Organizational Project Management Maturity:

Roadmap to Success

Why Organizational Maturity? Just as individuals benefit from achieving personal maturity, organizations benefit from organizational maturity. Organizational maturity enables an organization to: Translate organizational strategy into success Drive business improvement Gain competitive edge

All organizations should continually look for ways to improve thats just a law of economics, a matter of competitive survival -Jay Douglas, Manager, Business Development Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute, PA

Definitions Organizational Maturity is the process of adopting and refining business processes to ensure success Project Management Maturity is more specifically an organizations level of achievement with consistent methods and repeatable delivery of project management goals A project management maturity model allows an organization to examine its strengths and weaknesses and develop a maturity assessment

Traditional Organizational Maturity Model

Level 1: Initial

Level 2: Repeatable
Level 3: Defined Level 4: Managed Level 5: Optimized

Maturity Level 1: Initial

Features:

Fire Fighting is the way of Life Success depends upon individual heroics Few stable processes exist or used The introduction of new technology is risky Data collection and analysis are ad-hoc
Steps to go to next level:

An organization must focus on the fundamentals Establish basic project management concepts, training and simple processes

Maturity Level 2: Repeatable

Features:

Success depends on management system support Documented processes at project level Technology supports established stable practices Planning and management data is used by individual projects

Steps to go to next level:

Formalize and document the PM processes Customize training according to the roles Work toward integrated management processes

Maturity Level 3: Defined

Features:

Project groups work together Training is planned and provided according to the roles Integrated management and engineering processes are used across the organization New technologies are evaluated on a qualitative basis Data is systematically shared across projects
Steps to go to next level:

Establish standardized data definition and collection processes across the organization Encourage team work within and across the projects Collect project planning and management data across the organization

Maturity Level 4: Managed

Features: A strong sense of teamwork exists within each project Processes are quantitatively understood and stabilized New technologies are evaluated on the quantitative basis Data definition and collection are standardized across the organization Steps to go to next level: Establish process improvement teams Perform trend analysis on data gathered

Maturity Level 5: Optimized

Features:

A strong sense of teamwork exists across the organization Processes are continuously and systematically improved New technologies are proactively pursued and deployed Data is used to evaluate and select process improvements

Keep up the good work!!!! Continuous Improvement

How to determine the organizational Project Management maturity level?

There are many maturity models (OPM3, CMM, etc.) to evaluate and track an organization Some questions to consider are:
Are the business processes within the organization repeatable? Is any project methodology followed? Is any project data captured? Any Software tools used? How are projects chosen and initiated? How are project roles determined? How is project information communicated? How are the executives in the organization kept informed on the projects? Are there certified project managers in the organization?

When should the organization start looking to improve? As soon as possible One can prevent problems now or repair damages later. And later always has latent costs. In SEIs study of six sample organizations, companies that measured maturity achieved : - 35 % increase in productivity - 19 %decrease in time to market - 39 % reduction in post-release defects -Mike Phillips, Program Manager Capability Maturity Model Integration, SEI

How does an organization determine its current level of maturity? By doing the assessment

To navigate the journey of performance improvement, you must know where you are and how to get where you want to be.

How to do the assessment?

Project Management experts perform the maturity assessment by: Using proven tools like OPM 3 or PMMM Staff interviews Artifact evaluation Survey evaluation Benchmarking in comparison to established standards The current maturity is determined by performing a detailed maturity assessment of organizations capability, weaknesses, and overall business goals

Maturity Models
Maturity models serve as objective scorecards to measure and track progress. Here are some common maturity models: Organizational Project Management Maturity Model (OPM3) - PMI Project Management Maturity Model (PMMM) - Kerzner Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) SEI ESI Internationals Project Framework - ESI The best model is the one that can easily connect to real needs of the organization

Benefits of Maturity Models Provide a roadmap for strategic improvement Allow to look into the organizations strength and weakness Assess organizations project management against agreed criteria Set realistic targets for improvement Measure progress towards enhanced capability Identify the links between needs and real education requirements
Think of the maturity model as a corporate stethoscope that can assess and diagnose organizations health

Success Factors
Consistent effort Strong executive management support Emphasis on project management best practices Setting reasonable goals Implementing changes step by step Project management training Sharing knowledge across the organization Anticipating incremental improvement

Maturity is an on-going process, Organizations must be willing to stay abreast of changes in the field of project management, seek out best practices and implement these changes.