Entrenched Project Managment: The Dangers of Powerful PMOs

I am speaking rhetorically here about the need for project management - of course there is a need. Think of the consequences when large projects are left to their own evolution (or devolution as the case may be). What I am really speaking of is deeply entrenched project management organisations where, in many cases, project managers become the star players rather than the people sponsoring the projects. The term "Scope Creep" is fairly well known, but I want to coin a cautionary phrase here - "PM Creep." This is where project management organizations become so powerful in an organisation that the project managers dictate time frames and deadlines instead of project sponsors and business unit executives. Nobody likes to talk about this, but it does happen. I like to think of it as Project Management's dirty little secret.


Entrenchment
So how do these PMO's become so powerful? Seriously, how often do you ever see a Chief Project Management Officer or the like? Alright - once in a while you do find one, but even then their power within an organisation is usually so limited that they are there to merely manage the overall portfolio of projects and ensure that symmetry and synergy are maximised. One term - "Entrenchment." PM Creep occurs because of entrenchment. Back in my business school days we studied the social phenomena surrounding managerial entrenchment and how it gains a foothold. In a nutshell the major driver behind entrenchment is defensive - in other words justification against takeover, reduction in power or influence, and an overall sense that by becoming more important security will ensue. And, to a certain degree that is true. The more valuable any employee, or group of employees, becomes the less certain their demise will be. But in most organisations this comes from a display of competence, effectiveness, and efficiency rather than trying to gain power. However, as more and more organisations adopt project management strategies, and even internal project management offices, many are discovering that PMO can, itself, lead to inefficiencies.



The Lazy Side of Life
Aside from the entrenchment paradigm there is another reason for Project Managers to become overly important -  and this stems from organisational laziness. Shocked?  Well, take a look around and see who volunteers to head up a project during your next staff meeting. You will find that many people are leery of doing so - some because it will interfere with their jobs, but most because it just scares them to death.  So, the shining knight (also knows as the Project Manager) comes to the rescue. They have the skills to organise, and keep on track, the project that you are handing them. To some their organisational skills are mysterious, they have all sorts of charts and reports, and they speak in a strange language. 

So after a while the default solution is "turn it over to project management, they'll get it done," or some such sentiment. And, eventually laziness is replaced by one time efficiency where the PMs help to get it done. But, over time, the PMs start to dictate the terms instead of responding to the situation and now you are hooked on the sweetest opium known to executives everywhere - project management.



The Good and the Bad - and the Ugly too
Now, don't get me wrong, I am not down on project management - far from it. In fact, I love it, and I think it is essential. But, just like external consultants I treat PMs as, well - consultants. I never let them dictate to me what my project is going to look like - I am, after all, the client and my time lines are often not of my making. Good project managers will understand this and work with, and around, it. Better yet, the best will divine ways of maximizing events to gain additional time, or slack.

But, it is those select few that become entrenched and forget why they are there in the first place. They become more interested in scoring political points, something that should be absolutely VERBOTEN in the world of project management. Once this happens a PMO becomes virtually ineffective, but sadly other areas of the company like to use it as a political tool. This is done, most often, to exercise a modicum of control over an area that they traditionally have little. Some CEO's also like to use a PMO as a means of tightening the reigns, but there is a fine line between reign tightening and killing morale or stifling creativity.


The Give to Get 
Surrendering management over a project isn't something we should fear.  After all, these PM's are specialists who perform a very important task - keeping targets in check and on within sight.  However, it is important that we keep what they do clearly defined.  As mentioned previously my preferred method is to treat the PMO as I would an external consultant.  This keeps the line of responsibility much more clearly defined and it also makes for a better relationship.  I am looking to the PMO for expertise, not control.  After all, the project is still mine and so is the overall responsibility for its success.l

Market Data, CRM, and Business Intelligence - A Winning Combination

For organisations in the financial services industries there are a number of options when it comes to acquiring market data.  Some of the key players are well known names (household brands of a sort): LAVA (a CITI product), Bloomberg (possibly the premier provider of market data globally), IDC (another major player) and a few others.  But one of the greatest challenges facing organisations in our industry that use such products is the integration with our sales platforms and, more importantly developing pricing information, and the integration with our business intelligence mechanisms.

As a large scale user of CRM and Business Intelligence our focus, as a business in the financial services industry (namely insurance, lending, stock trading, currency trading, and bond trading) is to not only obtain market data, but to place it into the hands of decision makers via a format that makes it possible to absorb the information quickly and make rapid decisions.  It is here that integrating your products separates the heroes from the zeroes.  And here is the kicker - you only get one shot at this or your credibility becomes a zero along with your career options.

This is going to be too short for a case study or white paper, but it can give you some insights into how you can easily tackle what can be a rather daunting problem.

TARGET RICH ENVIRONMENT

So we have three rather high profile systems that we are dealing with: CRM (Customer Relationship Management), EFDP (Electronic Financial Data Provider); and BI (Business Intelligence).  To focus this discussion we are going to assume three key products that are highly commonplace in the market: Salesforce CRM, Bloomberg Terminal (the EFDP), and COGNOS (the business intelligence software).  The next step is to focus on what it takes to integrate all three platforms, the process, and the end results.

As you can see these are all very critical platforms for any business, but when you talk about integration the possibilities for bringing down any one of these systems increases tremendously.  That is enough to not only make you cringe, but it should frighten you into petrification.  This is not for the weak of heart.

START AT THE MIDDLE 
Let's look at the overall problem that we are faced with - there are two systems that are deployed in house (COGNOS and Salesforce) and one system that is essentially a service that you use to download information (Bloomberg Terminal).  If you are reading this article and wondering what a Bloomberg Terminal is then you are likely not in the financial service / trading industry and should read no further as this won't apply to you.   Since we are dealing with two in-house systems we are going to start in the middle by working on the components for integrating Bloomberg Terminal data into our Business Intelligence System (COGNOS).


Bloomberg Terminal (BT) is a bit different from many of its competitors and so there are a few things to know.  One, information that comes across on BT is uploaded to an internal UNIX server that then feeds data across to end users.  In some organizations the end user has a separate terminal and keyboard, but in others (such as ours) we use a toggle (or KVM) that we developed to enable end users to use a single or dual monitor configuration.

TAKE IT TO THE GOAL
The robustness of your infrastructure (in this case software) makes all the difference.  In this quasi cloud world that we live in the push to virtualise everything has to be questioned more and more.  For one thing you cannot virtualise a Bloomberg Terminal (although as of the date this article is being published that statement is true - the near future might turn that on its ear).  Secondly it is all about performance stupid.  Regardless of whether you follow football (soccer to some of you), hockey, or polo everyone knows that you have to punch the ball through the goal.  The near miss phenomena abounds with horror stories where you get 99% there and crash - you are still D.E.A.D. dead!!!

Integration on this scale is no different.  You need to focus...  So, here are the key elements to get your integration punched into your goal:

1. Make sure you have a sponsor high enough in the organisation that heads will roll if a milestone is missed or if cooperation is short in coming (this is basic project management ladies and gentlemen).
2. Know what the limitations are up front - it is a fair question to ask your vendor to prove that they have completed an integration of this type, scope, and scale and to provide examples of their work (don't be the test subject unless you really want to be).
3. When it comes to financial data such as this you are talking about sophisticated client lists - many of which are proprietary and some of the portfolio information is INCREDIBLY SENSITIVE.  So, make sure that you have your security in-line with what you want to accomplish.
4. Give yourself time to get each component aligned so that you don't end up rushing a deflated ball into play.  There are no second chances in many cases - if you bring down your trading network you will be PNG - Persona Non-Grata in a very big hurry.
5. Know what you are going to do with this new configuration after it is set up.  It is great to say you want these platforms integrated and talking to one another, but you have to know what you expect out of this excercise.  Is it better performance, better information, more built in automated analysis??? There are a plethora of reasons to do something, but finding the one that drives decision making is the one that matters here.

The flow of information in terms of pricing and how we deliver a message to our clients that keeps us competitive as well as responsive makes all the difference.  Gathering pricing information that makes sense to us internally is irrelevant unless this new integrated framework can help us deliver the same information to our clients so that we can drive sales.  You have to focus on what the overall target is and that, my friends, is to increase our transaction closure rates.