Project, Programme & Portfolio Management – P3O

Launched by the Office of Government Commerce in 2008, P3O is growing in popularity, taking its place alongside PRINCE2, MSP (managing successful programmes) and M_o_R (risk) as part of a robust suite for delivering change, with control.

Having recently qualified as a P3O practitioner, I take the view that there’s not much new to me in it, but the training it is really valuable for the following reasons:

• It correctly and strongly emphasises that projects and programmes represent an investment by the organisation, and should be managed accordingly; Governance, in particular, is addressed comprehensively, without being prescriptive
• It offers several models for operating across an organisation, which also take account of the organisation’s capability & maturity
• It acknowledges that projects can be a hotbed of risk, and offers approaches to deal with them

In summary, PMOs and mechanisms for managing programmes and portfolios are often poor relations when it comes to control, and P3O provides an approach to address this. Recommended.

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