Project Management Office (PMO): Characteristics, Roles, Functions, Transformations and Performance

Project Management Offices[PMOs]

Adson Cunha, MSc, PMP®[email protected]

Who am I?

• Visiting Scholar @ Centro de Estudos de Gestão – IST, Portugal

• PhD Candidate @ Center of Informatics – UFPE, Brazil

• Member @ Research Group in Project Management – UFPE, Brazil

• Project Management Office Member @ DATAPREV, Brazil

• Project Management Professional (PMP®)

• Consultant

What is a PMO?

“Management structure that standardizesthe project-related governance processes and

facilitates the sharing of resources, methodologies, tools, and techniques”

(Project Management Institute, 2013, p. 10)

In other words...

Why PMO?

PMOs can have different flavors

It started to become popular in...

1994

Typologies of PMOs in the professional literature

But in the reality it is much more complex than simple

models

PMOs has been studied empirically since...

2004

Two great authors in PMO are...

Monique Aubry, PhD

Professor at the Business Science School of University of Quebec at

Montreal (UQAM)

Brian Hobbs, PhD

Professor at the School of Management of the University of

Quebec at Montreal (UQAM)

The research program on PMOs

Let´s follow the state of the art in PMO based on

a Systematic Review

BUT...

Systematic Review

PMO

Roles and Functions

Structural Characteristics

PerformanceTransformation

ROLES AND FUNCTIONS

Group 1: Monitoring and controlling project performance

• Report project status to upper management

• Monitor and control project performance

• Implement and operate a project information system

• Develop and maintain a project scoreboard

Hobbs, B., and Aubry, M. (2007) A multi-Phase Research Program Investigating Project Management Offices (PMOs): The Results of Phase 1, Project Management Journal, Vol.38, No.1, pp.74-86.

Group 2: Development of project management competencies and methodologies

• Develop and implement a standard methodology

• Promote project management within the organization

• Develop competency of personnel, including training

• Provide mentoring for project managers

• Provide a set of tools without an effort to standardize


Group 3: Multi-project management

• Coordinate between projects

• Identify, select, and prioritize new projects

• Manage one or more portfolios

• Manage one or more programs

• Allocate resources between projects


Group 4: Strategic management

• Provide advice to upper management

• Participate in strategic planning

• Manage benefits

• Networking and environmental scanning


Group 5: Organizational learning

• Monitor and control the performance of the PMO

• Manage archives of project documentation

• Conduct post-project reviews

• Conduct project audits

• Implement and manage a database of lessons learned

• Implement and manage a risk database


The PMO role triangle

Müller, R., Glückler, J., and Aubry, M. (2013) A Relational Typology of Project Management Offices, Project Management Journal, Vol.44, No.1, pp.59-76.

PMOs as knowledge brokers and facilitators in knowledge sharing

Julian, J. (2008) How project management office leaders facilitate cross-project learning and continuous improvement, Project Management Journal, Vol.39, No.3, pp.43-58.

Arttoa, K., Kulvika, I., Poskelab, J., and Turkulainen, V. (2011) The integrative role of the project management office in the front end of innovation, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.29, No.4, pp.408-421.

Dutton, C., Turner, N., and Lee-Kelley, L. (2014) Learning in a programme context: An exploratory investigation of drivers and constraints, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.32, No.5, pp.747-758.

Müller, R., Glückler, J., Aubry, M., and Shao, J. (2013) Project management knowledge flows in networks of project managers and project management offices: A case study in the pharmaceutical industry, Project Management Journal, Vol.44, No.2, pp.4-19.

Pemsel, P., and Wiewiora, A. (2013) Project management office a knowledge broker in project-based organisations, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.31, No.1, pp.31-42.

Desouza, K. C., and Evaristo, J. R. (2006) Project management offices: A case of knowledge-based archetypes, International Journal of Information Management, Vol.26, No.5, pp.414-423.

STRUCTURAL CHARACTERISTICS

Need to understand the expectations of stakeholders toward the PMO

Andersen, B., Henriksen, B., and Aarseth, W. (2007) Benchmarking of project management office establishment: Extracting best practices, Journal of Management in Engineering, Vol.23, No.2, pp.97-104.

Necessity of right PMO leadership and skilled and experienced PMs in staff

Hurt, M., and Thomas, J. L. (2009) Building value through sustainable project management offices, Project Management Journal, Vol.40, No.1, pp.55-72.

Martin, N. L., Pearson, J. M., and Furumo, K. A. (2005) Is project management: Size, practices and the project management office, Proceedings of the 38th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, pp.52-60.

Community of PMOs

Aubry, M., Müller, and, Glückler, J. (2011) Exploring PMOs through community of practice theory, Project Management Journal, Vol.42, No.5, pp.42-56.

Hobbs, B., and Aubry, M. (2008) An empirically grounded search for a typology of project management offices, Project Management Journal, Vol.39, Supplement, pp.S69-S82.

Time to implement a PMO


Personnel of PMO excluding PMs


Legitimacy of PMOs


TRANSFORMATIONS

Age of PMOs


Relation between the PMO and the organization in which it is embedded is bi-

directional

Aubry, M., Hobbs, B., and Thuillier, D. (2008) Organisational project management: An historical approach to the study of PMOs, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.26, No.1, p.38-43.

Pellegrinelli, S., and Garagna, L. (2009) Towards a conceptualisation of PMOs as agents and subjects of change and renewal, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.27, No.7, pp.649-656.

More energy and resources should be dedicated to change

management

Aubry, M., Hobbs, B., Müller, R., and Blomquist, T. (2010a) Identifying forces driving PMO changes, Project Management Journal, Vol.41, No.4, pp.30-45.

Events from the surrounding social system, internal events, the philosophy of management and tensions to be resolved

Aubry, M., Müller, R., Hobbs, B., and Blomquist, T. (2010b) Project management offices in transition, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.28, No.8, pp.766 - 778.

Hobbs, B., Aubry, M., and Thuillier, D. (2008) The project management office as an organisational innovation, International Journal of Project Management, Vol.26, No.5, pp.547-555.

PERFORMANCE

Aubry, M., and Hobbs, B. (2010) A fresh look at the contribution of project management to organizational performance, Project Management Journal, Vol.42, No.1, pp.3-16.

Competing Value Framework

Aubry, M., Richer, M., Lavoie-Tremblay, M., and Cyr, G. (2011) Pluralism in PMO performance: The case of a PMO dedicated to a major organizational transformation, Project Management Journal,Vol. 42,No. 6,pp.60-77.

Case Study

The State of the Project Management Office (PMO)

2014

Concluding....

Project Management Offices[PMOs]

Adson Cunha, MSc, PMP®[email protected]

Project Management Office (PMO): Characteristics, Roles, Functions, Transformations and Performance

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