The Professional Project Manager

In today's rapidly evolving business landscape, organizational success is not just about meeting targets—it's about excelling in project, program, and portfolio management (P3M). A comprehensive understanding of your organization’s P3M maturity can be a game-changer. This is where a Portfolio, Programme, and Project Management Maturity Model (P3M3^®) assessment becomes invaluable. I have personally seen (and assisted) organisations go from low performing to high performing by completing a P3M3^® assessment and following the prioritized improvement recommendations that are central to it.

The Transformative Impact of P3M3^® Assessments

A P3M3^® assessment provides a structured framework to understand, evaluate, and enhance your organization's project management capabilities. The insights gained from this assessment are pivotal in:

1. Identifying Improvement Areas: Uncover hidden inefficiencies and areas needing refinement in your organization's project management processes.
2. Focussing on Existing Strengths: The assessment is not a punitive exercise but instead seeks to uncover what is working well and make sure you do more of this.
3. Enhancing Decision-Making: Equip your leadership with the data they need to make informed decisions, elevating the effectiveness of governance and resource allocation.
4. Boosting Project Success Rates: Ultimately, the purpose of the P3M3^® assessment is to improve the predictability and performance of your projects, leading to more consistent success (however you define it) and assisting your organisation achieve its strategic goals.

Why Opt for a Virtual P3M3^® Assessment?

In the digital age, virtual assessments have proven to be not only feasible but highly efficient. Conducting a P3M3^® assessment virtually offers several compelling advantages:

• Flexibility and Convenience: Adjust the assessment schedule to suit your organization's busy calendar, without the need for physical meetings. The data and evidence reviews, the workshops and interviews, and presentations involved in the assessment can be completed virtually so you can engage a certified P3M3^® Assessor from anywhere in the world.
• Cost-Effectiveness: The virtual option also saves on travel and accommodation expenses typically associated with in-person assessments.
• Rapid Implementation: By choosing a virtual option you get quicker assessment kick-off, setup and completion which mean faster access to valuable insights.

Achieving a high level of P3M maturity is a testament to an organization’s commitment to excellence. It’s a badge of honor, showcasing a culture that values continuous improvement and professional growth. By engaging in a P3M3^® assessment, you’re not just contributing to the success of your projects; you're uplifting the entire organization. This commitment reflects your dedication to excellence, a quality that resonates across all levels of the organization.

While the idea of conducting a P3M3^® assessment is appealing, the expertise required to do so effectively is crucial. Seeking a certified, authorised, knowledgeable and experienced professional to guide you through the process can make a significant difference. AXELOS makes a great deal of effort to ensure only the best organisations can become an AXELOS Consulting partner (ACP), and only people trained and certified can be a Certified P3M3^® Assessor. An expert with a nuanced understanding of virtual assessments can tailor the process to your organization's unique needs, ensuring that the results are both relevant and actionable.

In considering your options for a P3M3^® assessment facilitator, it's beneficial to select someone who is not just a certified and authorised assessor, but someone with a broad range of experience so that the prioritized recommendations they provide for improvement are based on what actually works and not just theory. An individual who combines profound knowledge with a flexible, virtual-first approach can provide a seamless and effective assessment experience.

Embarking on a P3M3^® assessment journey is a strategic step towards organizational maturity and success. By opting for a virtual assessment, you embrace innovation and efficiency, positioning your organization to thrive in a competitive business environment. Remember, the right expertise can turn this journey into a transformative experience, paving the way for sustained excellence and pride in your organizational achievements.

Find out more about the P3M3^® assessment at https://www.axelos.com/for-organizations/p3m3

And let me know if you have any questions, always happy to chat.

Sean Whitaker

[email protected]

And yes, in terms of full disclosure I am a certified P3M3 assessor and my company is a Authorized Consulting Partner (ACP) but this isn't a pitch for work. Its a genuine piece of advice to help you and your organisation improve your portfolio, programme, and project management quickly with a proven, effective, and cost efficient method for doing so.

In the same way that project management practitioners can be described as beginner, intermediate or advanced, organizations can also be described as having low, medium, or high levels of project management. These levels of project management reflect the level of organizational project management maturity (OPMM).  Knowing the level of OPMM your organisation is currently at, and also knowing where it should be is essential to help you reach your organisational goals and strategy through better delivery of portfolios, programmes, and projects.

An OPMM assessment will look at all aspects of the way you run portfolios, programmes and projects within the organisation including:

• Organisational Governance
• Management controls
•  
• Finance and cost estimating
• Planning and Execution
• Scheduling and time estimating
• Stakeholder management and communications
•  
• Lessons learned and information management
•  
• Risk management
• Quality management
• Practitioner capability development

A good assessment will look at all the processes and practices you have, evidence of them being used (or not), and also interview users and key stakeholders either in a workshop or face to face interviews. Once the evidence gathering is completed they can provide scores for individual business units, an organisational score (usually 0-5), benchmarking against others in the industry and a set of prioritized (and achievable) recommendations to move you towards your goal.

A good OPMM assessment provides a benchmark for your future efforts. It lets you know that you are progressing in the right areas. Without it you simply don’t know how well you are doing with your improvement efforts. It’s a good idea to commit to regular OPMM assessments every 18-24 months to check how you are progressing, and to reprioritize recommendations.

Don’t assume that all organizations must be at the top level of maturity, it’s important to consider that the level of OPMM that is desirable for any organisation is directly related to the size, cost, length, complexity and industry of the projects being undertaken. Organizations undertaking highly complex, long term, expensive projects should aim to have a higher level of project management maturity, while organizations and small businesses routinely undertaking short, low cost, low complexity projects may be perfectly suited to a lesser level of project management maturity.

Using an external consultant to assess your level of project management maturity and make recommendations has a number of benefits:

• A good consultant will make sure that your recommendations are achievable, affordable and appropriate.
• You get access to their wider experience with many organisations and their insights into best practice
• The report will be independent and objective

There are several good commercial models available in the market and the benefit of using one of these is that it allows you to more easily benchmark your organisation against others in their database.

I am experienced in using the P3M3, OPM3, HSI 4Q model and bespoke OPMM assessment models and if you have any questions about any aspect of organizational project management maturity please do not hesitate to contact me.

If you have any questions, comments or feedback please feel free to email me.

I am really interested to know your answers to these three questions about project management:

1. What one tip would you give to a new project manager?

2. What is the single largest contributing factor to project success?

3. What is the single largest contributing factor to project failure?

Total Quality Management (TQM) is an accepted part of quality management and customer satisfaction in many organizations. While it has a broad range of interpretation and application, it has some consistent principles which define it.

They are:

• Everyone in the organization recognizes that quality is central to organizational success
• Everyone in the organization contributes to quality
• The organizational culture and structure is built and maintained to support TQM
• Continuous improvement is mandatory and expected

Now imagine if we moved from project management as an ad hoc, practitioner lead initiative within an organization to Total Project Management (TPM). What would this look like? Keep in mind that most organizations rely on successful delivery of projects for operational and strategic success. Additionally, for a lot of organizations the largest part of their capital budget, and sometimes their operational budget, is spent on projects of some sort. These organizations don’t question the need to have finance and human resources as essential organization wide shared services but often question the need and value of organizational project management.

Let’s start by taking those four principles of TQM and substituting project management where it currently says quality management. Here is how they look:

• Everyone in the organization recognizes that project management is central to organizational success
• Everyone in the organization contributes to project management
• The organizational culture and structure is built and maintained to support Total Project Management
• Continuous improvement is mandatory and expected

If we did print these out, embed them in the organizational culture, and let our shareholders and customers know about them we could expect to see the following:

• A Chief Project Officer (CPO) operating a C-Level
• Appropriate and tailored portfolio, program and project management methodologies
• Appropriate and tailored PMO’s
• Support for ongoing professional development for all project management practitioners
• The CEO regularly acknowledging the role project management plays in the success of the organization
• Commitment from everybody in the organization to improving the approach to project management

Overall, these changes, if done appropriately, would lead to a more mature approach to project management within the organization and ultimately more successful portfolios, programs, projects and organizations.

What do you think?