How do you develop a project management methodology that isn’t too heavy or too light, that respects the experience of project managers, and that is accessible? 

Here’s how I approached it…

I was made the PMO Manager of a department of about 20 project managers. Although I didn’t have responsibility for the project managers or the portfolio of projects, I did have responsibility for the methodology they were working to and for the reporting of project information to the project portfolio board (comprising most of the organisation’s senior management).

Review the “As Is” methodology

At the time I was appointed, I assumed responsibility for managing the methodology – this was a comprehensive rulebook, spanning over 125 pages and including over 30 document templates, that was updated roughly quarterly. This rulebook was generally either blindly implemented in full (by the less experienced project managers, potentially impeding project delivery) or cheerfully ignored (by the more experienced project managers, potentially increasing the risk to delivery).

Seeing that this was not an ideal situation, I reviewed the methodology to identify the key control points and templates that delivered the most value, either for the project managers or for project and portfolio stakeholders.

I involved the project managers, who helped me to identify where things were inefficient and could be improved. I asked some of them to help me develop and test-drive new improved multi-purpose templates and more efficient ways of reporting, that removed the old cut-and-paste consolidation.

Develop the “To Be” methodology in consultation with stakeholders

To improve ease of use (and uptake) I represented the entire project management approach as a process flow diagram or “framework” on a single A4 page, with hyperlinks to the latest templates for each section. I identified the steps and documents that would always be required for the type of projects generally undertaken, and made these items part of what I called the mandatory “backbone” of the new approach. Everything else I made either conditionally mandatory (depending on project dimensions such as size, risk, complexity, etc.) or fully optional elements. These optional elements could be selected from the “toolkit” or not, as the result of a discussion held early on in the project between the project manager and their line manager (who typically was responsible for the project management of a section of the project portfolio). I designed a document to record the choices made and the reasons why any optional element was though not to be relevant or useful to the project; this empowered the project manager to make choices, but also made the project manager accountable for those choices.

Implement the solution and train users

I trained the project managers in the new approach and published it on the organisation’s intranet. I encouraged project managers not to print paper copies of the guidance or templates or to re-use old completed documents, instead pointing them to the intranet site so that they would always be using the latest versions of the PM approach and the templates.

Review performance, and tune the methodology

I carried out regular post-implementation surveys and facilitated review meetings, and integrated the lessons learned into the framework. I abandoned quarterly releases of a weighty manual, instead making changes to templates and guidelines as often as these were appropriate (and informing stakeholders of the changes and why they had been made).

The new framework gave increased flexibility to project managers whilst ensuring their accountability for their project management approach. The project management community bought in to the framework as they had been closely involved in its development.

So that’s my approach to refreshing a project management methodology, learned through experience. It this approach useful to you? Let me know in the comments.

If you would like to have the benefits of an approach like this but prefer not to have to worry about this sort of detail stuff, why not talk to us about taking care of it all for you?