The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

Projects & Programmes are two different animals, don'tunderestimate the gap

Thomas Walenta, PMI Fellow, PgMP, PMP

thwalenta@online.de

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

Hindu God Narasimha: Great Protector

Short memory and life Supporting a family Successful in hunting <50% Feared

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

Hindu God Ganesha: Lord of successand destroyer of obstacles

Long memory and life Supporting an ecosystem Successful in most cases Respected

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

Quick kill or sustained effect?

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

Successful Project delivered a product in time & budget

Successful Programme achieved benefits and created value

#1 Gap: Success definition gapScope, budget, milestones = business benefits?

Benefit: 'desired result of an initiative undertaken to meet a need or solve a problem'

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#1 Gap: Success definition gap - sidestepGood benefits management means better projects

Copyright PMI 2015 2015 Pulse of the Profession

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#1 Gap: Success definition gap - sidestepSuccessful projects do not imply business success

Business outcome expectationsinclude:

Delivery quality End-user adoption Business case attainment Sponsor satisfaction

Challenged53%Succeeded

29%

Failed18%

Copyright The Corporate Executive Board (CEB), www.pmo.executiveboard.com, 2009 Study 'Project Managing Business Outcome'

The top-performing projects in terms of budget and schedule compliance attain on average only 53% of their business outcome expectations.

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#2 Gap: Education gap Are Project Managers educated and trained to transform business goals

to requirements and benefits?

• Project Manager‘s curriculums & certifications focus on technical skills– Magic triangle scope/quality – cost – time– Soft skills to lead a team– Organizational skills – Technology

• IPMA & PMI competency frameworks include 3 domains lately:

– Practice / Technical PM

– People / Leadership

– Perspective / Strategic & Business Management

costtime

scope

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#3 Gap: Methodology gapDo Project Management Standards and Methodology provide real help to

Project Managers in delivering benefits?

• Benefits are specific to a business / a company• Benefits delivery is often seen as a primary task of middle management, consulting

companies or not addressed specifically

• 'Benefits' is found 24 times in PMBoK Guide 5th edition, but 129 times in PgM Standard3rd edition, which has a focus on benefits management

• Prince2 mentions benefits in the business case and benefits review plan, but only MSP covers benefits management

• IPMA ICB3 'benefit' is found on 28 pages, does not have a focus on benefitsmanagement, offers success criteria for projects

• ISO 21500: projects contribute to benefits, which are created by operations only (!)

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#3 Gap: Methodology gap – sidestepHow to successfully fulfill business expectations and deliver benefits to

stakeholders?

?Stake-holders

(sponsors)

Stake-holders(users)

Strategy

Environment (society, jurisdiction, regulators, market etc)

Req

uire

men

ts

Ben

efits

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#3 Gap: Methodology gap – sidestepProgramme Management provides for Benefits Management

ProgrammeStake-holders

(sponsors)

Req

uire

men

ts

Stakeholders(users)

Strategy

Project Adeliverable

ScopeCostTime

Ben

efits

(sus

tain

ed, V

alue

)

Ben

efits

(con

solid

ated

)

Project Bdeliverable

ScopeCostTime

Discretebenefit

BenefitsIdentfication

BenefitsAnalysis & Planning

Benefitstransition

Benefitssustainment

Benefits Delivery

Component C Discretebenefit

Environment

Based on PMI Standard for Programme Mgmt, 3rd Ed.

Governance

Discretebenefit

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#4 Gap: Significant capabilities gapAre capabilities of a successful Programme manager and a good project

manager similar?

Project Manager Programme Manager

Focus Detail Integrative

Action Reactive Proactive

Role Single Multiple and conflicting

Team Set tasks Provide vision

Risk Analyse, monitor Prepare redundancy

Time Schedule driven Anticipate changes

Funding Budget driven Uncertainity awareness

Scope Fixed, change control Staged definition

Change To be avoided Looked for

PMI Congress 2003 – Europe Paper Pellegrinelli, Partington and Young

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

#5 Gap: in/outward orientation gapProgramme Management is outward focussed while Project Management

mainly deals with project internals

ProgrammeProject

PlanControl Deliver

Scope /Quality

TimeCost

UnderstandCreate

Achieve

Strategy /Benefits

GovernanceStakeholders

The Way to Project Management in Multicultural Context

Understand when to ask for an elephant instead of a lion

#1 Success definition gap

#2 Education gap

#3 Methodology gap

#4 Significant capabilities gap

#5 In/outward orientation gap

Strategy Alignment

Governance

Stakeholder Engagement

Benefits Realisation

Lifecycle Management

Only about 50% ofsuccessful projects deliver

benefits

High benefits realizationmaturity impacts project

success

PMI Program Management StandardsDomains