What is a Project Management Office (PMO)?

A Project Management Office (PMO) is a unit or department that standardizes project management processes and helps share resources, best practices, tools, and techniques across the company.

Depending on its maturity, the PMO can provide simple support services (administrative support and sharing of best practices), expertise on crucial project performance elements and metrics (e.g., estimations, scheduling, risk management, and quality assurance), and act as a consultant/advisor to project managers (including issues relating to HR). At its most advanced, a PMO can play a crucial role in strategic and performance-related decision-making.

What are PMO Roles and Responsibilities?

A PMO is made up of various team members, all with their specific roles and responsibilities. Job titles, key responsibilities, and number of members will vary from business to business, but may include:

  • A leader, ‘head’, or director of the PMO is in charge of the entire function. They are responsible for sharing and encouraging best practices, setting clear objectives, and ensuring projects always support broader business goals.
  • Portfolio managers oversee one distinct portfolio. They must prioritize tasks, allocate resources, and support the execution of the projects within their portfolio.
  • Project managers lead individual projects or a small number of related projects within the same portfolio. Their role includes bringing the project to fruition, working within budget, and meeting the specified deadline.

Some of the more general roles and responsibilities of the PMO include but are not limited to:

Standardization of the Project Management Process

PMOs standardize methods, processes, tools, and templates across the businesses. By developing and implementing a ‘standard’ way of working, projects and tasks are more comparable to each other and easier to deploy across the organization. PMOs are also responsible for showing employees/staff how to use or adhere to these standards correctly.

Support Project Implementation

The PMO must lead project implementation and manage all the moving parts, including:

  • Problem-solving issues like capacity planning and resource allocation
  • Selecting the proper project methodology and building business cases for projects
  • Facilitating communication and collaboration to ensure everyone's on the right page
  • Providing accurate real-time data to empower stakeholders to make the best possible decisions and create a single source of truth
  • Mentoring and training project managers to ensure they have the right skills

Provide a Consolidated View of All Projects

PMOs must bridge the gap between projects and their stakeholders with thorough reports, tailored dashboards, and a consolidated view of all projects. This means your PMO must:

  • Develop and track Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
  • Manage and communicate budgets, forecasts, actuals, and margins
  • Consolidate all information and build a project dashboard designed for stakeholders
  • Provide essential, real-time data for any project reporting

Strategic Portfolio Management and Governance

Strategic Portfolio Management ****(SPM) aligns your project execution with your company’s strategic vision. The PMO’s role is to narrow down projects and prioritize them based on the organization’s overarching goals. This will include developing business cases, assessing the cost/benefit ratio, and completing risk assessments.

What is the Role of the PMO vs PM?

A Project Manager (PM) manages individual projects and their day-to-day running. Conversely, a PMO is often a whole team that operates at a high level and supports the project managers in meeting business goals, optimizing time, prioritizing projects based on business needs, providing a centralized view of all company information, and more.

A Project Management Officer, then, is a critical part of the project management office of an in-house team. Their role is administrative and technical, ensuring projects are complete, accurate, on time, and within budget and scope.

What is a Digital PMO?

A digital PMO is a system or tool that standardizes and digitizes a business’s processes, projects, and data. It performs the tasks of a PMO or project manager. Benefits include real-time data, reduced human error, the ability to schedule projects in advance, digitized workflows, enhanced productivity, and eliminating repetitive or manual tasks.

What are PMO OKRs?

Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) are tangible outcomes that PMOs put in place to measure and track the success of a portfolio of projects. A PMO should set an objective for each portfolio and identify the key results they or the team must achieve to meet it. OKRs will, of course, depend on the nature of the portfolio. Some examples of the types of OKRs that PMOs might set are:

  • Project execution OKRs, such as improving resource utilization, developing standardization, and increasing efficiency.
  • Financial OKRs, based on performance, budgets, ROI, and cost-effectiveness.
  • Growth and innovation OKRs, which focus on product launches, continuous learning and development, and adaptability.
  • Product Management OKRs, such as understanding end users better or improving product performance.

OKRs must be very specific and include a measurable element. For example, if the portfolio’s objective is to gain a better understanding of end users, then key results may consist of:

  1. Conduct one customer survey per quarter to gain valuable insight, aiming for 40% total participation.
  2. Create a suite of buyer personas in Q1 based on quantitative existing customer data and qualitative customer success team data.

This structure enables more effective success tracking of projects and portfolios.

What are PMO Processes?

Every business is different; thus, every PMO’s processes are, too. Some examples of processes your PMO may define and standardize are:

  • Resource allocation
  • Prioritization
  • Risk assessment
  • Budgeting
  • Reporting and ROI
  • Project feedback and changes

What are the Different Types of PMO Structures?

These structures define the characteristics and level of control each PMO has. These are the most common PMO classifications, though there are others.

The Supportive PMO

The supportive model provides “a consultative role to projects” and works best for organizations with low project management maturity. This role includes registering products and resources, standardizing tools, and supporting the wider PPM team(s).

The controlling PMO

The controlling model ensures compliance, data quality, and validating stages within the project lifecycle. This model is suitable for organizations with a higher level of project management maturity or who already have the supportive model.

The directive PMO

The directive model heavily controls resource and project management and oversees project/program/product managers. Organizations with a higher level of maturity or that already have the supportive or directive model in place will benefit from the directive PMO model.

There are many things to consider before selecting a PMO. If it doesn’t align with your business objectives, you can course-correct and find a model that suits you better.

Several factors will influence the right type of PMO for you. These include:

  • Industry
  • Organization size
  • Existing PMO Structure and Maturity
  • Anticipated PMO Function

Our eBook dives deeper into the multiple considerations involved in selecting a PMO type, but these are a few examples of types of PMOs and the PMO structure they might adhere to.

  • A Business Unit PMO that delivers training and resources to a specific division will suit a Supportive structure.
  • A Strategic PMO that aligns project deliverables with business goals may assume a Controlling function.
  • A PMO that closely controls budgeting manages project leads, and defines and deploys data quality processes will likely perform a Directive role.

What are PMO Skills?

There are several skills an effective PMO must have. Communication, people management skills, and technological know-how are vital to success. They must clearly understand the business and its goals and have a centralized view of all ongoing projects. This will help them prioritize projects, allocate resources and budget, and effectively report — all critical PMO skills.

What are PMO Standards?

Standardization is a key benefit of PPM. Your PMO will establish and implement best practices — and then promote them throughout the organization. Essentially, they must develop or identify an effective ‘way of doing things’, which is rolled out organization-wide. These standards may include:

  • Templates and documents such as project proposals, reports, briefing forms, etc.
  • Frameworks and methodologies such as the PMO model the business opts for and the approach for identifying and managing risks.
  • Establishing the decision-makers for projects, teams, and the broader business to develop a smooth and trusted approval process.
  • Training staff using the same resources, tools, and best practices to ensure consistency and ease of future collaboration.

If you are looking for a way to manage multiple projects better, we can help. Get in touch.

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