Program & Project Management are closely related disciplines but serve different purposes for an organization. According to the Project Management Institute®, projects are unique, temporary endeavors and progressively elaborated as they are better understood whereas a program is an ongoing or continuous effort on a collection of related projects that are managed in a coordinated fashion to bring strategic benefit to the organization while continuously improving the project management processes. Programs define a set of standard processes, procedures and controls across managed projects and may be managed through a Program Management Office (PMO) or a Program Office (PO). We help organizations with managing complex projects and programs, project and program assessment and recovery, establishing PMO or PO and project management best practices.

Programs are aligned with an organization’s overall mission, vision, objectives and values. Programs continue to exist even when contained projects end. On the other end, projects are temporary endeavors to deliver a specific outcome under various constraints such as budget and end date. Projects, however, can be standalone and managed outside of a program. Programs concerns with managed projects interdependencies, sequencing and various constraints imposed by the organization.

It is a preferred practice to manage programs through Program Office (PO) or Program Management Office (PMO) depending upon the size of the program, organization and other critical success factors. Research shows that PO or PMO provide tangible benefits as an essential integrator of people, processes and tools that manage and influence project performance. According to Gartner, “through 2008, three out of four successful $500K+ projects will be planned with project support… while three out of four failed projects will not”. Program Office or Program Management Office provides standard processes, controls, reporting mechanisms as well as it can provide guidance, mentoring, coordination support and oversight to the project managers.

Some of the key benefits of mature program and project management are cost savings, on-time delivery, increased customer satisfaction, reduction in rework, coordinated resources, actively managed risks, goals and objectives are known, aligned and agreed upon by all stakeholders. Lack of sound project management leads to missed deadlines, exceeded budgets, poor communications, inability to meet project requirements, to name a few.

In this practice, we provide several key services:

Project management

• Project feasibility, business case and expected outcome, initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and closeout
• Setting up processes, templates and reporting mechanisms
• Determine major risks, constraints and other requirements
• Establish project performance metrics and success factors
• Earned Value Management

Program management & Program Management Office (PMO)

• Develop and maintain program’s business case
• Establish scope and align program goals with business strategy in consultation with the leadership
• Establish governance policies, projects selection guidelines
• Setup processes, templates, key performance indicators and reporting mechanisms for the program and projects
• Projects interdependency and resource analysis and coordination
• Earned Value Management for the entire program
• Training/Mentoring of project managers and teams
• Project management tools and templates setup
• Project closeout reviews
• Project management process improvements
• Facilitate interaction between stakeholders and project managers

Project assessment, audit and troubled project recovery

• Independently assess the health of the project
• Provide monitoring and auditing of project deliverables
• Provide recommendation for project management process improvements

Contact us if you like to get more information regarding our project and program management consulting practice.