Achieve a Critical Business Objective

Failing to achieve a critical business objective that requires large-scale mobilization and deployment of

any company resources can be disastrous. When dealing with such an interdisciplinary venture, success

can be achieved only through centralized management and careful coordination of all involved projects, with a specific focus on communications and risk management. Therefore, if enterprise-wide PMO is to thrive in an increasingly complex and competitive IT environment, it must develop the skills to efficiently and effectively manage large-scale programs that cross multiple functional, organizational boundaries.

Whether taking advantage of the opportunities offered by new technologies, redesigning business processes, or developing new service offerings, the complexities of managing a series of concurrent and interrelated projects across many functional boundaries are a challenge to traditional project management capabilities and methods. Formal and standardized program management disciplines must be applied to steer individual projects to completion, while ensuring the overall success of the program.

The expertise required to implement these disciplines comes from experiences involved in delivering

large-scale programs. A model for establishing an organization that is responsible for managing the

program as a whole, as well as coordinating and controlling its constituent projects, has emerged. This

organization is known as the Program Management Office (PMO). The PMO applies program management practices to the needs of a particular program.

Here are some of the current challenges inherent in managing a series of interdependent projects:

• Senior executives not having comprehensive insight into projects’ progress and performance

• Projects’ customers