Contents
Project Options
Project 1 Background
Project 2 Background
Project 3 Background
Program management plan for PMO
Program Management Planning
Manage Impacts of organizational change on projects
References
Project Options
Project 1 Background
A retail company is growing fast at the rate of 60% and thus, needs to meet the needs of expansion for which the company is planning to upgrade its IT infrastructure for supporting the growing data that would result from new customers and orders. The company currently serves 1 million customers worldwide with 10,000 employees working with the retail chain to serve them. With expansion of the infrastructure, the company would have an increased support for the staff such that they would be able to serve the customer better and faster with new technologies and faster systems.
Project 2 Background
The retailer deals in apparels and houseware items that are sold through a variety of stores in the chain across the world. The company has a website that employees use to track the orders based on which the pressures on inventories are calculated and refilling is ordered. However, while the employees can get the data on sales automatically, the inventory is mostly managed manually. Thus, the company has plan to replace the old inventory management system which was manual with a web based system that automates the inventory processes for the company. The project is expected to bring the operational benefits like increased speed to market, faster response to consumer demands, and cost saving through reduction in administrative expenses.
Project 3 Background
The company is facing major issues in the organization due to lack of the resources that are not sufficient for the organization work at times because they need more employees and at other times as the employees lack the right skills. Thus, the management wants to initiate a new project that would involve hiring of new employees, training of those working with the company, and improvement in the HR processes with the implementation for the HRIM system. This project is expected to bring a variety of benefits for the organisation such as improved productivity of employees, better competency levels of employees, faster employee management, and better HR practices.
Program management plan for PMO
A Program Management Office (PMO) is a key to successful implementation of project management practices in any organization as it helps organization keep up with the customer expectations, manage in given economic conditions, and deal with competition with limited available resources. To maintain competitive advantage and attain high profit margins, the functions of PMO should be project focused and enterprise oriented. Key areas of PMO working include practice management, Resource integration management, infrastructure management, business alignment, and technical support management (A, et al., 2007).
Practice management is an important function of PMO which involves establishment of best practices in an organization for project management by providing project teams training on different knowledge areas of project management. The focus of PMO remains on the development of standard methodologies and development of lessons learned. The PMO is an enabler and facilitator who acts as an advocate for improvement in performance. A prominent function of a PMO is to develop record, complete and disseminate project management best practices for which a repository of information is maintained throughout a project life cycle. The data maintained in this repository is related to project performance, project scope, quality, risks, schedule and cost. With lessons learned recorded, successive projects can be built and improved. The experiences of the organization would form a base for bringing excellence to the organization as it would be used by managers to training their project team members and integrate best practices into program management policies and procedures (Abeysekera & McLean, 2000).
Infrastructure Management involves some key program management functions such as project assessment, project governance, and provision of facilities and solutions as the infrastructure of the project organization. Project governance deals with understanding how projects can be organized to make the most efficient utilization of resources, taking value decisions concerning budget, functionality and schedule, assessing engagement needs of stakeholders, and reporting of information that can enable decision making (Alcabes, 2000).
Resource Integration involves resource management, training, team development, and career development. Success of project organizations depends on how effectively resources are used. Without a formal resource allocation process defined for an organization, project managers would obtained resources from the functional managers when needed which can cause conflicts affecting capabilities of the organization to manage project teams. With documentation of knowledge and understanding of skills and competencies of available resources, PMO can assign specific resources to projects based on their expertise so that resources of the organization are best utilized (Caltrans, 2007).
Technical Support Management involves project planning mentoring, auditing and recovery processes. Mentoring is required when the team does not have required competency in the project area. A seasoned professional is often employed to assist such a team so that competency gap can be filled. The objective of PMO is to ensure that the project plans are optimally executed with effective use of resources. This is achieved with the use of certain activities like task based budget allocation, effort based schedule estimation, formation of accountable organizational structure, and metric based reporting (Commonwealth of Australia, 2013).
Business Alignment is achieved through effective portfolio management, business performance management, vendor and customer relationships management. Each projects serves as a learning opportunity for improvement in organizational approaches and project processes. The lessons can support enterprise level tools used for performing project management tasks like scheduling, reporting, estimating, resource management, risk management, requirements management and configuration management (Jainendrukumar, 2008).
The purpose of program management is to build long-term strategies and deliver outcomes.There are some prerequisites for having a program build to achieve a strategic vision and goals. Program management involves development, adaptation, and management of projects that are designed to achieve some wider goals in the organization. Programs create benefits for the organization as they enable projects to attain organisational objectives collectively which is not possible with individual project work. Programs can bridge the gap that exists between the organizational vision or strategy and the project delivery by pooling resources and marshalling projects in a way that project managers can be focused on individual project objectives. Organization can prioritize between competing proejcts within a program if they are using shared resources so that risks are reduced and packaged deals are created to use opportunities for sharing in best possible ways that increase gains for the organization. For this, program leaders set the project context and operational framework with boundaries for projects (DOE, 2008).
Figure 1: Organization of Projects in Programs
A program contains a chain of different projects that are connected in some way so that they may have some dependencies. Portfolios on the other hand have projects that are not overlapping. Program management uses a project based perspective such that programs are seen as structures with fixed objectives and time horizons. Program management serves a vehicle for enhancing organization wide capacities through effective utilization of resources (GOI, 2010).
The goals of program management include improvement in efficiencies and effectiveness through the use of proper planning and prioritization. A coordination is achieved between projects that have defined foals and requirements that are fulfilled by the organizations resources. Program management makes it possible to align he outputs of a project with the operational activities of the organization. PMO authorizes a defined scope, budget and schedule for projects according to which resources are distributed. Program management involves administering of shared pool of resources across a portfolio of projects and measurement of the performance of each project that are evaluated against their competing projects (Institution of Civil Engineers and the Actuarial Profession, 2005).
In traditional organizations, projects were managed independent and were given budget based on the value their output would bring to the organization. However, projects can have some interdependencies in their deliverables and thus, their resources may also overlap. In a program based environment, a portfolio of project, having some organizational goals that support each other, can be managed effectively and efficiently. Program environment makes an organization capable to adapting to different needs of different projects faster such that achievement of the portfolio of projects can be supported despite having triple constrains affecting all projects individually. This is possible as the program leaders are not just exposed to the tactical plans of projects but also the organization’s strategic objectives (Jainendrukumar, 2008).
Program managers have the authority to influence projects by prioritizing, modifying, selecting or cancelling projects if any wide gaols exist between the strategic goals and project outputs. For the program management to be useful, it is essential that there is a common understanding on what is a program, what is its structure, what are processes used, how would the performance of program be measured and who is responsible and accountable towards achievement of the organisational goals (MDOT, 2005).
Program Management Planning
Program plans are developed using some core information about the organization and projects and these include project timelines, outputs, dependencies, costs, risks, assumptions, transition plans, performance targets, monitoring, and controlling activities. The projects that are proposed within a program are evaluated to understand how they are linked with the strategic objectives of the organization. Based on this, the program plan may allot sufficient resources to the projects based on the priority decided by the value a project has to be offer to the organization in terms of achieving its strategic objectives (PM4Dev, 2007).
A program management plan consists of the following items:
Vision Statement: This refers to the understanding of the objectives of the organization that are to be fulfilled with the projected aligned (Quick Base, Inc., 2015).
Blueprint: This refers to what the company can expect to achieve with the selected projects considering that they are aligned with the strategic objectives of the organization.
Resources and Capabilities: the resources and competencies that are available with the organization for disbursal for individual projects would be studied and the requirements for each of the proposed projects or selected projects would be identified (PM4Dev, 2018).
Timetable: It records the dependencies and interfaces that may exist between projects that are within the program based on which the timelines and resources can be prioritized and set for different projects.
Progress monitoring; this would record the reporting measures and methods that would be used for recording performance and reporting the same for individual projects within a program.
Transition: Within a program, there could be a series of projects through which the project resources have to work. After they are released from one project, they have to shift to another which leads them to go through a stage of transition. This stage has to be managed with consideration of cultural aspects and acceptance by the project team.
Risks and issues: risks that can appear on each project are identified within the program as well as if there would be issues that could affect two or more projects, they would be recorded and a plan for mitigation would be suggested in the program plan.
Stakeholder Needs: There can be many stakeholders common to projects in a single program and their needs would be thus, understood in the program document itself which would serve as a guide for individual project planning (PMI, 2017).
Manage Impacts of organizational change on projects
Organizational changes can appear in many forms which can affect individual projects that are run within an organization. A simple change in the IT infrastructure for instance, can cause major disruptions in the work involved in all projects. With changes happening at the organizational level, objectives of projects can become moving targets that are difficult to chase. The project manager and the teams can face challenges due to these changes such as delays in deliveries and disruption at work. In the times of major changes in an organisation, even predicting risks for individual projects and making plans for mitigation becomes difficult (GOI, 2010). Certain strategies can be used to reduce such impacts on the projects happening due to organisational changes and these include:
- Project processes can be improved by developing a disciplined change management approach that is applied to the project management methodologies throughout
- Project team development can be improved by helping the team members gain skills to cope with the organisational changes.
- The changes can be understood and their impacts can be predicted for individual projects based on which mitigation strategies can be planned in advanced and followed for minimum damage (UC Davis, 2013)
- The project schedules can already have considerations for the possible delays that can be caused due to changes such that the schedule has a buffer
- Program management can help to a great extent as it would have the idea of what different projects are being selected and how they would bring the change to the organisational resources and if it would cause the pressures on the other projects. The resources can thus be made available accordingly, by the program managers who would ensure that all the projects within the program get sufficient resources to be executed (SPM, 2001).
References
A, A., B, K. & A, A. S., 2007. review of techniques for risk management in projects. Benchmark Int J , 14(1), pp. 22-36.
Abeysekera, V. & McLean, C., 2000. PROJECT SUCCESS AND RELATIONSHIPS FROM A STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE: A PILOT STUDY, New Zealan: UNITEC Institute of Technology.
Alcabes, J., 2000. Fast-track scheduling. Project Management Quarterly.
Caltrans, 2007. PROJECT COMMUNICATION HANDBOOK, s.l.: Caltrans.
Commonwealth of Australia, 2013. Manage Project Stakeholder Engagement, s.l.: Commonwealth of Australia.
DOE, 2008. QUALITY ASSURANCE GUIDE FOR PROJECT MANAGEMENT , Washington, D.C. : U.S. Department of Energy .
GOI, 2010. Change Management for e‐Governance Projects, s.l.: Government of India.
Institution of Civil Engineers and the Actuarial Profession, 2005. Risk analysis and management for projects (RAMP). , s.l.: \Thomas Telford Ltd.
Jainendrukumar, T., 2008. The Project/Program Management Office (PMO). PM World Today , X(I), pp. 1-10.
MDOT, 2005. Quality Assurance and Quality Control Process Guide for Project Managers, s.l.: MDOT.
PM4Dev, 2007. Project Management Organizational Structures, s.l.: PM4Dev.
PM4Dev, 2018. The roles, responisbilities, and skills in Project Management, s.l.: PM4Dev.
PMI, 2008. Project Management Institute. Guide to the project management body of knowledge. s.l.:Newtown Square: Project Management Institute.
PMI, 2017. Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide), s.l.: Project Management Institute.
Quick Base, Inc., 2015. How To Create A Project Communication Plan. [Online]
Available at:
SPM, 2001. Software Development Projects and Stakeholders, s.l.: SPM.
UC Davis, 2013. Introduction to Project Management: Principles, Techniques and Tools , s.l.: UC Davis.