Provide Value or Become Extinct

Welcome to the first publication of our new newsletter, Project: Impossible. If you've seen the tv show, Restaurant: Impossible with Robert Irvine you will understand the concept of the newsletter. We'll be sharing insights and tips to help you deliver projects better in your organization. So many organizations struggle to find value from project delivery. They are fighting the stereotypes and real bureaucracy created in many PMOs which leave organizations yearning for more!

In Restaurant: Impossible, Robert Irvine visits struggling restaurants and within 48 hours works with the owners and staff to help them overcome their challenges. The conversations aren't always pleasant as Robert delivers the hard truth owners need to hear to turn the restaurant around and get on a path to success. The solutions are often similar from restaurant to restaurant even though each restaurant is unique. Seafood, Italian, Mexican, or Pizza, regardless the cuisine, the challenges owners face are often the same:

• Do you know your finances?
• Are you managing your inventory properly?
• Do you treat your staff properly?
• Are you delivering quality food to your guests?
• Is your dining room inviting to guests?

Put all that into PMO lingo and you can see the similarities. Is your business healthcare, utilities, technology, education? Regardless your industry, company size, methodology or tool set the challenges are fairly common. The solutions become unique to your situation but understanding the basics and having someone share straight-forward truth can be the best medicine to get your Project Delivery team on track. Welcome to Project: Impossible and here is our first insight!

The most important item for a PMO Leader to understand is that RESULTS MATTER! When I say PMO Leader that covers everyone who is a Leader of the Project Delivery function within your organization. So if you have an Agile Management Office, a small PM Delivery team or a full blown PMO I am grouping you all into PMO Leader for simplicity of this article. As a PMO Leader if you are focused on the process over the outcomes you will fail. It's a simple concept to understand, in life results matter. Everyone keeps score. How many points did we score? How many invoices did we process? How many tables did we turn? Every business and every executive has a scoreboard.

I've attended countless executive meetings and rarely do executives discuss process. They discuss people and results. Over the past 20+ years I don't think I've ever once heard an executive ask for a breakdown of processes and what is and isn't working. What I have heard thousands of times in these sessions, "Are we going to hit our targets?", "Will we hit our numbers?", "How are we going to communicate these results to the street?", "What do our teams need to reach our goals?"

In contrast to that, when we start our project management careers we are trained and drilled into process based thinking. Follow the process regardless the outcomes is what so many PMs learned in the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and 2010s. There is certainly benefit to a consistent, repeatable process. Establishing processes to help the organization understand the project delivery process is important, but it is secondary to the outcomes of the projects.

To be a successful PMO Leader you MUST place Outcomes over Audits. You must recognize that your leaders expect you to have a process. You must recognize that your leaders expect you to use proper tools. You must recognize that your leaders expect you to hire and train the right people. All of these expectations are the basics of building a team. That team can be an HR team, a Finance team, a Supply Chain team or a Project Delivery Team. Doing the basics well and delivering projects poorly is a recipe for disaster.

As the PMO Leader you are working to provide value to the organization. Ensuring your team adheres to the process does not provide value. Successfully delivering projects provides value. Each project, uniquely chosen to solve some sort of business challenge or to reach a business objective will provide value with a successful outcome. That outcome determines our value to the organization, not the process we follow in attempting to deliver the outcome.

Take a moment to review how you've built your Project Delivery team and if you're prioritizing Outcomes over Audits. Does your culture reward outcomes? We've assisted many clients who reward PMs who adhere to the process yet have no measures in place to drive results. How are you conducting Portfolio Reviews, Performance Reviews, Status Meetings? Everything should be reviewed to ensure you understand and properly motivate teams to deliver successful project outcomes and not adherence to process.

PMO Leaders who don't emphasize outcomes are going the way of Blockbuster, Dinosaurs, and every thing on earth which wasn't able to adapt to their surroundings. The business world has evolved and executives reward results. Just think about your organization's Sales trips to some fancy resort. Are they sending the Sales reps with the most sales or the ones who keep the CRM system updated???