Program management is the process of managing several related projects in a manner that maximises an organisation’s value. Program management is responsible for ensuring that vision, strategy, project selection and project implementation are adopted by all stakeholders across the various projects.
mbh assists organisations in building their capability to effectively manage programs, so as to consistently generate real value. mbh’s services include the development of methodologies and consulting support for:
Program management office. We assist organisations in setting up a program management office (PMO). In general, the PMO is responsible for setting program governance structures, defining roles and responsibilities, providing oversight and managing programs and projects.
Project awareness. The PMO must increase awareness of both the organisation’s portfolio of projects and the project methodology to secure buy-in to the change program and to ensure resources are made available for implementation of cross-functional projects.
Project registration. In many instances, there will exist multiple projects that are focussed on achieving the same outcome, but are managed separately. This situation is inefficient, wastes resources, and will normally fail to accomplish the planned results. We identify these projects and consolidate those likely to add value and cancel those that will probably fail. This lowers the overall cost of managing the consolidated projects, improves their efficiency, and enhances the potential for full benefits realisation.
Program mentoring. A successful PMO needs to increase competency in program management across the organisation, including upskilling and providing a career path for the program management community. This ensures that the stars of the organisations stay and that working on a project is not seen as a next step to retrenchment.
Project review. The PMO is responsible for reviewing and documenting the success and failure of each program to increase competence in program management and embed the project culture within the organisation. It also ensures that the program methodology is constantly modified, that common problems that exist in one project do not occur in others, and that knowledge management and knowledge transfer takes place. After implementation of the program, mbh can conduct a workshop to examine whether the planned benefits have been realised.
Special interest groups. The program management office can be the driving force in establishing special interest groups in areas of project management ranging from software development lifecycle (SDLC) methodologies to risk management and valuation techniques.
Theory of constraints.
Theory of constraints is an overall philosophy for planning and managing organisations as systems. It states that a series of activities is constrained by its bottlenecks and only by isolating and resolving the bottlenecks can efficiency be achieved. In project management, the theory is known as Critical Chain Project Management (CCPM), which puts the main emphasis on the resources required to execute project tasks, as opposed to task order and rigid scheduling. Our CCPM approach ameliorates the wasteful practices that can assign a program to failure, such as bad multi-tasking, "Student Syndrome", "In-box" delays, and lack of prioritisation.
Enterprise portfolio management software. This web-based software product known as UniPhi assists clients in automating the planning, execution and management of programs across their organisations. See www.uniphi.com.au for more information.