOs face.Most PMO books are written by academics, trainers and consultants from the PM community and present academic or theoretical approaches and models that too often fail. The more sophisticated books tend to be limited in application to the larger or more advanced project management organizations. This unique reference presents new material not available in other books that is applicable to PMOs of all shapes and sizes. It challenges and calls into question various traditional approaches and strategies for the PMO citing examples and explaining when and why such academic and theoretical approaches are wrong. Business Driven PMO Setup was written by over 20 contributing authors that are veteran line executives who either directly manage PMOs, have PMOs reporting to them, or are subject matter experts that service them. These veterans with centuries of business acumen managing both US and foreign companies, divisions, and departments provide valuable insights into ensuring the PMO is setup correctly and remains focused on meeting the needs of the business for which the PMO was created to serve.Many PMOs are often vulnerable in terms of their continued existence. PMOs with a business mindset never have to sell or promote themselves internally, explain what they do, or worry about funding or their existence. This book establishes a clear bottom-line business mindset and practical approach that any PMO can adopt. Review: A Comprehensive Guide to Establishing or Improving your PMO - Business Driven PMO Setup is a comprehensive guide to establishing or improving your PMO broken out into digestible chapters. The author "gets it" and understands that it is about process not methodology, PMOs need to be adaptable not static, and ultimately you need to demonstrate the PMO's value to the business to be successful. The book is layered with figures, examples and real life case studies. A few that were of particular interest were the Project Selection Scorecard (Chapter Four) and the PMO Setup Phases (Chapter Ten). The project selection scorecard walks you through a series of example questions and scoring mechanisms to objectively determine if a project should be approved. The example empowers the end user to apply the information and adapt it to their circumstances. In Chapter Ten, the PMO setup Phases clearly lays out something we all know, a PMO's perceived value is not achieved until late in the process after much of the work and change has already occurred. A PMO is ultimately a communications vehicle ensuring that the strategic vision of the organization is applied to the work that is done by the resources. This is often overlooked by PMO leaders as the focus falls to tools, methodology and systems. This book guides you to focus your attention on the areas that matter in a dynamic environment. Mark provides a list of the Top 200 Tips, broken out into "Top Ten Lists", as a supplement to the book. These are great take a ways to quickly review a particular knowledge area. Mark's book is an excellent reference guide and demonstrates practical hands on experience. I will absolutely be using it during our next PMO engagement. Review: Great for Existing or New PMOs - Having read my fair share of PMO books, most of which seem to regurgitate the same information and come across as a showing the PMO holding a big stick to beat project managers with, I found Mark's book extremely refreshing and insightful. Our PMO is relatively established and we lived through many of the pitfalls Mark outlines and fortunately survived. I would look at this book as a tremendous guidebook for those starting a new PMO or for those that are looking to "refresh" the vision and mission of their PMO. While the author does an excellent job of describing each topic by itself, the case studies written by others were the most valuable in my opinion as they brought different points of view from various industry practioners. The "in the trenches" feel was extremely valuable as it was not a theoretical dissertation, but a practical application that weaves in PMBOK best practices where appropriate.