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Its a good question with a great deal of answers all depending on the requirements of the organization and the total project management maturity. Let us assume you've been given the task of coordinating a PMO for your organization. When launching a PMO's collection of solutions, it is very important to understand how the organization is currently performing and the desired target state.

The Project Management Body of Knowledge also provides a framework to assess how projects are being managed. I pay these functions in detail in my PMO Form and Function article. By examining the day to day execution of the projects in the organization, a PMO can spot opportunities in project initiation, governance reviews, project portfolio planning, PM training, knowledge sharing and status reporting.

Provide management by analyzing resource requests and responsibilities for projects starting and executing at the portfolio. Provide quality assurance reviews to ensure projects are following the project methodology. Consult and mentor new PMs on project management processes. I consulted for one organizations where one of the PMO analysts admitted "The amount of PM maturity here is nearly non-existent" and this person was at the PMO! Supervisors and employees will provide you with plenty of comments. Concentrate on the strategic recommendations to get your first few "Wins" underneath your belt and demonstrate the PMO's value. If the PMO can help decision makers prioritize when to start another or improve your project's readiness through gate reviews, the PMO may have made a difference in the organization.

Implementing a PMO is an exercise in organizational change direction. You're going to encounter push back as team members, project executives and managers ask you to justify the implementation of your recommendations. It's important to emphasize the "PMO wins" and in which you've made a difference in decision making, prioritization and organization. Assuming the C-level executive will be sponsoring the PMO, you'll want to ensure those leaders also have seen the value. In hierarchical organizations, in the event the topmost leader believes in the PMO, the other reports will align even if they don't necessarily concur with the template, methodology or procedure.

Assuming your PMO plan has short and long term recommendations, you'll want to reassess and develop new opportunities. Perhaps the very first year or two, you concentrate on project level maturity and then undertake portfolio and program management processes as the organization improves. You may get a lot of presentations, white papers and books on PMO control with a quick Google search. A great deal of PPM software vendors give useful white papers and their vision of PMO implementation. Below are 3 books that I recommend to anyone looking to start a PMO. Podcasts. There is even a podcast devoted to the artwork of the PMO! Mark Price Perry hosts this podcast and it is absolutely worth a listen! I'm rather partial to incident #135. There are a great deal of approaches to forming and enhancing a PMO office. If you're looking to construct a PMO or improve your existing organization's PM maturity, give these steps and tools a try. Sometimes simply getting the project organization to publish a status report in time is sufficient.

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