Project Management practitioners understand that running a Project Management Office (PMO) means different groups within a company will compete for their projects to take priority. As in any group dynamic, individuals are continuously assessing how they can better position themselves for success. It’s the PMO’s role to step in to accurately assess the business benefits of all projects and prioritize them in relation to the greater good of the company as a whole. More importantly, strategic alignment to corporate objectives is key to understanding where sponsored projects fit within the company’s portfolio – the wrong priority can mean the difference between order and chaos. It’s for this very reason PMOs exist to objectively define the business benefits of all the proposed projects at arms length from the business units in which they emerged. In many cases, business units propose projects to eliminate subjective risk. It’s the PMO’s role to assess the proposed risk and implement an objective risk management strategy that can in the end avoid unnecessary costs associated to projects “deemed” necessary.
In this episode, we will examine how project management offices can use project portfolio management tools to define benefits and build business cases to determine which projects to pursue. To do this, we sit down with industry insider, Beth Partleton, who has more than 30 years of project and portfolio management experience in manufacturing and construction. During her illustrious project management career, she was the Director of Strategic Projects for Miller Brewing Company in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; she was a founder, charter member, and president of the Milwaukee/Southeast Wisconsin PMI Chapter; she was Chair of the PMI Educational Foundation Board of Directors and lastly she served on the Board of Directors for PMI’s Manufacturing specific interest group. Today she will be sharing her insights and war stories around setting project priorities by properly defining project benefits and building the business case justification.
Hope you enjoy the episode. Thanks again to our community for sharing their war stories.
Music Notes
1. The opening of the episode – “Catwalk”
2. Interview with Beth Partleton – “Kickflip”
3. The closing of the episode – “Yearbook”
Finally I found your blog. It is my hope that I can learn some knowledge from you through this blog. Thankz
Posted by: Project Management Templates | September 23, 2009 at 05:41 AM
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On Wed, Sep 23, 2009 at 5:41 AM, wrote:
Posted by: PM War Stories | September 23, 2009 at 02:51 PM