Relationship between Project, Program and Portfolio: As a project manager, you should know the basic concepts of program and portfolio and how they are related to each other and to projects. A program may be a part of a higher-level program; it certainly contains some interrelated projects, and it may contain some non-project work as well.
Program management focuses on optimally managing the interdependencies among the various projects in the program. The person who manages a program is called the Program Manager. Just like a project is managed by a project manager, a program is managed by a program manager, who oversees the projects and provides high-level guidance to the project managers.
In other words, a program manager oversees projects and coordinates efforts between projects but does not manage the projects. Why is that? That is because; we the project managers are managing our projects!!! A portfolio contains both programs and projects and is managed by a portfolio manager.
The portfolio is drawn directly from the strategic business plan of the organization. The strategy of an organization is an action plan to achieve its business goals and objectives. The strategy determines the portfolio of projects and programs that the organization will execute. A portfolio is a set of projects, programs, or both that is managed in a coordinated fashion to obtain control and benefits not available from managing them individually.
With more businesses than ever before looking to add project managers to their teams, it is an opportune time to enter the growing field. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that job opportunities for general and operations managers are expected to increase at a rate of seven percent from This rate is about average in comparison to all other occupations in the United States.
In order to be effective, project managers and operations managers must both have certain essential skills. While the list below is by no means exhaustive, it accurately reflects the skills that are necessary for both positions:. Although the skills required for each of these positions are similar and overlap, the application of these skills is where the differences lie. It is also important to remember the skills required for a specific role will naturally depend on the industry and business in which a project or operations manager is working.
There are many ways to break into the field of project management. Becoming PMP certified shows potential employers that you are well-versed in the standardized practices of project management and are knowledgeable in the key areas of the discipline.
Oftentimes, project managers will also choose to pursue an advanced degree, such as a Master of Science in Project Management , in order to demonstrate mastery of the concepts involved in the field and gain additional experience that can help them advance their careers. Christopher Bolick, assistant academic specialist for the Master of Science in Project Management program at Northeastern University, encourages potential students to find a program that leverages faculty who work in the industry:.
This allows for a broad and dynamic representation of the industry as well as methodology exposure in the classroom for our students. In its simplest terms, experiential learning offers students the opportunity to acquire knowledge through real-world experience, reflective observation, and active experimentation in the classroom.
The process of becoming an operations manager is similar to becoming a project manager in many ways. As with project management, gaining real-world experience is just as important for standing out from the competition when it comes to job hunting.
For those looking to climb to managerial positions, graduate degrees are often preferred. Given the differences in project management and operations management, it is also important to consider the areas in which they overlap. But, one size does not fit all requirements. Just as there is a difference between the scopes of project management, program management, and portfolio management, there is also a difference between project management software and project portfolio management software.
Keep in mind that a project manager is concerned with tasks, deadlines, and output, while a program manager is focused on broader initiatives, roadmaps, prioritization, and resource capacity. Clearly, each requires specialized software geared towards their interests and responsibilities. Project management software facilitates common project management functions such as the creation of a Work Breakdown Structure WBS and Gantt charts.
Project portfolio management software delivers the functionality found in project management software combined with additional capabilities required to manage project portfolios. The most recognized project portfolio management solutions deliver capabilities required to manage work and resources across the portfolio such as:. Home-built or retrofitted legacy applications typically do not provide the level of integration, transparency and ease that a purposely built software solution can offer.
Project management software is within reach for most organizations and well worth the investment. The cost of doing nothing or relying on incomplete or obsolete applications is high and can be attributed to many of the most common pain points felt by many organizations.
Higher maturity organizations leverage PPM software primarily to provide the necessary visibility that is typically lacking from project management. Without a complete, real-time view of projects, work, and resources in the context of strategy, it is challenging to make informed decisions about where to invest.
If your organization never seems to have enough resources to meet incoming demand, PPM software will help your PMO balance, prioritize, and schedule resource capacity. It provides a real-time view into both future and in-flight work across project teams, departments, geographies, and the enterprise, and shows interdependencies. This insight makes it much easier to prioritize and plan resource allocation over time, as well as rationalize the need to hire additional resources.
With corporate strategies defined, the PPM software makes it easier to see where gaps and disconnects are apparent while also providing data to justify decisions.
You will be better able to see risks and address them early, before they doom a project to failure and before they consume valuable resources that could have been better spent elsewhere. PMO teams have always been in a position to provide value. But staying relevant means changing with the times and adapting to changes in technology, management demands, and business needs. Arming your PMO team with the right tools empowers them to drive both the strategic and the day-to-day programs that advance the corporate strategy.
The challenge is optimizing the way forward. Process and system improvements tend to fall into this category. The difficulty is knowing what is the best way to achieve the objective. Before committing major resources to the main part of the work, adequate time needs to be allowed for prototyping solutions and testing options before a final design solution can be determined and then implemented.
With these projects, the tools and techniques are well-known but the final outcome is uncertain. Only after completion can the results be measured and success or failure be determined. Most culture changes and marketing initiatives and, of course, actually making movies are in this category. The tools to be used, including training, communicating, and advertising, are well known, and the traditional if not optimal mix of techniques is understood for most situations.
Traditional project management is not enough in these projects; there is a continual need to measure results, provide feedback information, and adapt the mix of activities to optimize the likelihood of success.
There is an art to spending just enough effort to achieve an acceptable outcome—dealing with shades of gray. No one is sure of the optimum outcome or how best to achieve it. The only option is to proceed carefully, stop at regular intervals to check exactly where you are, and replan the way forward. This is exactly the way you would navigate through a thick fog. Both ambiguity and uncertainty are high. Management is both easy and difficult.
It is easy because it is pointless to set fixed plans you have no idea what to plan , while it is difficult because decisions regarding value and whether to stop or continue are subjective and need to be made in a collaborative environment of trust. Traditional measures of success such as on-time and on-budget are largely meaningless; typically there are no statistics on which to base this type of measure.
Consequently these projects are within the realm of cost-reimbursable contracts and partnerships; stakeholder relationship management and a clear understanding of value are the only effective tools for building to a successful outcome. Agile software development is ideal for this type of project.
Each iteration builds new capability and value, and the learning provides a platform for the next iteration of development. While most programs are likely to be larger, more complex, and less certain than most projects, the key differentiator between a program and a project is, as described earlier, their objective. Programs are focused on realizing benefits; projects are focused on delivering defined outputs.
One of the major roles of a program manager is to initiate projects to create the outputs the program needs to deliver its intended outcomes. Determining if the work to be undertaken is a project or a program is important because it will determine what management approach to use.
Attempting to manage a program as a project can lead to failure, or at best, to suboptimal outcomes. Programs generally have a multiplicity of requirements, deliverables, customers, stakeholders, departments, and interfacing organizations interacting with the work.
The following checklist can help determine the difference Duggal, :. The first question is the key: projects are best if there is one primary goal for the project to focus on delivering; multiple goals are best dealt with by way of a program, with a series of projects each focusing on a particular goal.
In many respects, the management of projects and programs appears similar. Both are selected via the portfolio management processes on the basis that they support or enable one or more of the organization's key strategic initiatives. Both are initiated, planned, executed, and closed with ongoing monitoring and controlling during their life cycles.
In addition, both apply common processes such as time, risk, and communication management. However, managing projects and programs have distinctly different themes and focuses, which have major consequences on the style of management:. A key challenge facing project and program management professionals is managing the expectation of senior managers. Unrealistic expectations are unlikely to be realized, and creating realistic expectations in senior management thinking requires a sustained process of education and communication.
Realistic expectations of a project should include reasonably high levels of certainty in terms of time, cost, scope, risk, and quality. Importantly, the level of certainty should progressively increase as the project moves through its life cycle. The skill of a project manager lies in identifying ambiguity and uncertainty and then seeking to remove or resolve the causes.
The more uncertain the work, the more likely program management approaches will deliver better outcomes for the organization.
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