Episode 166: Business Driven PMO Setup; Epilogue

This week The PMO Podcast™ Featured Story introduces, “Business Driven PMO Setup; Epilogue” presented by Mark Perry (about Mark), host of The PMO Podcast™. About four years ago, I was told by one of my customers, a CIO for a large Fortune 1000 firm, that I should write a book about business driven PMO setup. I found this CIO’s suggestion to be ridiculous and I told him why. By the time I had finished with my reasons, the CIO’s chuckles had become laughter out loud. After things had quieted, he seriously and candidly told me that he was adamant that I write a book and even suggest a title, Business Driven PMOs, which is fairly close to the title the publisher and I finally settled on. Prior to writing this book, I did a year of research. Part of this research involved reaching out to our existing PMO clients and talking with CIOs, PMO managers, and other members of functional management, and of course project managers. Another part of this research involved reading, and in some cases rereading, over 75 books on project management and PMOs and hundreds of articles and white papers. Over the course of this research, the very issues that that CIO and my now good friend had raised were now appearing before my very eyes in the various texts of these books, articles, and papers. It was as if, unintentionally of course, all of the project management and PM enthusiasts were so busy and loudly promoting project management as a professional and the PMO as a birth-right, that lost in the music were the needs of the business for which a PMO should exist to serve. The PMO Podcast™ Points Memo suggests, “Know your weaknesses." Everyone has weaknesses, I do, and so do you. Why is it that when it comes to a sport, we are all too quick to immediately know our weaknesses and take the appropriate action; yet in the workplace we don’t think in the same way. Think of work skills as sports skills or competitive skills, if that helps. Get to know where you are weak and then take action. Don't even think about hiding your weaknesses; that never works. The PMO Podcast™ Mailbag answers a listener question about how to deal with a frustrating international project management assignment. The PMO Podcast™ is sponsored by BOT International, the provider of Processes On Demand, a PMO Setup solution used by more than 1,000 companies.Request a Demo LoginThe PMO Podcast™ is a trademark of BOT International. The PMO Podcast™ and its RSS feed are copyright © by BOT International 2013. All rights reserved.