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Justification for Additional Project Managers

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Anonymous
How do I explain (in a very succinct way) to the business leaders (very large org) that their program/project has grown exponentially and a single project manager is no longer sufficient to get the job done?   It boils down to a bandwidth issue; too many meetings to cover (agenda, notes, action items, etc.), large project plan to manage, several executive level project status slides to update, and the list goes on.  Basically, you are so head down in the admin work that simply don't have time to focus on the bigger picture items.  Thoughts?  Thank you in advance! 
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Rami Kaibni
Community Champion
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten Associates New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
Your first step (and probably the only available option) is to have an in-person meeting with the leaders and explain to them, preferably by providing quantifiable data, that their programs has experienced exponential growth, resulting in a workload that surpasses the capacity of a single project manager. You can express this in terms of increased complexity, and heightened demands across various aspects of the project and at the same time explain clearly what could be the impact of such overload like for example not being able to maintain effective oversight over the project and/or program.
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1 reply by Javier Pena Gomez
Mar 22, 2024 7:54 PM
Javier Pena Gomez
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Thats a great way to do it, i will add different scenarios where you show them how the time or scope could be affected if you don’t have help or some risk management inputs
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Kiron Bondale Retired | Mentor| Retired Welland, Ontario, Canada
I might also suggest assessing the administrative requirements and validating that they are all necessary and valuable. It might be that a number of these activities are being done simply because "that's how we've always done it".

Kiron
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Javier Pena Gomez Project Manager| Diunsa San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Mar 22, 2024 12:15 PM
Replying to Rami Kaibni
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Your first step (and probably the only available option) is to have an in-person meeting with the leaders and explain to them, preferably by providing quantifiable data, that their programs has experienced exponential growth, resulting in a workload that surpasses the capacity of a single project manager. You can express this in terms of increased complexity, and heightened demands across various aspects of the project and at the same time explain clearly what could be the impact of such overload like for example not being able to maintain effective oversight over the project and/or program.
Thats a great way to do it, i will add different scenarios where you show them how the time or scope could be affected if you don’t have help or some risk management inputs
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Keith Novak Tukwila, Wa, United States
Write down your own WBS and put time estimates to your own work both recurring and one-time. Keep it reasonably high level and conservative so you don't appear to be gold plating things. Spread that over time to estimate your necessary headcount just like the other teams contributing to your project. Create a 1 page summary of your required staffing estimate for PM work.

Now you can clearly show where the time is going and it is on your business leaders to either staff for it, or decide what they want to give up whether that is bandwidth, or attention to detail.

Updating everyone's work statements including the PM team is very common at major inflection points. On large projects, staffing requirements generally follow patterns like the classic S-curve where effort starts low in the PD and feasibility phase and ramps up sharply once the program is formally launched.

One thing that supports your own business case for a bigger team is that often an hour of my time can save 10 other people an hour each so it is typically a false economy to try and avoid costs by cutting back on effective leadership.

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