PPM Perspectives

IT Governance in a Tough Economy

When survival is at stake, decision making tends to get clouded by knee-jerk reactions that often produce results opposite to what we want. "Retrench!" "Cut all new spending!"...
Maybe there is a way to say "No" that is better informed. I have seen good IT governance save many companies in 2000 and 2001 and I am seeing it re-surge again at this time of economic crisis.

Corporate PPM – reality or fantasy?

I recently attended an industry conference on PPM in Orlando. At the conference I talked with many large companies who have bought PPM solutions at the “corporate” level and are frustrated. One corporate CIO’s story was something like this:

Five years ago we were sold a “site license” to one of the big PPM vendor’s products. We were promised the grand vision of a single corporate IT dashboard that would bring all of our projects, resources, time, requests, etc all into one place. This would allow us to make the most optimal business decisions about new corporate initiatives, staffing and resource allocation, and duplicate project elimination.

 

How PPM helps IT Governance Initiatives

IT governance is about producing value for the business and mitigating risk. Both are key aspects of PPM.

Q: Does implementing PPM satisfy all the requirements of IT governance?   A: No.

Q: Should PPM be an integral part of your IT governance strategy?   A: Yes!

Justifying PPM and documenting its value

No one size fit all.
I have seen hundreds of PPM and IT governance implementations and I am afraid there isn't a single formula for figuring out their value. The specific conditions and maturity of an organization determine the approach and metrics that are appropriate. But don't worry, I am not trying to suggest that you need to hire expensive consultants to do a customized value study. Here are four typical profiles I have seen that cover most organizations:

• New to PPM - no big crisis, but wanting to stay ahead of it
• PPM processes in place - using homegrown tools/spreadsheets
• Poor project delivery track record - little or no processes
• On-premise PPM tool in place - switching to SaaS PPM (on-demand)

Let's take a quick look at the criteria and metrics appropriate for each of these situations.

Supply and Demand

In a June 25, 2007 article by Christopher Koch, CIO magazine interviews two McKinsey consultants about a trend to separate Supply from Demand within the IT organization. The article is titled "Why IT Executives Split Staffs to Create Supply, Handle Demand for Technology Services." While I'm not sure the article answers the question of Why, it does at least make the claim that this trend is happening, and that the positive impacts are substantial.

IT Governance Biopsy

I've read through the excellent posts on the Yahoo groups discussion on IT governance, and I enjoy the debate, especially the mode of questioning and learning.

I've been working on (banging my head against?) taking Project Portfolio Management (PPM) solutions to market for 5 years now and many of the issues you are talking about are critical to our clients.

One thought I would throw into the pile is that IT leaders need to start by establishing a simple, non-technical understanding of "IT Value."