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Okay, My PMO is Agile. But Is It Mature?

February 1, 2021 | by Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin

You may be asking the wrong question.

Welcome to Part 2 of our three-part blog series exploring questions that were left unanswered at the end of my presentation during PMI's Dec. 9 virtual event (to read Part 1, click here.)

Q: Is there a PMO maturity questionnaire and model that you would recommend and share?

A: Yes … and no.

There’s no simple answer to this question. Over the past decade, a lot of thought has gone into PMO maturity and numerous organizations have worked at creating models. You can read about a selection of these at the links below:

All of these provide insights and food for thought for anyone struggling to pin a qualifier on their PMO's performance. That said, there are a few central issues that tend to bog down PMO maturity efforts—including the one we engaged in here at PM Solutions Research back in 2012 (we expanded on this research in Kent’s chapter in the newest AMA Handbook of Project Management).

Here's the thing: It’s easy enough to develop a model, but developing the specific measurements for each component of a model, which are what allow you to baseline maturity and show improvement over time, is no small project. By the time you’ve developed the infrastructure, your model tends to become too unwieldy to use outside an academic setting. Time is usually at a premium in PMOs which, even today, tend to have dedicated staffs of fewer than 10 people. And one area that all the above models are lacking in, is connecting maturity improvement to a clear tangible value metric. Any PMO leader worth her salt is going to look at a model with nine dimensions and hundreds of measures and say: What value will it add? The answer, too frequently, is … umm … we don’t know.

And there’s another issue that’s fundamental to the whole maturity project: PMOs, unlike basic project management, do not always (or even usually) grow in capability incrementally. Sometimes, of course, they do follow the simple up-the-steps trajectory, from a simple departmental PMO, through more strategic cross-department responsibilities, to an enterprise powerhouse. But, just as often, an EPMO will be chartered at the strategic level with the mission to transform the organization. Boom, and away they go. This was the case with the subject of our recent case study and PMO Symposium co-presenter Preferred Mutual (download the recorded webinar here).

The focus groups we conducted in 2012 with PMO leaders ended in our changing course: rather than develop a full-on PMO maturity model, we incorporated aspects of the research into our existing studies on the PMO and other project management interest areas. In most of our studies, you will find data about PMO capability, functions, best practices, results, and value. And isn’t that the bottom line?

In addition, this year we’ve updated our Project Management Maturity Model, which includes a mini-assessment of the PMO as a Special Interest Component under the Integration Management chapter. The components that are included in the PMO assessment include:

  • Project Support Functions
  • Consulting and Mentoring
  • Processes and Standards
  • Training
  • Project Management Capability
  • Project Management Software Tools
  • The PMO in an Agile/Adaptive environment.

That book is forthcoming from Taylor & Francis in the spring; here’s their pre-order page.

Next week, tune in for our final blog in this series, when we will interview two Agile experts on the question of the PMO in a SAFe environment.

About the Author

Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin

Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin is editor-in-chief for PM Solutions Research, and the author, co-author and editor of over twenty books on project management, including the 2007 PMI Literature Award winner, The AMA Handbook of Project Management, Second Edition.

View Posts by Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin

Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin

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