The PPM guru's Blog

PMO’s and PPM

theppmguru — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 22:32:54 +0000

Project Management Offices have been around for a while. But not that long. They are usually set up to support a CIO and provide reporting and metrics (and sometimes even analysis) on how the IT organization is running and what decisions might be required to run it better.

Anatomy of an IT Portfolio..

theppmguru — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 22:18:25 +0000

So, an IT Portfolio consists of lot of projects, but where do you start when trying to make decisions about the portfolio and more importantly, what sort of outcomes should we have in mind?

Well, there are many answers to this question, as the desired outcomes really are dependent on the strategic goals of the IT organization and more importantly the business that it enables. But it still all boils down to one key thing – Increasing Business Value. Good portfolio management focuses on the value that can be achieved for the business first and foremost, and everything comes from that.

So what are the common levers for improving the likely contribution of an IT organization to the business?

Project Return on Investment, or ROI for short. Each projects individual contribution ultimately adds or subtracts from the overall value of the IT investment at any point in time.
Project Resource Efficiency – when we think of IT, most people think of the hardware and software costs, but the vast majority of IT cost is people. So, any inefficiencies here invariably lead to a hit to the company bottom line and lost of business value
IT Portfolio Cost – how much money are we going to spend this month, this year, or in the 5 year strategic plan? Budgets set a ceiling on spend that cannot be broken without extremely good reasons, and balancing cash flow across any given time period is a critical outcome of IT portfolio management.

What the hell is an IT Portfolio anyway?

theppmguru — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 21:21:23 +0000

And why would anyone care?

Well, its basically a collection of IT projects which a company decides (or has decided to) spend money on at any given time. Some of these projects are “in flight” so stuff is actually happening on them right now – coders coding, testers testing and project managers….well, usually on conference calls or using PowerPoint. Many companies don’t even realize that they have an IT portfolio. There is just stuff happening in the IT department and that’s pretty much it.

Other projects in the IT portfolio may not even be live yet. Picture Frankenstein’s monster, before the big switch with WARNING 20000 VOLTS being thrown. These are the projects that the company needs to make happen, but because of lack of money or people or too many projects already on the go, they have to wait.

And that’s where the whole Portfolio thing comes into play. A useful analogy here is to see projects as being similar to equities or stocks. Some projects we want to buy i.e. start work on, or spend more money on. Some we want to hold i.e. leave things alone. And, of course, some we want to sell – that usually involves pulling the plug and reassigning the people involved.

Welcome…..

theppmguru — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 21:05:51 +0000

Welcome to the PPM Guru blog – one mans adventure in the virtually unknown land of Portfolio and Program Management.

I’m completely new to blogging, and tend (as all good corporate types do) to spend most of my time doing powerpoint. So, once I figure out how to get diagrams into this blog, things will really start to move!