AN INFRASTRUCTURE IS THE BASIC, underlying framework or features of an organization or system. Project management requires a framework made up of product, people, processes, and (organizational) platforms within an enterprise.
The project management process according to A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) includes four phases: Initiation and Definition; Planning; Execution and Control; and Closeout. What the business community needs to visualize is that the inputs into this project management process are business needs. These business needs include meeting mandated government or legal regulations, creating products or services to stay competitive in the marketplace, upgrading systems and technology to become more efficient and effective. The deliverable out of each and every project will be a solution to a business problem or opportunity; thus a business result that provides added value to our internal and/or our external customers. And that deliverable cannot be created without a sound business infrastructure that supports project management.
A Project Management Infrastructure
A project management infrastructure, for the most part, consists of systems of policies, standards, procedures and guidelines that define how project management work is to be performed. I suggest that there are four key components that are part of a project management framework or infrastructure—a Portfolio Management System (product), a Process Management System (process), an Organizational Management System (platform), and a Performance Management System (people)—and that there are various ways to help the business community become aware of and embrace a project management infrastructure.
A Portfolio Management System ensures that the initiation of the project management process is grounded in sound strategic business decisions. A Portfolio Management System has five subsystems: a Solicitation Process (doing the right projects), a Selection Process (stopping the wrong ones), a Prioritization Process (doing them in the right order), a Registration Process (codifying them in a central repository), and an Enterprise Resource Planning Process (staffing them with the right people).
First, a Solicitation Process provides a consistent model for all proponents to follow; in other words, requestors of projects to follow. This model defines how a proponent prepares a business case that will be evaluated by the organization's business decision-makers. Then comes the Selection Process during which time the decision-makers approve those projects that add value to the organization and reject those projects that do not. After certain projects are approved, this same group of decision-makers prioritizes these projects relative to predefined business criteria, thus signifying those projects that will be given higher visibility and support and those that will not. Pertinent information such as project client, project scope, and team members is entered into a centralized database for all to access. In addition, these approved and prioritized projects are staffed (or resourced) relative to all the projects within the portfolio mix and relative to where the project sits within the prioritization ranking.
This part of the infrastructure allows the enterprise to manage the inventory of projects within the enterprise.
A Process Management System takes the approved and prioritized project through the Definition, Planning, Execution/Control, and Closeout phases.
The approved project from the Portfolio Management System goes into the Definition phase, which creates a project charter. The project charter becomes the input to the Planning phase, which creates a work plan; that is, schedule, staffing plan, project budget, and so on. The charter and the work plan then become the baseline in the Execution/Control phase of the project process. During this phase, the project team creates status reports and product deliverables. Once the project is over, these outputs from the execution/control phase are the input into the Closeout phase from which lessons learned are documented and archived for reference when starting the project management process all over again.
Various auxiliary processes such as a risk management process, a change management process, a quality assurance and control process, and a vendor/ contractor management process augment the above “core” process.
This component of the infrastructure ensures that the discipline of project management is performed in a consistent and professional manner throughout the entire organization.
An Organizational Management System is the governance structure defining roles, responsibilities, and authorities and reporting relationships.
From almost the beginning of project management, the applied organization structure that supported a project environment was a matrix structure. A matrix structure consists of representatives from various functional areas working together in an ad hoc team to accomplish certain business objectives producing specified deliverables. These cross-functioning teams work within the constraints of multiple bosses and often multiple priorities; however, they create a better and more “acceptable” product because of everyone's involvement in the project effort.
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Today the “Project Office” is the newest version of the matrix project organizational structure. This autonomous department, staffed by project management subject matter experts, becomes the focal point for the project management discipline. As time evolves, the project office gains credibility, builds expertise, grows in self-confidence, and simultaneously increases its responsibility within the organization.
The organization platform of the infrastructure indicates the political interactions among departments and among people within the project community.
A Performance Management System supports the three systems described above. This process sets project management performance objectives for project managers and for project team members and sees that these folks are rewarded for their successes and given development plans to improve their areas of deficiencies. The Performance Management System consists of a performance improvement process in which performance expectations and personal developmental plans are established and agreed upon.
During the appraisal review cycle, typically of 12 months, project managers have interim dialogues with their functional managers, with input from the project client. At the same time, project team members are having interim dialogues with their functional managers, with input from their project managers. The interim dialogues focus on whether or not project players are attaining their performance objectives and whether they are working toward their developmental plan. If they are not, the objectives or the plans need to be changed or the project players need to readdress themselves to these commitments.
As the performance improvement process comes to a close, the performance appraisal review process takes over. In this process, the functional manager of the project player prepares an official review document, with final input from the appropriate project client or project manager. The functional manager then executes the performance appraisal, and the cycle begins all over again.
This piece of the infrastructure sees that the people are guided, directed and rewarded.
Heighten Awareness
There are limitless ways to heighten the awareness of the project management infrastructure to the business community. Here are some suggestions:
Face-to-face approaches are events orchestrated to address one or several of the components of the project infrastructure. Formal symposiums combining speakers from both inside and outside the organization put a spotlight on project management as well as provide a learning forum for the participants to become aware of the infrastructure. Informal brown-bag lunches or one-on-one coaching and mentoring provide a continual stream of information and insights on how to better maneuver within the project management infrastructure.
Less rich means of communication than face-to-face events are equally as productive: for example, creating Project XYZ's monthly newsletter or offering access to Project AFJ's updated website, or setting up a centrally located project management library of books and internal best practice documents.
Ultimately we can combine all of these options onto an automated knowledge-based system, which would be a database repository of standards, procedures, templates, just-in-time training information nuggets, best practice samples from completed projects, and so on. This type of performance support tool is technologically feasible and cost justifiable, and is limited only by our creativity and imagination.
These are personal and nonpersonal mechanisms by which to spread the word and increase awareness of the various components of the project management infrastructure.
THROUGH A GRADUAL BUT OBSERVABLE paradigm shift, project management has become recognized as one of the management disciplines that will drive higher profitability. And as project management becomes more recognized and respected we build an infrastructure to support it and heighten the awareness of this infrastructure throughout the business community. ■