This document discusses the benefits of establishing a Project Management Office (PMO) to increase efficiency, savings, and strategic alignment within an organization. It outlines key roles for a PMO, including an executive sponsor, PMO leader, program managers, project managers, and administrators. Establishing clear communication of project status and metrics is important for a PMO's success. A PMO can help organizations convert their strategic visions into actionable project plans and prioritize projects that further their strategic goals.

1. PMO Standup, Operations and Continuous Improvement: A clear path to efficiency, savings,
and strategic alignment
Introduction
The Project Management Office, also known as a PMO, is at its core a simple organizational structure designed
to increase productivity. It is similar to any other fit for purpose organizational structure, but few other groups
have the same impact on efficiency, strategic alignment and output, no matter the industry. This paper is
meant to provide key points and general guidance for organizations that struggle to initiate, execute and close
projects on time or within budget. This can occur even if the organization has project or program managers if
those resources are leveraged inefficiently.
The accepted definition of a PMO is a group or department within a business, agency or enterprise that
defines and maintains standards for project management within the organization.
A PMO is called many things – Results Management Office, Project Support office, Project Controls Office, or any variation of
Enterprise, Global or Strategic PMO. No matter how it’s defined, the key attribute of a properly established PMO is the
collection of professionals with experience and training in managing all aspects of an organization’s effort.
PMO’s bring together the visions and objectives of leadership and convert them into action with an emphasis
on managing the schedule, scope, and resources of those activities.
There are a many benefits of a strong PMO. The most significant include:
 Alignment of strategy and vision with operations and delivery
 The right projects selected for the right reasons and delivered as expected
 Cost reduction or avoidance via process based management
Establishing a PMO is Harder Than it Might Appear
The creation of a PMO is normally not a hard sell to management. When presented in a cost benefit analysis
or based on ROI, it has to make sense, right? And the benefits far outweigh the flaws? Of course they do! The
challenges with creating a PMO start with the concept of loss of control by the teams the organization may
ultimately benefit. Often the individual groups within an enterprise prefer to keep running things the way they
always have. Adding to the complexity, many mid to large sized companies have grown by acquiring other
companies, who frequently have their own way of doing things, which may or may not use best project
management practices.
To increase the chances of short and long term success, organizations need a strong and engaged executive
sponsori, clear criteria for establishment, and an easy to understand path to completion in order to improve
chances of adoption by all involved. This is not to say that the ROI/CBA and benefits listing, along with
whatever other marketing tools are required, are not important, but the first step is presenting the solution to
known problems that most can agree on. When done with the backing of a leader and schedule to say when

2. the growing pains might become manageable, others may begin to look forward to the benefits and savings
proposed.
Besides leveraging a strong sponsor and leadership to overcome a specific organizations struggle with a loss of
control, there should be steps to transition responsibilities to the PMO. A clear plan and timeline to identify
and move project based activities into the PMO will allow teams to see progress and review lessons learned
from engagements, while limiting impact if there are operational or other reasons why a particular PMO
structure may not work.
Another challenge is the establishment of a PMO too quickly. Organizations in today’s fast paced business
environment, which are ever more focused on disrupting their markets for economic advantage (or survival),
frequently rush their PMO into ‘production’ without proper consideration of structure or goals. Frequently
these PMO’s do not have sponsorship or direct leadership. They struggle to bring the efficiencies promised
since they are sometimes little more than a loose confederation of project, program and functional
coordinators and managers. These PMO’s frequently fail, and depending on the company, become a reason to
avoid the centralized structure of a PMO for years.
PMO Creation Criteria and Type
There are no hard and fast criteria for the establishment of a PMO. In general, a PMO will benefit an
organization that:
 is decentralized geographically, by business unit or function
 has a history of projects failing, never starting or running over schedule or budget
 has projects that don’t align with the goals or strategy of the organization
 has or consists of leaders that don’t get information on status or results
A PMO can be formed and run under multiple frameworks. There is not a single structure that’s best for every
organization. PMIii identifies the five most common structures:
These structures allow an organization in any industry, from non-profit to fortune 1000 to government and
everyone in between, to create a fit for function entity that can produce results. Professional service based

3. organizations, with customer facing projects, may adopt an enterprise PMO to ensure that the right projects
are scoped and delivered for the margin and the customer service targets of the company. This can be done
while simultaneously creating project specific PMO’s for their customers. A medium sized company may have
a few business unit PMO’s. In both the professional service and the medium business scenario, there could be
an overarching PM center of excellence that ensures that repeatable processes and standards are created and
maintained across the enterprise. Whatever is best for the specific organization’s needs are what matter most.
Organizationally Speaking…
A PMO needs a strong executive sponsor and a strong PMO leader. These individuals team up as champions
for the PMO, but more importantly, what the PMO stands for – a business enablement platform. The
executive ensures that the PMO is a tactical tool used for strategic purposes. The collection of projects and
programs they manage MUST allow the business to achieve its goals faster and more efficiently than it would
have otherwise.
From the leadership outward, resourcing will depend on which framework is selected. Listed below are the
roles that are best practice to have for most PMO’s:
The exact roles and application of resources may, and actually should, vary depending on the current and
projected needs of an organization. The resources suggested above may be leveraged in countless ways, as
long as project management best practices are followed. For example, a new PMO may start with more PM’s
in the early days, with a plan to move them into program management roles and back filling them with more
junior PM’s and Project Administrators. This plan could reduce overhead costs if firm processes are developed
Assist with project related tasks to help the
PM’s focus on delivery (they can also assist
with administrative functions of the PMO,
such as metrics and financial tracking).
Manage the day to day details of the projects
and project administration (a PM can also
manage the Admins and analysts)
Manage the groupings of projects and ensure
alignment (in smaller orgs, the program
manager can also be the PMO
leader/director)
Leads the PMO and interfaces with sponsors
and all business units, customers, and staff.
Provides executive level support and ensures
alignments
PMO
Sponsor
PMO
Director
Program
Manager(s)
Project
Manager(s)
Project
Admin Lead
Project
Admin
Project
Analyst

4. and followed and the work performed does not require highly dynamic and fast paced decision making.
Conversely, a PMO may start with a few project coordinators and a PMO leader, and grow into a highly
dynamic office as business grows.
When the metrics come in, Communications go out
Every successful PMO has a way of monitoring and reporting progress. It is also critically important to manage
the flow of information. Communication is arguably one of the greatest values that the PMO brings to the
table. The PMO should compile status and statistics, and push actionable information out proactively.
There are some vital measurements every PMO needs to capture. Performance against financial/capital
targets (whether margin or costs), is one of the most important. Resource utilization, percent complete, and
performance against schedule are others. Each of these metrics by themselves give a quantitative snapshot of
progress, which should be filtered into usable data and presented at a preset schedule, using the most
effective medium.
The mode of communicating status is as important as what’s communicated. Status reports sent via a link to a
shared drive are fine, however the PMO should hold regularly scheduled meetings to review the written
status, and any associated metrics. Executive level meetings should be held as well, and where the
organization is mature, the executive level and PMO internal staff meetings can be combined. Ad Hoc reports
and status should also be communicated in the most direct manner, with some pre-set labeling of importance
or contents so the right audience gives it the proper attention.

5. Another overlooked but sometimes difficult to quantify measurement is customer satisfaction. It should be
noted that PMO has multiple customers. The stakeholders, the organization that gave control of the project to
the PMO, executives and end users are only a few. Each PMO configuration and industry will have a different
set of customers, but overall, customer satisfaction metrics provide a measure of not just what was delivered,
but HOW. If you run roughshod over the customer, internal or external, while delivering your project or
program on time, to scope and under budget, the PMO will suffer the same bad press as if the project was
late, over budget and unfinished. The downside of pursuing this metric is that it can be difficult to get useful
responses from customers of the PMO. This makes collecting data a balancing act for sure, and usually only
more mature PMO’s can solicit, receive, process and change based upon the feedback, buts it’s well worth the
effort in the long term.
Finally, every PMO should avoid metrics and tools for the sake of metrics and tools. Sometimes spreadsheets,
databases and document repositories, all basic elements of a PMO’s measurement and tracking strategy, can
grow unnecessarily complex. If tracking financials, leave the complexity to the finance department where
possible. It is important to avoid reporting more than is required for the audience. Use the least information
required to tell the story. Let your customer or stakeholders ask questions and provide more detail as
required. Some organizations do ask for microscopic detail, and if that’s the rule, adapt; however, if it’s not,
keep your metrics to what’s required. There are enough other moving parts to be concerned with.
Strategy into Action
One of the many issues facing organizations is the ability to convert their visions into actionable plans.
Properly formed and staffed PMO’s excel at identifying requirements and forming plans around them. This
gives leaders the opportunity to focus on strategy, and align that strategy across the enterprise. The PMO can
work with operational teams to provide a clear roadmap on how any strategic goals will look with respect to
funding, ROI, schedule, and resources.

6. This allows mapping and prioritization of projects to ensure that those with the most impact to the
organization’s direction move forward with maximum effort and efficiency, and those that do not meet the
group’s vision are delayed or not funded. Organizations that have highly decentralized operations can
definitely benefit from the efforts of a PMO that is able to facilitate the alignment of strategy across business
units with different objectives, functions or concentration.
Summary
There is definite tangible and intangible value in planning, establishing and running a PMO for most
organizations. There is no single framework that works for every organization, and each group should carefully
consider their needs before embarking on the journey to establish one. All properly established and run
PMO’s bring value, and the points in this paper are just that, points to consider on the path to creation and
operation.
i Strategic PMOs Play a Vital Role in Driving Business Outcomes, Forrester Consulting, a PMI-commissioned research study, 2013. Research based on in-depth
interviews with 40 PMO leaders and executives in July 2013.
ii Pulse of the Profession: PMO Frameworks, PMI, 2013.