Digital acceleration generates major challenges of adaptation and transformation for companies that result in an explosion in the number of transversal projects and transformation projects, especially digital ones.
This proliferation of projects has multiplied The structural and cultural barriers for organizations. However, they have a an almost vital need to innovate efficiently to carry out all these transversal projects without For all that destabilize what works in business verticals.
Numerous examples have shown that these transformation projects are essential for the very survival of the company. However, they generate a lot of new problems, including the failed project syndrome: around 70% of projects fail (McKinsey, IBM and Project Management Institute studies).
The vast majority of transformation projects are transversal and have a digital aspect, with services that have more or less significant skills for this aspect.
When they are carried out in isolation in each department, we realize aA waste of resources With duplicate projects by several services, sometimes simultaneously.
In managing projects in silos, pedagogy through error is expensive for the company. The lack of openness to the outside world and to other services does not allow access to the feedback necessary for make project management easier and more efficient.
Then, in the case of single-service governance of transformation projects, many projects are often abandoned in the implementation phase, this is linked in particular to non-conformities with company processes and to the poor involvement of other departments upstream.
In addition, with this mono-service governance, we are entering into a dynamic of “techno push” often induced by a misunderstanding of business needs (or a need relegated to the background compared to the goals of the service in question), generating a heavy climate around these projects, a customer/supplier dynamic that arises between the professions and the service in charge, with in the worst case, ego wars and political games reinforcing resistance to change.
Rather than uniting around business goals, projects carried out “in silos” generally end in relative failure, generating frustration and a feeling of waste of time. At the same time, this diffuses a toxic dynamic for the pursuit of transformation in the company and above all does not promote the commitment of employees “tired” by this type of project in systematic failure mode.
Let's remember: a single business service alone cannot transform the entire company. This is a collective issue that requires everyone to be able to identify, adapt and plan. A transition where silos are then a real structural problem.
Later we will also see another failure of silo projects: the inability of the various departments to collaborate.
Are the teams under water? What if we added them an additional transversal project manager's hat?
With this surge of new projects, new roles and collaborators are obviously needed to carry them out successfully. In these projects, we often need business knowledge and can only rarely justify the immobilization of an FTE.
More and more key collaborators, who are often already well charged with their main activities, are asked to work on more and more projects in best effort mode.
La transversal project management It is not in reality not as obvious as it seems and needs, with the multiplication of projects, to structure itself as well as rely on a strong culture.
Because of the Multiplication of workload and tasks, of the mental load, or the deprioritization of projects and lack of meaning for the teams, we very often see a lack of employee commitment in projects, a necessary and essential driver of their success.
We also often see, a very poor adoption of solutions and technologies, which contributes a little more todisengagement and the failure of projects.
This can also be explained by the need for projects to be carried out successfully, of a number of skills To know who is growing and which, without training and without additional resources, contribute to the failure of teams.
It happens that for some projects it is possible to justify the hiring of specific skills in the face of these new needs, especially for digital aspects, however these profiles are in tension on the market and more and more difficult to recruit because they are more and more in demand. In addition, if digital technology is not the core business or is not very well established in the company, The chances of making recruitment mistakes are increasing.
Finally, even when going through external and subcontracting, you need a minimum of this internal knowledge to get to monitor and challenge these new services.
Here the PMO has a strong role to play, he will be able to Help employees better adapt their project management to make their limited time more effective as well as help them with best practices and the realities of the digital market.
Here are some known barriers that prevent collaboration:
A PMO here will be able to act in resolving or anticipating the above problems. Her role is to put in place and adapt tools and a culture in order to participate in resolving these issues.
If we think of project management, as a process of managing and carrying out a defined set of tasks, then the majority of collaborators, regardless of their role, do project management. The cognitive bias frequently encountered is the following: If an employee has been able to successfully carry out one or more projects in his department, then he will successfully carry out a transversal project, because whether it is transversal or professional, it remains a project.
However, your project managers will face many additional difficulties, and sometimes new and very poorly documented, whether they are soft skills (e.g. how to influence/manage stakeholders without hierarchical links and without triggering ego wars) or hard skills (e.g.: methods of managing projects in open innovation and interservices, integrated and effective portfolio management, etc.) or hard skills (e.g.: methods of managing projects in open innovation and interservices, etc.).
A PMO will be more experienced in managing these types of projects and operations. He will get used to these new types of interpersonal relationships. One of the advantages of the PMO is its openness to the outside world, by the nature of its role but also by its appetite for looking for REX and good practices, he will be able to more easily disseminate them within the company due to his position and the new open communication channel.
The challenge is to take a “radical” managerial shift. To move from a culture of controlling the execution of tasks, of relaunching employees or even of hunting for reports to a position of “cultivator” of a project culture adapted to the company. An open culture to clarify and create an old-fashioned vision.
The actions of the PMO should allow a race to the top within the teams in terms of skills and business knowledge.
If accompanied by a real example from the Codir, this new context can contribute to real increased operational efficiency and increase the capacity of the company and its management to transform more quickly and above all, continuously.
The first challenge will be to create new rules of the game. To create stable and motivating points of reference, to enable everyone to better adapt to technological and organizational changes that shake up its missions. To include projects in programs. Among other things, this can prevent the status quo from taking hold, which is a real poison in the face of accelerated innovation.
In summary, the role of the PMO therefore contributes to harmonize the project procedures, to optimize efforts, provide appropriate tools Which leads to more efficient and pragmatic project portfolio management. With new tools and processes and behaviors, the solution will largely lie in the involvement andeveryone's commitment.
At the team level, this involves the creation of a common language, cross-department project coordination, clarification of the meaning of projects for employees as well as the definition of a clear role for everyone, thus avoiding wasting time on “how” to carry out the project and from focusing more effectively on the substance.
This gained efficiency will make it possible to reduce the impact of best effort commitment and to reduce the mental load associated with these projects, making employees more efficient in project management but above all more serene.
In a previous article, we discussed decision-making that is often too long or partial, identified among the important causes of the failure of transformation projects.
Failures, which could be attributed to the lack of information, easy access to information and clarity on projects that induce ½ or no decisions in Copil.
Thanks to its actions on project culture and its connection with departments and employees, the PMO will be able to provide an unobstructed transversal vision and with the right tools. This will make it possible to play a decisive role in the cognitive processing of information for top management, bringing clarity to all hitherto difficult projects and in the end, will allow better decisions to be made and above all, much more quickly.
When a project is growing or is either more complex or more ambitious, we often think of hiring a project manager. Most companies cannot hire a project manager for each cross-cutting project to be carried out, even if we assign several projects to an ETP.
All employees have a project leadership aspect in their activities., more or less simple. Project management issues are often more related to problems of commitment, collaboration, collaboration, efficiency and best effort management than to the number of available project managers. You can do better with less If we adopt a adapted project culture and that we invest in the development of the skills of the company's employees.
Increase the skills of your workforce and invest in people so that everyone works better together within a platform and so that the company becomes effective in implementing the digital transformation roadmap. Hire less and train better and The arrival of a PMO will be the most pragmatic way to get there.
Among all the questions it is the one who Comes up most often : when is a company big or mature enough to set up a PMO? For having often heard”But we are too small to take a PMO” or even”We are not structured enough to open a PMO position”.
Well, before answering the question, let's comment on the last two recurring points:
A good indicator for setting up a PMO is when the sum of transversal or transformation projects reaches 400K € to 500K €. Provisioning 10% to 20% of the value of your portfolio in setting up a PMO seems to be a good practice to secure these current investments but also to improve investment in future projects. It will also allow make savings on the time spent by employees on projects.
One last word... beyond the best rational indicators, RoisAbles... there is a third criterion that you can take into account when considering creating this role... When your CRM/ERP project has been sliding for 18 months and your CEO Feels like you're rowing.! OK we are entering into full subjectivity... but maybe a sign that you will have to govern your transformation differently.
To go further, read our article on how to set up a PMO.
