The Project and Programme Support Office

The PSO, Project or Programme Support Office, is now widely seen as a must have for any organisation serious about deriving maximum benefits from its internal change programme or successful delivery for its customer projects.

If you are thinking about pulling a PSO together or looking to move an existing PSO on to the next level you should find this page of assistance.

What is a PSO for and what does it do?

Max Wideman's Glossary of Project Management terms defines a Project Support office as:

• The central location of planning and project support functions that has the responsibility of managing resources across projects and maintaining planning standards.
• A resource that supports the project through the examination of project status information and the provision of project help as needed.
• Where a large number of projects are regularly undertaken it can be beneficial to concentrate the planning and project support functions in one area which has the responsibility of managing resources across projects and maintaining planning standards.

It also defines a Programme Office as:

• A group within an organisation responsible for supply, support and internal consulting to ensure that projects are carried out consistently and successfully in accordance with company strategies.

In practice the term PSO is used to cover a wide range of different set ups and circumstances but in essence a PSO is an area of Project and Programme specialism put together to help projects and programmes be more successful.

Sometimes the Project and Programme Managers belong to the PSO and they deliver projects on behalf of the rest of the organisation.  But it is also common for the projects to be supported and assured by a smaller PSO team with the PMs residing in the business.  As always a middle way is possible where smaller less risky projects are delivered by business units with their own PMs who are supported by the PSO and larger more complex or risky projects are delivered by senior PMs who reside in the PSO.  Which model will work for you depends on a number of factors:

• The diversity of your projects (domain areas as well as complexity, risk, geography and other factors);
• The availability and maturity of PM skills throughout your business units;
• The culture of your organisation;
• Strategic direction and intent.

To make a practical success of your PSO it is important to take a contingent approach and to decide what works best for your organisation rather than following a template approach from other organisations.  Instead think about what you want from your PSO both now and in the future and use this to plan its development.  You might like to start with the list below as possible roles/services/capabilities:

• Standards Setting
• Methodology ownership
• Project Assessment/grading service
• Specialist skills provision (planning, estimating and quality)
• Configuration Management, Library, Archive etc
• Project Assurance or Audit
• Support and Mentoring
• Project Recovery
• PM resource Pool
• Report production
• Gateway, Project Status and Post Project Reviews
• Lessons Learned library
• Standards assessment and raising

Setting Up a PSO

Setting up a PSO is straight forward.

Setting up a PSO which delivers tangible net benefits to the organisation from day one is much more difficult.

Firstly it requires Strategy - an excellent understanding of where your business is now, how it operates and where then where it wants to be in the future and what it wants from its PSO.  The organisation needs to be bought into this and a sponsor must be identified with organisational clout and good interpersonal skills.  Often an external perspective is useful here to guide and provide an independent view of the current situation and review of the proposed strategy.

Then it requires Commitment and Action - having made the case act while the mandate is strong.  A PSO usually requires critical mass to be effective at delivering the objectives set (consistency, costs etc) but during set up be sure not to throw the baby out with the bath water.  If some existing projects or departments need to be brought in more slowly then do this to keep the individuals on board (temporary exceptions/delays should be negotiated and recorded though so they don't become permanent).  As mentioned above it is often a key objective to bring the PMs into the PSO and some business units may resist this.  Their reasons may be good and where a PM requires strong domain skills or is a 'player manager' it may be best to leave them in situ but other aspects of the PSO such as assurance, configuration management etc should still be rolled out to provide consistency of support.  Beware of situations where these reasons are simply political control issues being dressed up.  Again an external perspective can help here to arbitrate.

It is important to create a shared sense of direction amongst the PSO and its customers in the organisation.  Usually a new PSO will have many individuals working in it who haven't worked together before and have different ideas of how and when things should be done.  It is important to align these into  shared methodology or approach/process for delivering projects.  Such an approach should cover the range of project and programme environments the organisation operates in and can in effect be a collection of different processes with some unifying  terminology and touch points to build consistency.  Here you will find external assistance helpful to guide and arbitrate on the myriad of methodology choices and implementation can be much simplified with the implementation of project management software which can support the methodology approach.

If you try to go to quick you will not succeed, set a plan and follow it.  Often difficult in a fast moving business environment but each organisation has its own acceptable pace of change depending on a myriad of factors.  Of course you should manage like a project, communicate the plan, clearly identify the actions and timescales expected and quality criteria.  At the end of each stage review and plan the next stage you may look to accelerate or slow but don't be tempted to pause as stagnation and even a slip backwards is likely here.

If the organisation has never really done quality or Gateway reviews, Post Project Reviews, Lessons Learned and customer feedback then these are good practices to build into your methodology and should be amongst your very first additions to the PSO because they will help you identify where further work is needed and where the PSO can best direct its resources to improve performance

Getting Help

Setting up and running a PSO can be really hard work and it is often very helpful to have some external assistance in getting it right and arbitrating in those difficult discussions.  PROJECT in a box can help you here, our consultants and partners can provide you a full range of services to help set up and run your PSO including:

• Consultants to help with strategy, planning and implementation etc
• Consultants to help with methodology development, mentoring and assurance/audit services
• Experienced Interim Managers or contractors to provide a step change resource to set up your PSO until the right internal resource can be located or recruited
• Planners, Estimators and quality assurance resources to populate your PSO resource pool
• Workshop/review leaders for Quality, Gateway and Post Project reviews

Of course we can also provide you with the best in Project Management software to support your PSO including:

• Fully customisable and scalable support for any customised process based project management methodology
• Project Document management and archiving
• Project logging, audit trails, and assurance access
• Project, Programme and Portfolio reporting consistency
• Integration with range of existing legacy tools for planning finances risk mgt etc
• Capability to share access under permissions control with outside bodies including suppliers, partners and customers for integrated working

Next Steps

To find out more you can call us on +44(0)1993 810425 or email us at enquiries@projectinabox.org.uk.  We will be delighted to discuss your circumstances, answer your questions and to arrange a personal or virtual meeting.