Set a Strategic Course of Action for the PMO in 100 Days
Use your first 100 days as PMO leader to define a mandate for long-term success.
- As a new PMO director, you’ve been thrown into the middle of an unfamiliar organizational structure and a chaotic project environment.
- The expectations are that the PMO will help improve project outcomes, but beyond that your mandate as PMO director is opaque.
- You know that the statistics around PMO longevity aren’t good, with 50% of new PMOs closing within the first three years. As early in your tenure as possible, you need to make sure that your stakeholders understand the value that your role could provide to the organization with the right level of buy-in and support.
- Whether you’re implementing a new PMO or taking over an already existing one, you need to quickly overcome these challenges by rapidly assessing your unfamiliar tactical environment, while at the same time demonstrating confidence and effective leadership to project staff, business stakeholders, and the executive layer.
Our Advice
Critical Insight
- The first 100 days are critical. You have a window of influence where people are open to sharing insights and opinions because you were wise enough to seek them out. If you don’t reach out soon, people notice and assume you’re not wise enough to seek them out, or that you don’t think they are important enough to involve.
- PMOs most commonly stumble when they shortsightedly provide project management solutions to what are, in fact, more complex, systemic challenges requiring a mix of project management, portfolio management, and organizational change management capabilities. If you fail to accurately diagnose pain points and needs in your first days, you could waste your tenure as PMO leader providing well-intentioned solutions to the wrong project problems.
- You have diminishing value on your time before skepticism and doubt start to erode your influence. Use your first 100 days to define an appropriate mandate for your PMO, get the right people behind you, and establish buy-in for long-term PMO success.
Impact and Result
- Develop an action plan to help leverage your first 100 days on the job. Hit the ground running in your new role with an action plan to achieve realistic goals and milestones in your first 100 days. A results-driven first three months will help establish roots throughout the organization that will continue to feed and grow the PMO beyond your first year.
- Get to know what you don’t know quickly. Use Info-Tech’s advice and tools to perform a triage of every aspect of PMO accountability as well as harvest stakeholder input to ensure that your PMO meets or exceeds expectations and establishes the right solutions to the organization’s project challenges.
- Solidify the PMO’s long-term mission. Adopt our stakeholder engagement best practices to ensure that you knock on the right doors early in your tenure. Not only do you need to clarify expectations, but you will ultimately need buy-in from key stakeholders as you move to align the mandate, authority, and resourcing needed for long-term PMO success.
Member Testimonials
After each Info-Tech experience, we ask our members to quantify the real-time savings, monetary impact, and project improvements our research helped them achieve. See our top member experiences for this blueprint and what our clients have to say.
10.0/10
Overall Impact
$12,999
Average $ Saved
32
Average Days Saved
Client
Experience
Impact
$ Saved
Days Saved
Lifecare Assurance
Guided Implementation
10/10
$12,999
32
Elvis's real-world career experience overplayed on the I-T PPM framework is very helpful
About Info-Tech
Info-Tech Research Group is the world’s fastest-growing information technology research and advisory company, proudly serving over 30,000 IT professionals.
We produce unbiased and highly relevant research to help CIOs and IT leaders make strategic, timely, and well-informed decisions. We partner closely with IT teams to provide everything they need, from actionable tools to analyst guidance, ensuring they deliver measurable results for their organizations.
What Is a Blueprint?
A blueprint is designed to be a roadmap, containing a methodology and the tools and templates you need to solve your IT problems.
Each blueprint can be accompanied by a Guided Implementation that provides you access to our world-class analysts to help you get through the project.
Need Extra Help?
Speak With An Analyst
Get the help you need in this 4-phase advisory process. You'll receive 11 touchpoints with our researchers, all included in your membership.
Guided Implementation 1: Survey the project landscape
- Call 1: Scoping call
- Call 2: Conduct a Mission Identification Survey
- Call 3: Take inventory of the PMO’s resources and tools
- Call 4: Develop a PMO network stakeholder map
Guided Implementation 2: Gather PMO requirements
- Call 1: Assess the interest and influence of key stakeholders
- Call 2: Develop a requirements gathering elicitation plan based on stakeholder priority
Guided Implementation 3: Solidify your PMO goals
- Call 1: Assess the current state of your portfolio, project, and organizational change management capabilities
- Call 2: Define strategic expectations and a tactical approach for your PMO
Guided Implementation 4: Formalize the PMO's mandate
- Call 1: Define an implementation roadmap
- Call 2: Develop a communications plan
- Call 3: Establish a feedback and evaluation process
Deliver Engaging Portfolio Reports With Power BI
Develop a Project Portfolio Management Strategy
IT Project Management Lite
Master Organizational Change Management Practices
Set a Strategic Course of Action for the PMO in 100 Days
Define and Deploy an Enterprise PMO
Determine the Future of Microsoft Project in Your Organization
Prepare an Actionable Roadmap for Your PMO
Demystify the New PMBOK Guide and PMI Certifications
Transform PPM to Optimize Value From Every Investment