PMOs vs. PMs

Kenneth has 14 years of healthcare experience in government and private industry. Over eight years of experience managing healthcare IT projects, operations, contracts, and personnel. His work experience includes project management, contracts and procurements, data analysis, claims adjudication, business writing, and business process modeling. Kenneth was certified in 2006 as a Project Management Professional.

  PMO   Quality  

The project management office can be a difficult beast to understand. From the outside, it may simply look like an office full of redundant project managers--or perhaps a gaggle of gatekeepers who spend their time telling others how to do their jobs (or how not to).

Executives and stakeholders might feel like they can just hire a project manager instead of building out a PMO, but in fact there are many benefits to having a fully staffed project management office instead of just overloaded project managers scattered throughout the organization. If an organization is engaged in project work on a continual basis, a PMO may be the best investment in securing successful projects.

Benefit 1: Emphasis on Process
One project manager by him or herself will have a difficult time keeping track of the schedule and resources working on the project. It is easy to get bogged down in the tasks and details that consume the work days. The project management office should be somewhat removed from that work or have dedicated resources to track that information closely. The PMO should be able to take a step back in order to develop and refine processes for the projects and the project teams.

This emphasis on process will help everyone on the project, even though it may seem burdensome if the resources are not conditioned to working with processes--which help standardize the work …

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