LIFESTYLE | opinion June 2023 www.womanthismonth.com 66 PROJECT MANAGEMENT OFFICE (PMO) First certified PfMP Bahraini woman, PMO Consultant, PMO Global Awards Judge, PMO Award Winner According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), only 58 percent of organisations fully understand the value of project management. Further, according to Wellingtone (2020), 71 percent of project professionals believe that the perceived value of PMOs will increase. In addition, the study conducted by Wellingtone in 2020 stated that 89 percent of organisations have one or more PMOs; 26 percent of these are less than two years old. Earlier this year I did a short poll in one of the social media channels to get an idea whether organisations in Bahrain have an established project management office (PMO) or not. Many of the respondents stated they don’t have one or they are not sure if they do. Then I did a quick scan and realised that many organisations have no PMOs, and their projects are scattered, or sometimes not defined or managed as projects. No ownership is assigned and hence no accountability can be established, budgets assigned to them are mostly ad-hoc and approvals on the same are only sought when needed, projects are not strategically aligned to the corporate strategy (if any) and no mechanism is there for projects selection nor prioritisation, etc. That’s why writing about this topic to establish some sort of awareness became a necessity. “You don't know until you know.” – Cynthia Hand. Or in other words, you don’t realise you need it until you know what it is. What is a PMO? In the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) Guide, the Project Management Office (PMO) is defined as “a management structure that standardises the project-related governance processes and facilitates the sharing of resources, methodologies, tools, and techniques”. To elaborate on the above, the project management office (PMO) is a unit or department that defines and maintains the standards of project management for a company. It could be 1) centralised where there is one hub managing the projects, or 2) decentralised where a subunit is created under each department to manage the projects under that department – like having an IT PMO for instance for managing IT projects, or a 3) hybrid, where a centralised hub and cross-functional units are established to create a matrix structure. Or it could simply be established for managing a project for the period of the project and then dissolved. It could be insourced or outsourced. There are many international bodies and associations nowadays that have defined many models for PMOs. In general, there are many types and models for PMOs; no one size fits all, each organisation might require a different PMO setup. It depends on the organisation’s maturity, size and structure, stakeholders’ needs, the type of services and processes that are to be handled by the PMO. HOW FAR WE ARE IN BAHRAIN? Written by: Eman Deabil
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