How Effective Is Your PMO?

Project Management / By

Project management office or PMO is the office established by organizations to create and maintain procedures and standards for project management methodologies. As per PMBOK 5.0 it is an organizational structure that standardizes the project related governance processes. 

Types of PMO Structure:

Some different type of structure includes

  • Supportive: In this type the PMO provides templates, best practices and relevant training required for the project. The degree of PMO control is very low.
  • Controlling: In this type the PMO support the project and ensure it is complaint. The degree of PMO control is moderate.
  • Directive: In this type the PMO manage the project directly. The degree of PMO control is really high.

Role Of A PMO

The PMO is responsible for:

  • Analyze and evaluate the issues and provide possible resolutions using project management methods
  • PMO reviews all the project in the initiation stages so that they can plan and resolve the issues proactively.
  • Provide support to the project and ensure that problems do not occur again.
  • Ensure reduction in cost using centralized services.
  • Have the authority to terminate the projects.
  • Review and audit the projects.
  • Assign and plan the shared resources in different projects.
  • Ensures that the stakeholders are updated with the current status of the project.
  • Supporting ongoing improvement in project management.
  • They sometimes acts as an integrator which means to bring things together.
  • Improves communication and update the top management and critical stakeholders with the current status of the project.
  • Participate in decision-making, so that projects achieve strategic goals and objectives.

A PMO’s role is varies from organization to organization. It is defined by its core activities, which includes its primary and secondary roles and responsibilities.

Some of them can be categorized as follows

  • Finance Role – In this role a PMO controls and plan the project funding reconciliation and overall budget of the project.
  • Planning and prioritization Role: In this role a PMO take responsibility of prioritization of the projects considering business perspective and other important factors. At times they takes the accountability of development and maintenance of critical projects.
  • Constraints and Issue Role – In this role a PMO ensures that effective process is in place to take care of all the issues that are internal or external to the project. An effective PMO ensure a timely resolution and documentation of all the issues.
  • Change Management or Change Advisory Board (CAB) Role – In this role a PMO take lead in in approving or rejecting all the changes (major or minor, big or small, critical or non-critical, urgent or not). An effective PMO plays an important role by rejecting too many changes in the middle of the project. Too many changes or entirely new scope leads to failure of a project, so an effective PMO can prevent both gold plating and padding.
  • Resource Management Role: In this role a PMO, creates a long-term plan of resource calendar. They maintains the resource plan for multiple projects (both the current projects and those that are in pipeline). They ensure that no resource is either over-burdened or under-utilized, in other words ensures resource levelling across all the projects.
  • Quality Assurance Role – In this role a PMO ensure that any new products and or services delivered by the project is in line with the company policy and solve the purpose to its best.
  • Risk Role – In this role a PMO assist the respective project managers in ensuring that the project has effective processes in place to identify and resolve risks. It is involved in ensuring these processes are aligned with the risk management policy of the organization.
  • Audit and Reporting Role – In this role a PMO provide a reporting service to the project. It is involved in collecting and analyzing the base data, auditing and verifying it, generating and presenting it to multiple audiences.

The role of a PMO actually depends on the organizational culture and its requirements. PMO is involved in defining and revising various processes and policies to ensure improvement in their current and future deliveries.

About Aditi Malhotra

Aditi Malhotra is the Content Marketing Manager at Whizlabs. Having a Master in Journalism and Mass Communication, she helps businesses stop playing around with Content Marketing and start seeing tangible ROI. A writer by day and a reader by night, she is a fine blend of both reality and fantasy. Apart from her professional commitments, she is also endearing to publish a book authored by her very soon.

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