As understood in the PMP Course online - the top 3 key considerations to building a great project management office. As you read these, consider how much more effective you and your organization will be with a PMO that can plan, prioritize and perform consistently and with confidence across your entire portfolio of projects. 


1.      Ensure PMO support from your organizational leadership

Senior leadership buy-in is essential to the long-term success of any PMO. I have personally worked in PMOs that were not supported at the top, where executives pushed their own projects through with hand-picked project teams outside of the PMO. It led to organization-wide confusion as to who owned the process, funding issues for the PMO itself, and undermined the authority a project management office relies upon in order to deliver project successes. It also challenges the PMO’s responsibility to shepherd the priorities of the holistic organization to ensure the resources are deployed on the right things. Bad structure and misalignment lead to PMO failure, every time.

2.      Hire the right people

What do you need? Experience? PMP-certified project managers? Both? Emphasis should be placed on experience. Take the time to find and hire talent who have demonstrated success in leading projects and achieving business objectives. Proven PM experience with articulable results achieved will lead to project successes. Going through the PMP Course online to obtain the certification, while definitely good to have, is not real-world project management. The certification simply reveals that the candidate has invested to develop their academic perspective. In my experience, some of the theory conveyed in the PMP certification is valid, but some simply does not translate well to application in most organizations. When considering two prospective hires, or weeding through a stack of resumes, do not fall victim to biasing your selection to PMP-certified candidates. You will be robbing your PMO team of the practical experience that will lead to success. I know this is controversial, but I implore you to go with experience as the number-one priority. You will thank me later.

3.       Put the right leadership in place

Organizational savvy and perspective matter. Consider those already part of your company. Who do people trust or turn to for advice? Who consistently gets work done? Identify these leaders and work to pull them into the ranks of your project team. Someone from inside will already have connections and informal influence that will help you navigate change as the project management office goes through the creation process and the growing pains that follow. In addition to connections, look for leadership courage that will enable critical cross-team engagement and the establishment of processes and policies they will stand behind. The connection angle is good because PMO projects need resources, and project managers will need access to information like financials and accounting input for the projects they are managing. As the PMO team structure is established and resourced with the right talent, it will enable the leader in place to invest in appropriate oversight. This includes reporting on progress and providing insights to company executives. 

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