What’s A Real PMO?

 

I own a Casio® wristwatch that is suspiciously similar in appearance to an Omega® Seamaster, the watch worn by James Bond (we see a close-up of his wristwatch’s face in the movie Goldeneye). A new Seamaster (“James Bond” version) retails for $3,900 (USD), but can be purchased “on sale” for a mere $3,100. My Casio – which is also a chronometer, by the way – arrived at my door for less than $100.

Now, I readily admit that the Seamaster has many more features than my Casio; but, really, how many current Seamaster owners really need a helium release valve? If the object of the game here is to deliver the time of day, accurately and reliably, to humans walking around on the surface of the planet, then those owners of the Omega watch who do not perform dives of excessive depth or extended periods wear them, at least in part, as a signal to others that they can afford to spend amounts that most middle-class folks would view as excessive on their personal effects. Which is absolutely fine by me, don’t misunderstand – I just think we need to be clear about the form-versus-function balance being attempted here.

The first Project Management Office I headed was part of a small niche contractor, and didn’t compete for contracts quite the same way the established mega-firms did. In this environment and during this time, having a PMO at all was something of an anomaly. Since new contracts would come this company’s way more easily than they would have in an environment of proven-excellence-just-to-submit-a-proposal, the pursuit of outstanding cost and schedule performance wasn’t on everybody’s mind, at least not all the time. The establishment of management information systems that would tip off the executives about which projects were doing okay, and which were train wrecks in the making, was deemed sufficient for their purposes.

Again, don’t misunderstand: I and my staff worked diligently, trying to get all of the decision-makers in the company to recognize the value of doing project management properly. But as we droned on about the need to set up the chart of accounts consistent with the reporting level of the Work Breakdown Structures, or how a cost variance IS NOT the difference between budgets and actuals,  weeks turned to months, and months to fiscal quarters. My little PMO’s exaggerated capabilities would be featured prominently on some of the company’s proposals, as if we were one of the most central aspects to managerial decision-making. Away from the marketing spotlight, however, we were largely ignored, or tolerated with a sort-of bemused patience. Some of the PMs would readily accept any help we could give them, and these ones made the whole PMO enterprise worth pursuing. These were, unfortunately, a definite minority within the firm. From that era of figuratively beating my head against the Vice Presidents’ suite office walls, I remember now as alternately an interminable amount of time, and no time at all. The day came when the company was set to graduate from its niche, and had absolutely no record of project execution excellence to point to as they entered the realm of enhanced contract competition. I discreetly left prior to this change, and none too soon: the company, failing to make the transition, was bought out soon afterwards.

The point here is that we can’t all be the Omega Seamasters of the PMO world, and that’s okay. Sometimes it’s alright to simply look like one, while doing the best we can to deliver accurate and reliable cost and performance information, even when our chronometer-like accuracy is taken for granted or ignored. Looking back, not only do I have no regrets, I’m actually very grateful for the opportunity and the lessons I learned during this time. My little PMO did its best to deliver the critical project cost and schedule performance information that the company’s executives should have used to keep the firm viable. I’ve often pointed out that the 20% worst managers with access to 80% of the information needed to obviate a given decision will consistently out-perform the 80^th percentile top managers who have access to only 20% of the information so needed. Those execs willingly chose not to avail themselves of the PMO’s information stream, so they performed like … well, you know.

So, was this a “real” PMO? You can bet the difference in wristwatch prices it was.