Sonya CalefSenior Project Manager| Hennepin CountyMinneapolis, Mn, United States
One would assume that most PMO members and management would certainly be PMI certified and know the PMBOK in their sleep. However, that assumption may not be true in all cases. Can there be an effective PMO without PMP certified management to steer the ship? Will it be recognized as legitimate by its project manager members if no one in charge has any experience or affiliation with PMI, particularly if the PM members are PMP certified?
I'll go ahead and state that we all know PMP certification is no magic spell put on a person that transforms them into a highly effective, savvy manager. My position is that a PMO needs to be grounded in the foundation of what we know works to evolve efficiently. Without some contingent from what we lovingly refer to as PMI-Island, precious time may be wasted floundering and struggling with what has already been solved. What do you think? Saving Changes...
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Don KimPROJECT-TO-PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT EXPERT| Seeking opportunitiesSacramento, CA, United States
I think it may be too big of an assumption to believe that those with a PMP certification would first, know the PMBOK "in their sleep" and second, that they would know how to apply that knowledge if they had it, and apply it to optimizing the functions of a PMO.
While I completely agree that it would be a waste to re-invent the wheel with respect to problems and processes established by organizations such as the PMI, my real life perspective from the trenches of running and working under a PMO is that the exact opposite occurs for the most part. Unfortunate, but I think my anecdotal observations are true for the most part.
Mark Price PerryBusiness Driven PMO Evangelist| BOT InternationalOrlando, Fl, United States
Hi Sonya,
Very interesting post and reply by Don. I agree with you both. And of course, I suspect that the answer to your question is, once again, "it depends." But, I have a few thoughts to add as well.
First, project managers and PMO management are high performing and high value knowledge workers. As such, they are well served to have professional development and training throughout their career. Professional certifications and professional memberships are no doubt an important and practical component of that development and training, but they are not by any measure a complete curriculum. As you said, and I agree, "PMP certification is no magic spell."
Second, regarding the need for the PMO Manager to be PMP certified, I think that depends upon the needs of the business. In some cases, the answer will be yes and in other cases it might very well be no, and may need to be no. For example, for some organizations, perhaps many, the skills needed by the PMO Manager are business management skills, an understanding of the business, the company, how the company works and makes decisions, how to negotiate and lead peer managers, how to work with and through senior management, how to hire, fire, coach, counsel, and appraise staff, how to manage a department budget, how to bring about organizational change over departmental resistance's, etc. I have seen this many times, and I can assure you that it is almost impossible for a PMP certified project manager, with no prior management experience or people management roles within the company, to step in and be successful. To no discredit of the PMP, the existing management and resisting influences will not give him or her a fair chance to lead and succeed. My point is, that in the scheme of things, a PMP credential for the person managing the PMO may or may not be the most important area of knowledge that the PMO Manager brings to the table. The PMO Manager can hire a PMP, but the PMO Manager can't hire a manager to do his or her job.
And third, PMI has earned and deserves tremendous credit and accolades for what it has accomplished over the years. Does the PMO need PMI? Absolutely, just like the poker player needs an ante to get into the game. But don't confuse the ante to get in the game, with all that is needed to play the game well!
Just a few thoughts, I hope we hear and learn from others. Great post, Sonya.
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Richard HowProgramme Management Consultant| How Associates LtdHarthill, South Yorkshire, United Kingdom
My answer would be no they dont, I run a PMO and I am not PMI certified, I am however a certified Prince 2 practitioner and a member of the association for project management. The PMO I run doesnt currently have the PM's reporting in to it so theres no issue there eihter. It very much depends on the country and what the structure of the particular PMO is.
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Mark Price PerryBusiness Driven PMO Evangelist| BOT InternationalOrlando, Fl, United States
Hi Richard,
Great reply and I agree with you. Following up on Sonya's post, as a PMO Manager can you share with us to what degree a certification (PMP or Prince2) is a top critical requirement for a PMO Manager as compared to line management experience, knowledge and skills such as department management, business problem solving, budgeting, people management, internal negotiating and communicating, etc.
Of course, all of these skills are of value. But for the average organization, what do they need most in their PMO Manager..?
Being certified is necessary however not sufficient to run a PMO.
The PMP certification indicates that the individual understands the PMBoK (rather than just knowing it) and has a level of experience in the discipline of project management.
I believe there should be Prince related certifications that would aim the same.
The common denominator for all PMOs is that they should be centers of excellence. In many cases the PMO is a central continuous quality improvement element. As such you would need resources in the PMO that know and understand the methodology to a proven level so they would be able to adapt this framework to the needs of your organization. Otherwise you will get people that will “reinvent the wheel” or implement a rigid, bureaucratic set of rules and so on…
Sonya, thank you for these thought provoking questions.
It has been my experience that it is Executive Management that first realizes the need to create a Project Management Office. A CEO/CIO/COO who recognizes the value of establishing a program within the organization will gain a significant edge over their competitors who can't. Project Management Offices (PMO) in any organization should be modeled to fit the culture, achieve business needs, and be aligned with the leadership vision to be successful. A model PMO should champion the demonstration of the value of the project management profession, effect the bottom line, establish cross organizational relationships to foster partnerships to achieve change, help realize return on investment, establish a competitive edge for the organization, create repeatable best practices, and instill motivation for a high performing organization.
A PMO Manager in my experience is not solely chosen from a cast of thousands who have PMI’s PMP certifications. There are some very important skill sets that a PMO Manager should have to lead and manage a PMO but like many others who have responded, it depends. Many times, I see many PMO Managers hired from inside the business or are selectively chosen from candidates who have been successful in managing large projects, programs, established a previous PMO that is still thriving and evolving, or were just a candidate already doing good work as a certified PMP in the organization. Your question regarding if a PMO will be seen as legitimate by the organization has a lot to do with it’s alignment that I mention above, and the leveraged value that the PMO staff ( PM practitioners, certified Project Managers and business analysts )can demonstrate to Executive Management and the organization. Managing a PMO requires strong leadership.
The PMO Manager must be able to understand executive leadership's vision and the organization, its challenges, opportunities and where it wants to go. The PMO Manager who takes on this challenge must take the time to consider the alignment of his/her vision and its alignment and be able to lead the PMO under their own vision. A PMO must crawl before it can walk and unfortunately along the way many fail for not taking the time upfront to plan and charter the right model of PMO for the organization.
I’ve personally have developed many PMO, worked as a certified PM in PMO’s and my personal response to your questions are as follows:
• PMO’s will add value that are aligned to the strategy, business and culture of the organization
• PMO’s will thrive on a mix of certified PM, practitioners, schedulers, business analysts and support staff.
• PMI certifications are a career path for each individual to continue their personal growth and development.
• PMI certifications are globally recognized and will open doors for PMs.
• PMI has developed standards and certifications that are developed with collaboration from volunteer practitioners, certified PMs and others in the field of Project Management worldwide.
• PMO will be successful with leadership that understands the business, develops relationships, bring out the best in others, customer focused and has a charter vision to manage and measure to demonstrate the value over time.
• Many contracts and organizations are now requiring certain postions to be filled with certified PMP's and the PMO is one of them.
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Don KimPROJECT-TO-PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT EXPERT| Seeking opportunitiesSacramento, CA, United States
I think Naomi gave some very excellent and compelling reasons to adopt a PMO. And though I think it is a great idea, I also think it gets implemented in many organizations inappropriately.
In my humble opinion, PMOs work best in a project centric organization such as a construction company or software company where the main focus is on projects, but my feeling is that they don't work very well in a weak matrix or functional organization, especially if it is very large and has a lot of silos.
My rationale for the above opinion, is that such a PMO gets too involved in creating a "Center of Excellence" and defining and maintaining standardization and processes and "policing" them which breeds resentment and resistance to following the PMO's policies and procedures. Furthermore, often times these standards and processes are built in a vacuum and typically overburdened with heavy processes that no one follows and is not adaptable to the real world.
This can really be compounded if the PMO is run by a bunch of PMPs w/out enough real world experience looking to impose the PMBOK's practices word for word to the organization, looking to make use of those 5 processes, 9 knowledge areas and 44 processes they studied (or crammed) for a number of months.
But if thought out carefully and planned appropriately by real world seasoned project practitioners, being fully acclimated and mindful of the points raised in Naomi's post, then it will succeed and bring real value to the organization from the most functional to the projectized, though I still maintain the latter is the best environment for a PMO.
Don, thank you for your complimentary feedback and points on ineffective PMO implementations
I agree with you on your points that more mature organizations are more successful such as construction and software companies. The challenges for companies with weak matrix and functional organizations is that many executives want to implement a PMO and have it immediately function as well as a mature PMO.
In my experience, Executives have driven the agenda for the PMO since usually funds for resources and startup costs are allocated to launch the PMO and most organization don' equate the PMO with cost savings and revenue. Also, Executives want immediate realization of measured benefits and return on investment so expectations for a PMO are already high. Many times it is the Executives driving the use of standard templates which a new PM may or may not agree with using but the organization and the project team have one common face of the PMO to share their frustration...the PM. I agree that common methodology, common tools and common language make a huge difference in an organization to produce repeatable best practices but PMs need coaching and mentoring to take their foundation knowledge and use tools appropriately in the "real world".
Also, Executives and the PMO manager seem to underestimate the training and development needs of each PM, the flexibility of available tools that can be used for small, medium and large projects, training for the organization about PM and overall strategy for coming up with quick wins and basic measures.
A PMO must demonstrate its value and make the best use of its resources.
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Sonya CalefSenior Project Manager| Hennepin CountyMinneapolis, Mn, United States
I think all of you have valid considerations. This is one of those issues that is not 2-dimensional like a piece of paper, but has many facets that can be cut different ways based on the scope of the PMO’s reach and marching orders. I’ve worked with clerical PMOs whose only concern was generating usage reports and billing statements, PMOs who were trying to control standards and processes within one department and were tenaciously focused on templates, and EPMOs who were trying to get their arms around an enterprise of disparate PM approaches. No matter though. I think (and I could be right or wrong) there has to be a balance of business-oriented and PM-ideal orientation within a PMO to be a center of excellence. If it’s all one way to the exclusion of the other, then dysfunction sets in and there’s little chance of anything excellent. I can’t help but think of a sign emblazoned with “Bill & Ted’s Excellent PMO.”
I see a list forming of "Ways to Kill Your PMO Center of Excellence":
1. If the PMO is out of touch with the real world, organization cultural context, and daily obstacles the PMs face, the formal best practices and edicts can hang like millstones around everyone's neck. The whole thing can be very self-serving to the PMO if the managers can pat themselves on the back about the shelf of bureaucratic policy & process binders, and rafts of forms and reports they invented to reign in projects. Meanwhile, meaningful progress and PMs suffer.
2. Conversely, if the PMO is out of touch with "Industry Cannon", the PMBOK being one example, then it runs the risk of being so focused on the rudimentary or obvious elements of the job that experienced PMs feel like they are forced to dumb down capabilities to fit into the PMO mold while it wanders a cow-path of self-discovery. I have been in a situation similar to this, and it is excruciatingly painful to have a group with little to no exposure to what has already been institutionalized as appropriate dictate what to do and how to do it. You can see the train wreck coming, but no one will listen. PMs in this situation have to become crafty and stealthy to work around the PMO's self-imposed obstacles.
4. “Set it and forget it” approach to PMO strategy and tactics that makes concrete detail decisions and never revisits them to ensure they still add value. Just because a process or template solved a problem 10 years ago does not mean it is still relevant today.
What else could go on this list?
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Brian PhillipsCEO| Yellowhouse.net Pty LtdHolland Park East, Qld, Australia
I would like to support Naomi's comment about the Executive perspective on the maturity of a PMO in relationship to organisational Project Management maturity.
We support and mentor several PMOs in various forms and those that have been established in an organisation that has baselined project/program maturity have a more realistic chance of success.
PMI certification is not the issue. It is the PMO's recognition that the value the PMO is not just the development and growth of common language, tools and processes to an organisation.
The PMO will only be an overhead if it does not deliver 'value' in terms of reduced project costs and improved project success. This should be aligned with a centres of excellence model; improved project management expertise; and (as an output) professional certification for project managers as part of the growth and maturity.
But it takes time, and should be given realistic time and realistic targets and KPIs to deliver improvements. Saving Changes...
