Project Services
Problem Statement
Project managers are responsible to establish project scope based on business requirements and then, once approved, for delivering the scope within approved schedule, resource and budget limits. In many cases the project manager’s own available project resources were fully absorbed in managing stakeholders and the team that there is little time left for updating the schedule, resource and budget planning.
Goals
Ensure that:
- schedule, resources and budget are planned,
- they are regularly updated and presented,
- reports to the team and management are generated,
- the project management can make informed decisions.
Approach
We reviewed the project portfolio and found that many project managers had varyingly delegated or awarded resource, schedule and / or cost tasks to colleagues or contractors. Most of this support was on a part-time basis.
We established roles and responsibilities for the required tasks and recommended that the effort be pooled. The pooled resources would provide a single point of contact as a service to project management in controlling plan, actual and forecast data for the following to allow informed decisions to be made:
- Schedule: developing master and control schedules, linking to detail schedules, consolidating progress measurement information, highlighting deviations and reporting status including forecast completion dates.
- Resources: consolidation of project resource needs over time, linking to actuals, highlighting deviations and reporting status including forecast total resource need.
- Cost: preparing estimates, aligning with procurement to provide work package budgets, tracking contract amounts, monitoring actuals, highlighting deviations and reporting status including forecast final costs.
- Expediting: identifying procurement and design deliverables, establishing timelines, tracking progress, highlighting deviations and reporting status including forecast delivery dates.
Project Services will be implemented in four steps
Benefits
Schedule, resource and cost management activities were standardised across the project portfolio. The pooling of these tasks creates efficiencies by concentrating them in a small team of experts. These experts would focus on specific activities across multiple projects.
Project management was presented regular updates on the status of each project which enabled informed decisions to be made. Updates were consolidated and made available at the portfolio level which again enabled informed decisions to be made.
Process Implementation & Pricing
Teamwork is essential in the project. The teamwork between Project Management and Project Services is summarised as follows:
As a Service Provider we offer Project Services Deliverables in all project phases on a unit price basis.
Use Case
Judy, Program Manager in a global biotechnology company, initiated an organisational consolidation program. A number if departments spread across different locations were to be consolidated in one new area. The program comprised multiple projects each with dedicated project management. The program schedule was tight.
From recent experience Judy decided immediately to establish project services to provide a single point of contact for the project managers. We were contracted to set-up project services. We prepared standard processes for project execution, project controlling, deliverables (procurement and design) expediting which after approval were made available to the project teams.
Project Portfolio Management Office
You need support in reaching your project portfolio goals?