Put More Agility Into Your PMO
Imagine you’re leading your organization’s new Project Management Office. The organization is growing and the demand for more projects is increasing. A few months in, you and your team of project managers are already feeling the pressure that what you thought was working is now starting to fall apart around you. Projects are running over budget and taking too long.
As someone who works with clients on creating improved workflows and building agility in their operations, I have discovered a few reasons that drive these challenges:
Lack of a proper intake process to determine if ideas should become projects
Unclear roles and responsibilities between the business and program/project managers/scrum masters
Project success or business outcomes are not clearly defined
Lack of alignment with the overall organization’s strategy
Allowing projects to continue when they no longer produce the outcomes they set out to achieve
These challenges arise when there is not a well-defined workflow for bringing in, selecting, overseeing, and closing out projects. However, a more Agile approach would better benefit the organization and would consist of the following:
Idea initiation/business case
Review for business strategy alignment
Evaluate against business priorities
Elevate to project and place in the backlog
Place a project into a sprint when budget/capacity is available
Evaluate for business impact/goal achievement
Monthly evaluations to determine stop/continue with the project
Project closeout
To begin, there should be a critical eye for business cases before they turn into projects. Many times projects are evaluated based on their merits rather than linking them back to the overall business priorities. It can be tempting to start a project based on budget approval alone, but you must also ensure that adequate resources (i.e. PMs, Scrum Masters, Developers, Analysts, etc.) are available to implement the project.
The most critical aspect of this approach is to have a routine step to evaluate projects in execution. This evaluation determines whether a project has achieved “enough” and can close out or if it needs to stop because it is not achieving its intended objectives. Organizations can fall into the trap of being consumed by tracking statuses and keeping the project running for the sake of appearing successful.
In the spirit of Agile, organizations should be focused on determining if the project is bringing value throughout implementation. Equally important is the willingness to end the project or make adjustments quickly if needed. The opportunity costs are far too great if these projects continue in their current form.
By having this approach organizations can ensure they are not wasting time on projects that do not bring value. Leaders can also determine more quickly if a project should move forward and not pull work in that isn’t ready to be implemented. Lastly, money and time can be saved by ending the project sooner once it achieves most of its important outcomes rather than focusing on mere completion. Ask yourself if that last 5-10% of features truly need to be implemented. A better alternative could be applying the capacity and budget of that 5-10% towards another project.
