We could go on and on about how a PMO can benefit your organization, we could write a whole book about it! But you busy-bees don’t have time to read a whole book so lucky for you, we’ve made a quick list to highlight the top 10 PMO benefits for your organisation!
What is a PMO?
Before we go on about its benefits, we need to cover what a PMO is all about!
A project management office (PMO) is a group, department or office either internal or external to an organisation that defines, maintains and ensures the standards and practices for project management within the organisation. PMOs can also go a step further and play a significant role in supporting and improving strategic decision-making over entire programmes and portfolios within an organisation in the form of an EPMO.
In organisations with hundreds of projects happening at the same time, getting an accurate understanding of how they are performing and the value they bring to an organisations can be an impossible task. A PMOs job is to be the supportive backbone that allows your organisation to achieve their strategic goals by ensuring the organisation is selecting the right projects, executing them in the right way and choosing the right people for the task.
Top 10 PMO benefits for your organization
So just what are the key benefits of PMOs for your organisation? Here’s our top 10 list!
1. Gives organisations transparency and a big picture understanding of their projects
Many organisations make the mistake of believing that simply because projects are completed, they are making a legitimate impact to the organisation’s strategy. Sadly, the typical top-down structures adopted by organisations mean projects are handed down a long ladder of different managers before reaching the project level. This long bureaucratic process makes it hard for top-level leadership to know the actual impact and value of their projects on an on-going basis. And sadly, they often come to know of their lack of impact much too late.
The PMO is responsible for being the single source of truth. They provide accurate and relevant information on an on-going basis and make sure all processes are in place to make sure project value, activities and risks can be measured, reported and dealt with in the most effective manner.
2. Aligns the organisation’s activities with their strategy
PMOs make sure that your organisation’s portfolio doesn’t simply look busy but is actually producing value inline with your strategy. This is the key difference with maximizing and optimizing your portfolio. Without a proper PMO, organisations may believe they are making the most out of their resources because of the growing projects and activities that are occurring. Remember more projects don’t always mean more value! EPMOs are specifically made for this job and research by PMI shows they have the ability to improve strategic alignment by 23% and portfolio reporting services by 20%.
3. Optimizes an organisation’s resources and portfolio
One main job of the PMO is to make sure resources are being allocated as efficiently and effectively as possible. In large organisations with multiple projects running at the same time, keeping track can be an almost impossible task. All projects have to be managed according to priorities, schedules, budgets and much more. With all these tasks, it’s more important than ever for effective PMOs to have a proper PPM software that can back them up and make life easier. But it’s not software alone that allows PMOs to optimize resources. PMOs also make sure that teams are using practices and processes that increase productivity and efficiency through building governance frameworks and project pipeline management structures.
4. Eases your risk management activities
Risks are a big part of any business and are pretty much unavoidable. But don’t make the mistake of believing that high risk always means high return. PMOs help organisations make sure that they are taking on the right risk for the right returns. PMOs can help organisations identify, prioritize and evaluate all the risks associated with projects within a portfolio, often through a RAID log, and produce contingency and risk response plans to mitigate these uncertainties. Risks don’t need to be as scary and daunting as they seem with an effective PMO.
5. Enhances the decision making-process
A PMOs key benefit is their ability to gather all kinds of data across all projects and analyse this information in order to give key decision-makers within an organisation all the relevant information they need. To make informed decisions, people need real-time, accurate and precise information on a on-going basis. Don’t be fooled into believing that getting the right data is easy. Many organizations are swimming in data but fail to put the right process and measures to make sure the right data is being collected. An additional benefit of PMOs data gathering abilities is that they help remove biases and personal preferences by providing tangible measurements of value, leading to a reduced likelihood of ‘pet projects’ being selected.
6. Facilitates the sharing of knowledge to achieve success
A running issue with large organisations is that departments start running in individual silos, using their own processes and tools to execute their projects. Some departments may have found their golden recipe to teamwork and project processes but aren’t sharing it with everyone else. PMOs are there to make sure teams don’t keep good things to themselves! By acting as the central hub, PMOs facilitate the sharing of knowledge and prevent your project teams from having to reinvent their practices. They help gather, identify, develop and implement the most effective project management methodologies, best practices and standards for their organisations context.
7. Achieves the best results through project governance and standardization
One of the best ways to reduce costs, improve traceability of successful models and make sure those models can be repeated is through implementing standardized processes and frameworks. PMOs bring all of those benefits as their key job is to create, implement and maintain effective governance frameworks that clearly define responsibilities, accountability and mechanism of oversight for projects. If you’ve got a winning recipe, make sure to use it well and use it consistently. Consistency is key!
8. Improves communication, collaboration and coordination across departments
Say bye-bye to departmental silos! As your organisation’s central hub, PMOs are not only able to gather resources and know-how from other teams, but are able to facilitate smooth and efficient communication between different departments or teams. Open and organized communication also has the added effect of improving collaboration and coordination capabilities within an organization. Organisations often make the mistake of falling to fully optimise their skills and resources simply because of a lack of communication. With an effective PMO, those issues will be long gone!
9. Supports project teams so they can do their jobs better
PMOs are your project managers coach, teacher and hype-man. PMOs aren’t there just to tick boxes and do general quality control. They’re there to make sure project managers have all the tools they need to do their jobs and achieve results that directors are expecting. Some of the ways they do this is by acting as project delivery support to reduce bureaucratic processes and providing all necessary training, coaching and mentoring to make sure they can use the implemented systems to their maximum capabilities. PMOs don’t just push for what the head of organisations want, but make sure teams have everything they need to do it well and do it right!
10. Increases your organisation’s ROI
In the end, this is the most important benefit of the PMO. The whole point of increasing efficiency, strategic alignment and optimization is to make sure your organisation is getting more value for their money. An effective PMO can help guarantee a higher chance of achieving greater results with an organisation’s project investments. PMOs are there to make sure organisations have a winning recipe- from start to end- that sets them up for a win!
pmo365 brings the best out of your PMOs
You’ve read all these benefits and now you want in on PMOs. We wish starting a PMO can be as easy as a click of a button but we all know it may be a bit harder than that. But with pmo365, we make the whole process of establishing your PMO as pain-free as possible! We are your best all-in-one packaged service that caters directly to your needs and brings all the tech, tools and talent together to make sure you are getting the most out of your PMO.
If you want to know more about how pmo365 can revolutionise your PMO activities, make sure to book a free trial and speak directly with our PMO experts.
