Every organization’s ultimate goal is always stable growth and sustainability.
As an organization grows, managers have fewer tools to control projects. Your
team might work passionately, but without deliberate leadership to ensure the
success of their projects, the entire office can disintegrate into kindergarten-
level chaos. This is why we begin the month by introducing the project
management office and its primary types as an important aspect of every
business.
The Project Management Office, also known as the PMO, can be simply
described as a centralized entity within a specific organization that is
responsible for setting standards, maintaining discipline, providing a
governing body, and enforcing the right set of accountability to project
management and leadership in a clear, concise, and consistent way.
Project management is an art geared toward the objective of increasing the
production of products or services. Many confuse the PMO with the figure of
the Project Manager, but they are different things. The project office
supersedes the project manager’s, as the manager is responsible for one or
more specific projects, while the office is responsible for all projects in the
company or for a specific area.
Recent studies indicate a significant rise in the adoption of Project
Management Offices (PMOs). For instance, the number of organizations with a
PMO increased from 61% in 2007 to 71% in 2017. This trend has continued, as
evidenced by the 2020 State of Project Management Survey. This means that
the subject of PMO is so important that the success or failure of an organization
could depend on how solid the project management plan is. It can help you
oversee multiple projects without overloading your staff if well planned.
From the least support to the most support, we list the three paramount types
of PMO below.
1. The Support PMO
This is a project office with a more consultative and coaching-oriented
profile. Its main role is to make recommendations to project managers
distributed within the organization, pointing out the advantages and
disadvantages of each model, technique, or tool and suggesting the best
path to follow in each project.
It is also the role of the supporting PMO to organize project
documentation and ensure that information from past projects is used
as lessons learned in future projects. A support PMO is usually
implemented when the organization hasn’t bloomed to full in project
management maturity, as its degree of control is lower compared to
other types of PMO. It is not advisable to create very strict controls in
immature organizations, because this would only generate unnecessary
frustration. First, it is necessary to “educate” project managers on best
practices and, only then, begin to apply any type of audit. As the PMO
becomes more recognized within the company, it can act more
effectively in controlling projects.
2. The Control PMO
This is the project office that, in addition to supporting project managers
in carrying out initiatives, also assesses project compliance. That is,
it verifies that project managers and the entire project team are
following the project management models, tools, and processes
established in the organization. After training project managers, the
controlling PMO demands that the knowledge learned be applied in
practice. For this, the control PMO uses process audits, which allows
for identifying the points in the process that are not being completely
followed. This means that audits aren’t only used to expose people who
are not complying with the rules, but the process as well. The notable
benefit of audits is in generating process reviews, tying up any “loose
ends” or reducing some controls, as project managers increase their
maturity in the processes.
Once there is more standardization of processes and uniformity in
the way project managers do things, it is possible to better measure
the quality with which projects are being delivered. Another
assignment of the Control PMO is to help control the project portfolio
, either by organizing and prioritizing initiatives or taking control of some
projects for themselves.
3. The Directive PMO
This is that project office that has an even greater degree of control
than even the control PMO. The term “director” is not used loosely:
this type of PMO is responsible for directing the organization’s
resources to the projects. The director chooses which project
managers will work on each project and how much money can be
spent on each of the initiatives.
The directive PMO represents a center of excellence in project
management and, like the consultative PMO, it also makes
recommendations to project managers and is responsible for
disseminating the project management methodology throughout the organization. In addition, like the controlling PMO, the directive PMO also
performs compliance audits to verify that processes are being followed.
In conclusion, a PMO without the right set-up will have minimal impact on the
rest of your business. The PMO team will become an island and might even
slow down your project’s progress. iCentra provides consultancy services to
create an interconnected PMO that adds a level of transparency across
projects while giving managers all the functionality they need to maximize
