we're going to get started um Laura
Barnard is our guest today
um and if you don't know who Laura is
she is an absolute goddess in the pmo
world
um and uh she's a complete ball of
energy an inspiration to us all uh so
and there's a whole there's a whole
bunch of us right who are kind of in a
tribe who are really passionate about
helping pmo
um leaders be more effective have more
of an impact in on the on their lives
their careers the organizations they
work on and Laura is right at the center
of that tribe right if if the tribe has
a has a chief Laura is the chief and she
took the bone out of her nose today so
that we could uh be presentable on Zoom
um so so Laura is absolute the chief PML
Global Alliance named her as the
influencer of the year last year as she
said she highlighted and headlined a
couple of the conferences over here last
year and she's just incredible it was
bizarre walking around this this
conference
with Laura and literally groupies were
running out and taking selfies and
they've been looking at me going yeah
who are you
oh come on well it was pretty cool when
I got to meet some people that have been
in our community for a long time and get
to meet them in person and some people
had some really nice things to say about
me so I it just felt really good because
Stuart you know that my heart and soul
is with the people on this webinar today
you all are my people and I'll tell you
a little bit about my journey and the
shoes I wore that you're all wearing now
um in just a moment and and that's very
much the spirit of this is is it's a
spirit of giving learning sharing and
um uh and Laura has a lot to get through
today a lot of really impactful
insightful stuff so I am going to break
with tradition and I'm going to try and
keep my mouth shut
probably won't work but I will try and
keep my mouth shut and just let let
Laura go so Laura I'm gonna I'm gonna
hand over to you
um I will man the chat so if you have a
question if you have questions or
comments or you want to throw something
in
um or clarify something let me know and
if it's appropriate and and if it's you
know fits in with the flow I will
interject so that Laura can can address
it so keep your fingers on keyboards
let's go yeah all right awesome thank
you and I will definitely try to make
sure that there's some time to answer
your questions
um please feel free to ask your
questions uh as we're going through this
but note that there will be better times
to answer them
um you know a little bit later in the
program and definitely at the end and
that's because some of the things that
I'm going to say today are going to
um ruffle a few feathers and there's a
reason for that right um so I'm going to
talk you through a little bit of of some
things that have changed uh in this
space uh the role that each of you have
uh and I don't think many of you realize
how very important you are to the
futures of your organizations you are it
baby and I'm going to show you exactly
how the um I've come to that conclusion
I'm going to show you the role that you
can play and how to help you earn your
seat at the table in closing the
strategy to execution Gap and you're
even going to learn why it's not closed
with the 800 books out there and all the
Articles and all the stuff on closing
the Gap I'm going to show you why
they're struggling to close it and why
you're the secret to the success of
organizations being able to deliver on
your strategy
um so please do me a favor and give me
your undivided attention and here's why
because we're going to be talking about
some things today like Roi return on
investment and if you're here by the way
nobody can multitask it's a joke and
we'll talk about that more later if
you're here let's get the most out of
this time together so give me your time
and attention I'm going to go quickly
but I'm also going to give you some
really great insights so get your
notepad ready I'm going to give you tons
of things that you can take away and go
take action on right now to start making
a difference elevating your role in the
organization and helping your Business
Leaders close the gap between strategy
and execution so if you are new to me
which some of you are like Stuart
mentioned I was named the top Global
influencer of the year a give them a top
Global pmo influencer of the Year by the
pmo Global Alliance in 2021 I guess 2022
where that Crown uh and uh that's really
a testament to all of you pmo leaders
because everything I do I do for you uh
to help support you uh in the tough role
that you're in and
um help you help support you carry the
heavy burden that you actually carry
around every day I was in your shoes for
15 years building pmos business
transformation organizations and worked
my way up from 1999 having no idea what
I was doing the first time I built a pmo
to an executive level uh position in a
business transformation organization run
shared services pmos Enterprise pmos for
15 years and I had to learn a lot of the
things the hard way and I'm going to
share a little bit of that experience
with you because I think it resonates
with a lot of the experience that some
of you are in
um now and along the way I learned a lot
of things and I found myself saying to
people this community when I would you
know speak on stages or have a chance to
talk to a new pmo leader and I say no no
no don't do this do this instead and
here's why and I said that again and
again and again and I actually found
myself saying gosh I really wish I had
me when I was you I really wish I had
someone that would tell me all these
things share all the secrets and help
make it easier for me to do this hard
work that we have to do in pmos and
that's where pmo strategy started I had
no intentions of ever I want to be you
know some you know executive incorporate
that was it that was my that was my plan
and
um and I didn't have a plan to start pmo
strategies but what I found was that a
lot of the things that were out there
were not helping PML leaders do the kind
of thing that they needed to do so we've
created some really unique programs
which I'll give you a little glimpse
into today that are changing the game
for pmo leaders around the world truly
around the world uh you also should
check out the pmo strategies podcast
this is free there's all almost 200
episodes on there Stuart's been on there
um and uh we're talking about all things
specifically pmo and a lot of what
you'll hear there
um is different than the typical advice
which we'll talk about in a minute this
image you here to see here on the left
is the image on that podcast so it's
very easy to find and I'm pretty sure if
you Google pmo it shows up in the
podcast right on the first page so
you'll see that picture you'll know it's
the right one definitely hit subscribe
download the episode so that they're
with you no matter where your high
impact Journey takes you I pour my heart
and soul
um into making sure that you have
everything you need to be successful
because I was in your shoes and I know
just how hard it can be we also host the
pmo impact Summit the world's largest uh
pmo conference I was going to say
virtual but it's actually it's just the
largest pmo conference in the world
specifically focused on supporting pmo
leaders and strategy delivery Leaders
with an emphasis on making a bigger
impact in your organizations so the
that's a little bit about me and now
let's talk about you because that's what
we're actually all here to do so I'm
going to help you get laser focused on
exactly what it takes to build a pmo or
other strategy delivery team some of you
call it pmo some might call strategy
delivery Office business transformation
I'm going to help I'm going to help you
build the pmo that your organization
needs to thrive and show you what you'll
need to do to drive undeniable business
value for your organization quickly and
it's probably not in the places you've
been told to spend most of your time and
this applies even if you're just getting
started we have people that have never
done this before and they come to us and
like yeah but will that work for me
absolutely everything I'm telling you
will work for you whether this is your
first time or your 10th time building or
running a pmo you're going to learn some
things today that I think will be
helpful
so for us to start I think we need to
start at the top we need to start with
where
um a lot of the challenges actually
originate with the organizations that
we're working in
um you know no matter where you've been
as a pmo leader over the last many years
it's been pretty tough for a lot of you
in fact
um not just the organization and the
Business Leaders but pmo leaders found
that they had to Pivot and shift and
their role significantly changed
overnight when the kova 19 Global
pandemic first became a global pandemic
organizations were forced to change how
they did things overnight all the things
they didn't think they could ever do
somehow magically happened for many of
you it was because of your influence and
your help and you had a seat at the
table helping to answer the tough
business questions Business Leaders had
to answer when they were faced forced to
change when they were faced with
undeniable change that they had to make
others of you found yourselves on the
outside looking in you found yourself in
a place where you weren't actually with
a seat at the table and you watched as
your organization
made really big business decisions that
you could have facilitated supported and
enabled and so this meant for some of
you you had this great seat at the table
and for others you weren't part of the
conversation at all but here's the thing
for organizations to thrive now and into
the future they're going to need your
help because the only constant and I
remember years ago saying the only
constant is change well guess what baby
it's happening even faster than ever
before every organization is going to be
forced to transform some of them
overnight
six months ago were any of you talking
about chat GPT
and now it's literally changing the way
people are making decisions getting
information and organizing work they do
businesses are using it for all kinds of
creative things so much so that the
servers can't even handle the load and
you have to get on a waitlist just to
get access to the platform and they're
going to this is not the last disrupter
there are going to be so many disruptors
like this that are going to have
organizations having to rethink how they
face the countless obstacles and
challenges and opportunities that are
going to be presented to them
transformation is going to become the
norm
I have a client that yesterday met with
me it's actually two days ago met with
me and said okay we had all of this work
that we were going to do and our
Executives just decided that we are
going to do drop everything that's what
they think now we're going to have to
make sure they actually do drop
everything and work on this number one
priority Initiative for the organization
we're going to do something that should
take a year and a half in three months
that's the goal and I said okay so how
important is this to compare to
everything else this is the most
important thing for the organization so
how are we how so what we're teaching
them is how to reorganize and make it
the actual most important thing in the
organization because as many of you know
they'll say that and then they'll keep
working on all the projects and then
none of it's going to get done so we
have to help them understand and this is
the Stewart's area of expertise what
prioritization actually means so I'll
walk you through some things you can do
to help them when you are facing a
situation like that
but the bottom line is for organizations
to thrive now and into the future the
one thing that we know for sure is that
they must figure out how to better align
strategy delivery and results
that's what they need and that's where
you come in because your ability to
understand where and how you can help
your organization Thrive amidst this
constant environment of change is going
to be the secret to your success
so what does that look like what does
that actually mean let's talk about
what's happening in many organizations
today that will prevent them from being
successful prevent them from thriving in
the future and what the typical
situation looks like right now we'll
start with the real world and then we'll
talk about how we can actually support
changing it
when we look at the executive's
perspective here's the kind of things
that we hear about their ability to
successfully execute
forty percent of Executives say that
Enterprise accountability and leadership
are not aligned on strategic execution
so the leaders in the organization
are not aligned to the strategy look for
the opportunities and what I'm telling
you here and then I'll help you figure
out how to apply those opportunities in
each of your organizations gets even
worse sixty percent of organizations and
I know this resonates a lot with you so
put it in the chat if this sounds
familiar 6 60 of organizations don't
actually link their budgets to the
corporate strategy so strategy is
defined in one place and somewhere else
in the organization the budget and the
projects are defined and then we wonder
why we can't deliver on any of our
strategy it's because nobody's being
incentivized no work is being put into
it directly and we don't have any
alignment between the dollars and the
Strategic goals
and Business Leaders will tell you and I
think it's actually worse these are all
the only ones that will admit it and the
next statistic will will confirm that 61
percent of Executives say that they
struggle to bridge the gap between
strategy formulation and implementation
and what do they do when they have this
problem they look to us and they say why
aren't you getting it done
and here is the worst statistic of all
Harvard Business Review says that 95 of
the typical Works force does not
understand their company's strategy
95 percent
I go in and talk to Executives and they
ask me to come in because they want us
to fix project management or they need a
pmo or things they can't get their
strategy delivered
and then when I talk to their teams
about aligning their work to the
strategy do you know what they say to me
what strategy
what strategy nobody actually knows what
the strategy is and this statistic
says that proves that Harvard Business
Review asked people at all levels in the
workforce and most of them don't know
and I would challenge all of you
listening today do you know do you
actually know what the organization
strategy is because what's happening is
that organizations are failing they're
not thriving they're barely surviving
because they have not figured out how to
close that Gap but the problem is is
though they're looking in all the wrong
places and that's why they can't close
the gap because you know they think the
problem is in implementation so what
happens this is where we get called in
this is what this is what they see when
they look to the implementation of their
strategy and it's failing project
managers are constantly to blame 40 to
60 percent of projects are considered
failing to meet their business and
quality goals 86 percent of
practitioners report
and I want to hear in the chat how many
of you think you have a resource believe
no you have a resource management
problem we don't have enough resources
86 of project people will say they don't
have enough resources to meet the
project demands we're going to come back
to that one because that's a pretty
important one
71 of projects are not well aligned with
business strategic business priorities
projects are not tied to strategy
and 50 of project leaders aren't using
what they know about strategy if
anything to drive prioritization
this is a big problem I think this
number is actually
the 50 that we're willing to admit it
I think this is the 50 willing to admit
the truth I think there it's far worse
than that because as Harvard Business
Review said 95 of the typical Workforce
does not understand the strategy so I
know they're not using strategic
insights to drive prioritization this is
a huge problem this is what I love about
stewards software transparent choice
because it addresses this problem
specifically it actually addresses a lot
of the problems we're going to talk
about today
so this is where all of you come in this
is where the pmo leader is hired or
project manager has told poof you're now
a pmo leader go fix this problem and
here we come to save the day and what
happens all right pmo leaders hired
they're pulled into the role they're
told everything's a hot mess in fact we
get called in this way a lot because we
have a fabulous Consulting practice and
we come in and the Business Leaders say
project Management's broken go fix
project management and do it by setting
up a pmo now when we come in we don't
see these kind of Statistics because we
know why these things are happening but
usually we come in in a rescue mode
because this is the kind of problem
people are experiencing 68 of
stakeholders perceive their pmos to be
bureaucratic absolutely and I'll show
you exactly why that is in a moment and
here's something scary
fifty percent of pmos that are ever
attempted actually become operational
they actually 50 percent fail to Launch
so half of the pmos tried never get off
the ground and produce any results and
of the half that make it through that
first round half of those close and it's
actually getting worse than three years
it's getting closer to two so I guess
the good news is they're failing faster
but what that actually tells me is not
that they're failing faster it's that
their Executives have become less
patient and they're not willing to wait
as long as they used to be to see
results and in fact I know a lot of
cases where they don't even have a year
in fact our entire impact engine system
implementation program is a continuous
value delivery approach to pmo Value so
that you're delivering value every three
months as opposed to you know working on
it for a year behind the scenes and then
by the time you actually deliver
something
um people have moved on they've run out
of patience or they're working around
you
so here's what I want to tell you that
you need to really pay attention to and
that is the typical guidance on pmos
doesn't work or these results would be
better
if these are the typical results
that's because of the typical guidance
and when I say typical guidance what do
you think I mean
what do you think I mean when I say
typical guidance
this is your cue to jump into chat folks
yep
I'll show you how many have used this
today
say yes in the chat or heck yeah or yeah
I live by it if any of you have used
this today
I use it every single day every single
day and it's awesome for a lot of things
I I even went on chat GPT and said
what's the purpose of a pmo and I almost
cried I almost cried when I got the
answer because it's based on data from a
couple of years ago that is based on
information from a couple decades ago
that doesn't actually align with what
the purpose of the pmo is so we'll talk
about that in a minute we're going to
reshape
um how we talk about and think about the
pmo and the role can bring to the table
here's the problem with Googling your
way to a PML you're going to end up with
a little piecing together a ton of
different information from all over the
internet
and unfortunately a lot of it is bad
advice
now when I was back in your shoes
building my first pmo in 1999 I couldn't
just Google my way to a pmo because you
couldn't say uh how to set up a pmo and
get 8 Million results like you can today
might even be 9 million at this point
and now the problem with today is that
you can Google how to set up a pmo and
get 8 Million results
and most of it's going to be bad advice
when I was trying to figure out how to
set up a pmo back in the 90s I was first
of all I didn't even know that's what I
was doing I was just doing what made
sense because my business leaders had a
problem to solve and so I actually had
to I don't know ask them what they were
trying to accomplish so that I could
figure out what to do and I didn't have
the luxury of you know tons tons and
tons of information which I think was to
my advantage not disadvantage but when I
did try to get feedback or insights
here's what I found a lot of what
I was told to do was based on a heck of
a lot of theory that never seemed to
apply to my situation it was a
theoretical pmo that buried that buried
me in a bunch of templates and tools and
process and stuff and a good pmo looks
like one that has 863 templates and
processes that do all these things and
so I thought I was failing so I kept
trying to try all the things it said to
do and my Executives were like what are
you doing stop
because here's the secret
I I will tell you in my experience I
have never met an executive that said
wait hold on hold on can you come back
when you have five more templates for me
to fill out
they're not going to do that they don't
care they don't care about all that
templates and process stuff and I'll
show you why in a moment or you could
find yourself in a situation where
you've hired a consultant to come in and
help you and I just got off of a call
with one of our impact engine
accelerator Mastermind coaching students
and she said
well unfortunately they hired the
consultant that's coming in with their
cookie cutter approach
and we're already in trouble I already
see that this isn't going to work
because everything they're not listening
to us they're not listening to our
unique challenges and problems and the
pain points and they're just shoving
what worked at another company in here
and we know it's not going to work and
we're stuck that's the problem with the
typical Consulting approach which is
come in and spend as much time as you
can creating as much work as possible
and figuring out how to stay as long as
possible and when I went when I decided
to start my own company 10 years ago I
said we're going to build a Consulting
practice that's the exact opposite we're
going to do everything we can to teach
people to fish in the organization and
get out of there with them set up
sustainable and fully operational long
term without us so that when we leave
everything doesn't fall apart and we
plan our exit strategy from the moment
we get in there because our success is
not tied to the number of dollars we
squeeze out of organizations it's tied
to the big impact results we're helping
organizations make but if you have these
cookie cutter pick it up and try it here
again and again you're going to end up
with things that don't work that's what
the typical advice is giving us cookie
cutter lots of bad advice and a bunch of
theory that doesn't work so if you want
better results you've got to stop
following the typical advice if you want
to stop getting the typical results
so let's talk about what that means what
does that actually mean for you how do
you drive this Unstoppable business
value and do what makes sense and put
common sense into common practice in
your organization
well it starts by taking a step up and
out of where you've been focusing most
of your energy and looking at why you
were hired in the first place
because you're in a very critical role
in the organization and in a very
important place
but many of you don't have your seat at
the table and many of you don't even
realize the opportunity in front of you
so we're going to explore that
opportunity and figure out how to set
you up to get there the answers are all
there in those scary statistics all of
it is there for you to take and for you
to be able to grab your seat at the
table willingly like and and with that
them welcome welcoming you to the table
if you rethink your perspective about
your role while you were hired and what
value you bring to the table
and even PMI is an agreement on this
even the templates tools and process
people also will tell you that their own
data suggests from their surveys that
the alignment of the pmo to the goals of
the organization is actually the key to
driving strategy implementation not in
how much would perfect our templates
tools and process so I'll show you what
that means in a minute
but I'd like you find that chat if you
haven't and I'd like you to put a yes
and amen a heck yeah a haha that's me if
you hear any of these pain points in
your organization any of these
challenges if you've heard any of these
I want you to put it in the chat and let
me know so any of you have Executives
complain that they don't know what's
going on in the organization I don't
even know what projects are happening I
didn't know that project was taking
place who's doing this what's happening
here yep exactly yep we're here that all
the time I've only gotten to number one
and we were already getting people
laughing right so complaint number one
yep how about from the project manager's
perspective or the staff doing the work
they're like uh or the pro you know the
pmo you might be saying yeah exactly
Stuart you've heard it twice today so
many changes we can't even plan work
right we can't even plan the work that
needs to get done because the changes
are happening faster than we can put a
plan together
how about this Business Leaders and
stakeholders complain that projects
don't achieve their business benefits
yep all right right okay well guess what
also Executives every executive is
saying projects take too long they're
costing too much I like Jan I love where
you're going with this if they measure
it exactly exactly if they measure it
and we'll talk about why measuring
benefits isn't enough projects are
taking too long they're costing too much
ownership and accountability are unclear
put it in the chat if any of these are
resonating with you every department has
different priorities therefore how do we
possibly get everything done right
decisions take too long which delays
projects I mean Stuart this literally is
the foundation of your business I'm
dying here Laura I'm just pulling off my
chair this is this is the conversation I
have several times every single day
every single day right every single day
resources are spread too thin who has a
resource management problem right okay
I'm gonna we're gonna talk specifically
about that one in a minute IT project
results are unpredictable unpredictable
every executive is like okay that's
great but when we do something over here
it's going to be completely different
over here and unfortunately the solution
that you've all been told is to make
everything consistent and do a bunch of
standards and then become the standard
police and that won't work either and I
know every single one of you has this
challenge at some level every project is
number one priority should we go for
drum roll there you go yes exactly
Executives and listen by the way just so
you know I yell at Executives all the
time for this and I'm trying to teach
them too
um but when you ask your executive they
roll out the new strategy and you go ask
them hey so how important is this
compared to everything else you want me
to do and they say well
it's really important like everything
else and so what do you do you go try to
make everything important and you start
dividing the work up across all the
teams and everybody ends up with 1 16 of
a critical resource on their project
who's getting anything done with 1 16 of
a person no one so everything grinds to
a halt right so this is the challenge
that we have is that we we are stuck in
this position of trying to
see respond and react to all of these
symptoms and we're not actually getting
to the root cause problems so we're
going to talk about what that looks like
now I'm going to take you into we're
going to dive into what we call the
impact engine system this is our
approach to helping organizations build
a pmo a strategy delivery organization
Elevate the one they have or even rescue
it so that it's driving really big value
for the organization and I'll show you
exactly what I teach our students in
just a moment we're going to dive into
doing what I call iterating your way to
impact we teach organizations how it's
an agile implementation approach to
Value delivery continuous value delivery
using what we know has been working over
the last 25 years
so
um so what we're going to dive into is a
little bit of the stuff that I teach in
the mindset stage of the impact engine
system and you'll see why this is
changing the way organizations operate
okay so Stuart this is going to look
very familiar to you because this is the
world that you live in every day right
all right so
what's going on is let's let's go to
let's go back up to the executives
because if you want to solve the
problems we've got to stop living in pmo
and project management land we've got to
start at the top with the executives
we're going to take a typical strategy
life cycle and talk about what happens
and why there are so many quote-unquote
gaps so let's say strategy definition
strategy execution strategy realization
basic life cycle for what an
organization goes through to to create
strategy and realize their strategy and
we'll align to that the typical Project
Life Cycle initiative life cycle I don't
even have to say project now remember
when I say project here I don't mean
waterfall I don't mean agile agile water
scrum full I don't mean any of that I
actually mean all of it because what
we're talking about here is not an
implementation methodology but how
projects are aligned to these parts of
the strategy life cycle ideas are
generated projects are approved and I
know lots of stuff happens in there but
you get the idea projects are planned
projects are delivered and then benefits
are realized but we can't stop there we
actually have to make sure that they
have value that they were worth doing in
the first place
here's where most of you live in
strategy execution world
this is the typical focus of pmos or
agile transformation organizations
business transformation organizations
change management functions here's where
most of you live and so what most of you
are doing is spending a lot of time
fixing the problem you are hired to fix
by training staff creating processes
creating templates implementing tools
awesome some of you even did this in
reverse order and first thing you did
was try to implement a tool how'd that
work out for you
if that was the first place you started
so what happens is this is where you're
focused but here's what's happening when
you're busy creating all these templates
and process
there's some other things going on in
the organization excuse me
there's some other things going on in
the organization before those projects
are even starting well everything is
number one priority right we all laughed
at that one but we laughed because it's
true
the strategy is not clear we've proved
that with the 95 statistic resources are
over allocated everybody complains they
have a resource management problem right
and managers are redirecting staff
but put it in the chat if any of these
are happening to you in your
organization
but pay attention
to where I'm showing the problem
actually is all of it right of course
all of it and by the way those of you
that are messaging make sure you change
it to everyone instead of just hosts and
panels so everybody can see your
comments some of you are hilarious here
uh everyone should see it
um okay so but there's more wait there's
more problems that we need to address
because in the strategy realization
stage we have problems that our
executives are complaining about as well
projects don't meet their goals they're
cost more than the benefits oh someone
said Jan did you say if anybody's
actually measuring value nobody's
actually measuring value and what
happens is we keep making the same
mistakes over and over and over again
and that's the problem we keep making
the same mistakes and nothing gets
better but then your Executives come and
they say okay but I need your help pmo
leader can you go fix this for me and
everything's broken and if we don't fix
it you're in trouble so here's what we
do we start shoving more templates and
tools and process and training and
templates and tools and process and
training at the problem we think we have
but that's just it that's the problem we
think we have but what you don't realize
is that only about 20 of your value to
the organization can be found in that
space because no matter how many
templates tools and process you shove it
we still have the same problems those
problems are not fixed by any of your
templates and tools and process in the
strategy execution space so what's
important to understand for you as a pmo
leader is that your value is not tied to
the quantity of stuff that you create
but the impact you help the organization
make
right it's not about the stuff it's not
about the Temple's tools and process and
I'm not saying never have them but I'll
show you how to use them for good
instead of evil in this process because
there's ways to use them to help enable
and Empower as opposed to what many of
you hear which is you're slowing things
down
so there is an actual clear path to
success and I'm going to show you how to
take it full advantage of that in the
coming slides just remember that most of
the value you can contribute as a pmo
isn't even in the execution stage that's
the 20 the rest of it is found in fixing
problems beyond that your usual focus of
execution is not solving the problems
Your Business Leaders have that's why we
can't close the strategy to execution
Gap in organizations the business has
gaps in places you haven't been involved
traditionally or you've tried to get
involved or they don't even have you at
the table or you've been so busy with
your templates tools and process you
haven't even had time to look at the
real challenges going on and where you
can help
so your path to success is going to be
in addressing the root causes of each of
the pain points these symptoms that
you're experiencing so you can actually
solve the right problems and I'm going
to walk you through an example that I
know Stuart's going to make you laugh
because you see this probably every day
okay very simple root cause analysis
here and you can do this to any of the
problems that you have all right
typical complaint projects are taking
too long and costing too much who gets
the blame somebody put in chat who gets
the blame for that when the projects are
taking too long costing too much who's
the first to be blamed
I know you're there in the chat where
are you yeah
project manager absolutely the project
manager's fault it's always the project
manager's fault they're not managing the
projects well of course obviously it's
them well I would like to challenge that
and ask a few more questions so when I
go to the project managers and say hey
what's going on here they'll say well
the project team members never get
anything to us on time they make a
commitment and then they blow that out
of the water every single time
so when you ask the project team members
what's going on what do they tell you
well new projects keep getting added to
my plate I don't have enough capacity to
do all the work that keeps adding to my
plate and this is where most of us
conclude we have a resource management
problem
but here's the thing
you don't actually have a resource
management problem
what you have is what we and you know we
see what you have is a shoving 10 pounds
of projects in a five pound bag problem
that's the problem you actually have
what you have is not not enough
resources what you have is more projects
than staff to do them the 842 projects
you want to get done with 16 staff is
the problem
it's not a resource management problem
there's nothing wrong with these poor
resources now you might need help
organizing them and allocating them but
the fact that they're allocated 425
percent is the problem which is not a
resource management problem it is
actually a portfolio prioritization
problem
this is the underlying root cause so
when we try and fix the symptom of
training project managers yelling at the
teams and all these other things which
are being the squeakiest wheel you know
saying that our problem is we can't
utilize resources going to beg our
Executives for more people it's actually
because we don't have good
prioritization instead of starting the
projects when we actually have the
people to do them we fire the starting
gun on every single project the first
day of the fiscal year and everything
grinds to a halt everyone ends up with 1
16 of a critical resource on their
project
so the answer is actually to create a
portfolio and prioritization and
governance model that protects the
strategy and helps ensure that it gets
delivered and the most important things
in the organization are focused on First
and if you're not familiar with
transparent Choice Nobody Does this as
well as they do this we we tell our
clients and our students all the time
and we have a very special relationship
with Stuart because we know that they're
the best at this this is the thing that
they do that nobody else can do quite
this way and it's because and the reason
we love it and recommend it all the time
is because this is one of the biggest
problems that organizations face when
everything is important nothing is
important that's the future of
organizations is solving there are other
problems to solve and I'm going to give
you some examples but that's one of the
biggest we always have our students
start there because if they don't have
that nothing else they do matters
all of it will be wasted effort and
energy templates tools and processing
things because we don't have that
underlying problem addressed so when you
have this shoving 10 pounds of projects
in a five pound bag problem what you
really have is more projects than the
staff to do them not not enough staff to
do the projects and that whole dynamic
changes when we shift the order
resources pulled in too many directions
yeah also a prioritization problem
success criteria for projects unclear
because nobody actually took the time to
evaluate what success looks like right
up front conflicting priorities causing
confusion still a prioritization problem
strategy is unclear and therefore we
haven't aligned our work to that
strategy I mean Stewart you're like yes
I'm really struggling to keep quiet
Laura but I'm going to keep her I know
you are we're almost there
yes I know
yes and this is and this is what we do
and this is what we help people do and
this is I mean this is very emotional
thing for us because Bo Stuart and I uh
and the people that are close to us in
our in our tribe our family and this
community care very deeply about solving
these problems because we cannot stand
watching people suffer and this is the
kind of suffering that not just upmo
leaders are experiencing but your
Executives and your teams my gosh
support project managers and the staff
they're getting the worst of it and it's
so hard to watch we can't stand it which
is why all of this you know is happening
right
100 yeah so uh and Business Leaders are
not aligned yes Jen and uh bottom line
bullet being the root cause of all of
them right exactly so how can you help
your role is to help Business Leaders
realize their business strategy with the
highest possible return on investment by
driving Better Business outcomes instead
of Simply perfecting outputs so I'm
going to give you some very specific
examples that we teach our students how
to do inside the impact engine system
and we're going to go through some of
these ways that they're iterating their
way to impacts you can see what it looks
like and we're going to go back to those
three stages so we can walk through some
very purposeful examples and Stuart this
is the place you live the most which is
actually setting projects up for success
so let's talk about a few of these
things we can do to actually set these
projects up for Success so we're not
playing the game of blaming the project
manager when they're actually not the
problem at all
so the first one create strategic
alignment now in the best case scenario
you're in an organization where you do
something mind-blowingly crazy by
actually deriving your projects from the
strategy so if we look at the strategy
at the top level what should come from
that is not projects actually but it's
your products and services the ways you
deliver value for the organization
that's what comes first and then from
that is all of the portfolios and
programs and projects that are to enable
those products and services to the
market right it's either the change
projects to create them or the change
projects to improve them but the whole
idea is projects are not the end they
are the means they are the means of
getting good products and services out
the door to deliver value to the market
to whoever the customer base is so when
you're hearing people say oh we do
product management we don't need to do
project management they're too totally
different things and with different
goals and I know people I know Stuart
you're like
go ahead say it say it
hahaha
that's what people don't understand is
that they are not the same thing it's
not one of the other you actually need
both to do things well and we do that in
our own business we have product and
service development and definition and
design and then we say great now we need
a project to go create this thing we
just designed great now we need to
measure that those products are actually
delivering the value in the marketplace
long after the project is over and the
pmo should be strategically positioned
to play in both spaces now you could be
in an organization where things are
magically all defined the way they're
supposed to be but if not then it's your
job to help close that gap between the
pro the strategy and the places where
you are playing a game which is in the
programs and the projects and hopefully
eventually into the portfolios and the
products and services so we have to
close that Gap in alignment and we'll
talk about ways you can do that in the
strategy realization stage as well if
you show value if you show how you're
helping the organization move the needle
they will invite you into those
conversations but you do not earn your
seat there by just saying I should be
there you cannot earn your seat Deb or
trying to sell them on the value of the
pmo you have to actually deliver some
meaningful results and provide
information to them that helps drive
that strategy delivery so we'll walk
through several examples one really
important one is strategic alignment
once you understand what the strategy is
and you've set that strategy up for
success by I don't know asking what the
purpose is why uh getting a business
case and clearly saying what it is we're
trying to accomplish then you can feed
that into portfolio prioritization but
you have to know a strat you have to
know what the strategy is to even do
that well and that's part of what
Stewart's software is super helpful with
you have to get clear outcomes and
greater focus and then align people and
their work to that strategy and then
give them the prioritization they need
to know what they should be talking
about if you want to fix resource
utilization problems Resource Management
problems you must address portfolio
prioritization this than more than
anything else will fix that problem
because what you do then is you say
we're going to actually organize our
people to the work that we have and we
align that with single task focus and
staggering
here's a crazy idea how about we
actually start projects when we have the
people to do them
I mean radical you're getting radical
here Laura no think of them as being
deliverable what are you are you crazy
that's the problem we have most people
when the fiscal year starts everybody
gets their budget and everything happens
all at once and that's why the whole
organization comes to a crawl and then
stressed out managers see no progress
being made and they start shoving every
empty space with work and what happens
is you have a whole lot of people
running around being very busy but
nobody's actually getting to those
critical business outcomes because
everybody looks very busy but nobody's
really focused busy does not equal
productive busy actually gets in the way
of productive if you want to get big
results you have to stop with busy and
focus on getting the business outcomes
we do this by creating an environment
where you can have a single task focus
and stagger projects to only take place
when you have the people to do them you
know what makes it really easy to do
having clear strategic alignment and
having your portfolio prioritize because
when you have those you can list
everything out in priority order and you
can staff the projects according to the
priority and make sure those get done
and then everything below the line where
you stop having resources it's not that
it doesn't happen it's just waited to
start it waits to start until you
actually have people available to do the
work
crazy idea I know but you'll actually
get more done in a year across your
portfolio if you do this kind of work
and our dear friend um Mike Hannon
um wrote the book on this right so you
can I don't know if you want to look up
his uh book and put it in the chat for
everybody but I will do that Mike's book
is amazing on this and what it actually
does is explain a lot of these
techniques and we actually teach them in
our impact engine system and and the
impact accelerate Mastermind in fact we
have all kinds of top industry thought
leaders coming in and talking to our
coaching students in our in our
Mastermind program sharing these exactly
how you do it techniques with our
students so that they can apply them in
their organizations
um and another thing that we can do to
set the whole strategy up for success is
actually ask a simple question
what does success look like
right if you do not have a business case
for every single initiative that you're
undertaking how in the world do you know
what success looks like if you are not
clearly defining success criteria then
you're not setting that project up for
success and let me be clear when I say
success criteria I do not mean on time
on scope on budget and I'll talk to you
about why this why this is important in
a moment what you're defining here is
business success you want to think and
act like a business leader you want your
seat at the table stop thinking like a
project manager and start thinking like
a business leader Business Leaders think
in terms of value return on investment
and outcomes not in terms of templates
tools process triple constraint and evm
and I'll talk to you more about that now
let's talk a little bit about what
happens in the execution space because
this is the place we're usually geeking
out in and instead I want you thinking
about accelerating value delivery
instead of focusing on where you can
only do about twenty percent of your
value and templates and tools in process
and listen I'm not saying don't have
them I'm saying that we need to
streamline and optimize them so that
they are accelerating value delivery not
slowing it down every template and Tool
and step in the process that you create
you must ask yourself how is this
enabling getting to the business
outcomes
for example a business case with clear
success criteria super important to
accelerating getting to the outcomes
because if you don't have that nobody
knows why they're doing what they're
doing they're in the 95 percent that
don't understand the strategy so we have
to make sure that we're very clearly
focused on providing the right sized
resources that will help enable getting
to those results faster
so streamline process and ask yourself
is this going to make things move faster
or slow it down I would argue a business
case a charter a project schedule are
accelerators not slowing it down
right but a 45-page status report not an
accelerator right so we need to look at
how we streamline and optimize and
simplify and exactly what things we
should focus on to speed things up
because your job I'm going to say it
again is to help the organization
achieve a higher return on investment
for the strategy as quickly as possible
the longer something takes to do the
less value it has to the organization
because it'll cost more our Market
opportunities will be missed and it will
drain resources from other strategic
priorities so we have to figure out how
to do things quickly which means we have
to spend time educating our stakeholders
so that they understand what they're
supposed to do how they're supposed to
do it and why it matters
here's the thing one of the problems we
have in this space is that we spend a
lot of time trying to educate people on
project management and why don't they
get it and why don't they understand
instead of doing that we have to flip
the whole script and help educate them
on how they can accelerate the value
delivery life cycle and their role in
doing that one example and there's so
many of these if we had I only need like
a few more weeks Stuart to like go
through all three examples but for
example your sponsors they're slowing
things down because nobody's actually
trained them on how to be a good sponsor
nobody's born a good sponsor they have
to learn it along the way or they don't
so if you want a good sponsor educate
them on how to be a good sponsor and
what's expected of them and how can you
align Health how can they help you align
people and work to the strategy so
everybody understands the business
outcomes they're driving and the results
that they're trying to get to
and when you were thinking about your
communication instead of
instead of giving them all the
information you possibly could because
you have it get very laser focused on
any meetings reports information
communication being laser focused on
driving actions and decisions to get to
Better Business results faster an
example of this never send an email to
anyone that just says FYI with a 45
email thread underneath it nobody's
reading it nobody cares and they have no
idea what you want them to do if you're
having problems with your sponsor
getting stuck on page five of a status
report on some data point in the bottom
right corner that nobody really cares
about and now you have to have another
meeting and then the meeting before the
other meeting and then another meeting
just to get a decision that's on you for
putting that in front of them
instead why don't we simplify it to
here's what we need here's the
information you need to make a decision
here's the decision that needs to be
made the effect of that decision let's
get it done and move on it can be done
in 15 minutes not 45 meetings right so
look for places to do that and then in
strategy realization your job is to
enable business value the most important
things you want to remember here are
it's not enough to define success by on
time on scope on budget
when you do that for example if you're
using evm I want you to be very clear
that earned value management does not
actually measure value
it measures a lot of time spent and a
lot of money spent and we hope we got
some deliverables from that and we
double hope that those deliverables
actually return turned into some kind of
value created for the organization but
hope isn't a strategy and that's not a
way to measure value we must look for
better metrics like return on investment
and every single one of your Executives
I don't care what organization you work
in they use the term Roi even all the
nonprofits we work in they use it but
it's maybe return for a mission right
it's Mission focused return doesn't have
to always equal dollars exactly return
on investment does not necessarily just
mean don't in fact usually it doesn't
just mean dollars exactly now one thing
you want to think about as a pmo leader
is how you measure your own value and if
you if you're no I meet people these all
the time I manage a you know we have a
portfolio of 50 million dollars or 500
million dollars of budget all you're
telling me is how much you're costing
the organization not how much value
you're driving nobody cares about how
much money you're spending they care
about what you're doing with that money
to drive a better impact you must
measure things that actually matter and
it is your fiduciary responsibility as
the investment manager that's right you
are an investment manager you are
responsible for taking their investment
and creating a return for that that is
your role in organizations you're not a
cost center you're not a cost engine
you're an impact engine you must measure
impact you're creating for the
organization and when you do nobody will
ever question your value ever
remember that project management is the
means to the end and if you want to
bring real value to the organization you
must look at project management and all
the process and the tools as the means
and shift your focus from perfecting the
means perfecting those outputs to
driving Better Business outcomes and
when you do these things you will become
what we call the strategy navigator for
an organization you become the one that
is the only one that can help take that
whole strategy all those brilliant ideas
and turn them in to an incredible return
on investment for the organization
that's the value you bring to the table
and that's our mission that's what
Stuart and I have partnered together on
countless opportunities the summit the
podcast these things to make sure that
all of you understand that we want your
role to be the strategy Navigator in the
organization and we know exactly what it
takes to get there
so with that said I just want to leave
you with this one thought just remember
that project management is not the end
game project management is simply the
process that we use to drive business
results and the pmo is the engine that
generates that impact for an
organization
so thank you so much Stuart for allowing
me to share all of this with your
audience
um I do want to say that I just if any
of you are interested in joining us we
have an incredible opportunity for you
to join us and work together to help you
create an impact engine for your
organization we've been helping students
and clients do this for a decade and it
works 100 of the time you do the work
you'll see the results so welcome to
your seat at the table it's time for you
to take it and join us and this would be
a great time Laura for me to just jump
in and say look
um we don't we don't take any money from
Laura we don't do anything like that
right but I've seen this work so often
and so predictably that
um we are offering everyone on this call
today and everyone who signed up
uh we are offering to pay for your
attendance to to the to the impact
engine system program
you know if you go to buy a software
tough right but but you you come along
you buy your software and we will pay
for you to go on that program because
we've seen the direct link between
people attending that program and then
having a roaring success as pmo leaders
in their organizations
and that's what we want right we want
our customers to be successful I don't
want to sell you software I want you to
be successful right so so if you are
interested in Laura's program come talk
to us as well right let's see if the
software is a fit if you end up buying
the software we will pay for you to go
on the program there's a whole bunch of
terms and conditions that go with that
so anyone that's interested I'll share
the t's and C's but but fundamentally
you know this is this is like this is
like getting that little toy in your
cereal right that food type but it's
loads better loads better loads better
right a little bonus right yeah yeah
absolutely so so just just going through
this I have got sticky notes all over my
desk right
um
uh so you know we're talking I I love
the things the things you said so the
ability to help your organization align
and manage the the strategy and the
priorities
will mean that your organization will
Thrive right so think about this if
you're working for a government agency
how many government agencies thrive
right
I'd be kind of cool if you were part of
the reason that your government agency
thrived or your business really took off
and and that is the impact you can have
it really as we've seen it we've done it
right
um I love the um
you know inherited wisdom doesn't work
absolutely Google's great for a load of
things but it is not right people out
there who tell you how to do things
online they are full of good intentions
but that doesn't mean they're right
and the other is research there are
tried and true methods and processes and
and that's what you've heard today right
um so I thought that was absolutely
brilliant what else did I get
um not a cost center it's an impact
engine right right it's it's not about
the outputs it's not about the volume
it's about the impact that is all that
matters the only thing that matters so
so get out and do it go check out
Laura's system
um reach out to us and uh you know if
you if you want to learn about
how to do prioritization well there are
heaps of free resources on our website
that you can go and access and you can
you can download and read their ebooks
there are webinars by world-class
decision scientists there's all kinds of
stuff in there that you can access
um and we give that stuff away for the
same reason that Laura did the session
today because we passionately want to
make a difference right so this stuff
you can have it you can use it it's free
whether or not you ever buy software
from us
um so um Laura there weren't there
weren't a lot of questions I think
people are just completely blown away
um I know that there are a couple of
people on here who are at the early
stage of establishing pmos
um you guys in particular you know who
I'm talking about because I've spoken to
to you in the last couple of weeks
um you have to go and look at this and
see if you can find beg still borrow the
budget to do this it really will make
that big a difference actually yeah and
I I highly recom and uh we we've
implemented that we've had several of
our clients use transparent choice and
in fact here's the thing with Stewart
and his organization that I want to help
you understand they're different than
the typical software organization I
think of Stuart as a thought leader in
this space first and the owner of a
software company second and what I mean
by that is he's come in and talked to my
coaching students who are trying to
learn how to do prioritization and he
shared all this expertise with them on
how to do portfolio prioritization and
that's he's he's my go-to expert on that
and then we have our pal Mike Hannon
come in and say okay now you need to
learn how to do the magic of once you
prioritize that portfolio how do you
best stagger and organize and use all
these you know portfolio accelerating
techniques to then take it from there so
um I I can tell you that I've spent a
long time in this space and
um Stuart and his team are very unique
and what they're trying to do how
they're trying to do it and we've been
working together for years for those who
join late you know he took me out on a
punt and took my husband and I on a on a
whole trip to uh in Cambridge we went uh
spent a time together and just you know
figured out how we can support changing
um changing the world together frankly
that's what this is all about we do what
we do because we know what it's like to
be you we know what it's like to be in
your shoes we know the challenges you
experience and there is a better way
have you ever felt like that if you were
trying to do a family trip with your
family and you're like but I know
project management I know how to plan
the heck out of this thing and nobody's
listening to me right it's like so
frustrating because you're like you see
a better way and you see all this going
crazy like but if we had just planned
this it'd be better right so that's how
we feel about all this we see executive
struggle we see pmo Leaders with tears
in their eyes so frustrated we see the
opportunities that you all have in front
of you but you don't have the tools to
get there and that's what the impact
engine system is all about that's what
transparent choice is about is helping
you have the tools you need to be
successful and get that seat at the
table that's what we want for you
because that's when organizations can
change the world they need you to do it
brilliant well done Laura uh you can all
see how enthusiastic we both are yeah I
feel a little bit like Steve bulmer have
you ever seen the video Steve Ballmer
did was it Windows 3 when they launched
it and then it did this whole spoof of a
double glazing sales advert you know you
yeah over those three and and you get
right yes wait there's more right
there's more
you look at one not two but
oh but it's just you know it comes from
our enthusiasm to really support the
people on this page listen
for you when I was in the role of pmo
leader in 1999 it was we were in the
middle of the.com craziness we were
doing bleeding edge things in this
company my CEO was 27 nobody had any
idea what they were doing I was The
Herder of cat herders it was insane and
I did not have the kinds of things
available to me to support me on this
journey so I have tons of Battle Scars
to prove it and I'm trying to make sure
that nobody else has to go through the
tough lessons not everybody has to learn
everything the hard way please
help you make it a lot easier so we will
after this send out a recording of the
session might take us a day or two to
get it all edited down Laura can we
share the slides you're happy with that
yeah yeah I'll make um makes it on my
team will put something together so you
can excellent and and I will put and we
will include details of this special
offer uh for the very special people who
joined us today
um uh you know come sign up and get your
free seats your free access to the
impact engine system yeah that's a
pretty big deal
um so uh definitely take advantage of
that if you because sometimes
organizations will have software money
but they won't know how to ask for this
implementation program and so if you're
in a position where you have the
software money then this can just you
don't even have to pay for it because
you get the software and then Stewart's
going to pay for it that's how much he
believes in your success which is a
pretty pretty big deal
absolutely and and it and it that's and
that's the motivation right it's it's we
want you to succeed that's it that's the
end absolutely on that note oh do you
get pdus
absolutely and I'm gonna send all of you
the link to our website where you can
where we give you all the pdu
instructions that you need I think this
is it let me double check
um where you can get all the pdu
instructions on how to
um and actually by the way if you're
looking for pdus Deborah I know you've
been in my community there's a lot of
ways for you to get pdus in fact we show
you how to get pdus for the podcast uh
for any live webinars we do because they
count as live training so yeah you can
go right to pmostrategies.com pdus and
we have instructions that walk you
through all of the different categories
of pdus and how to actually submit for
each one of them so you bet uh and like
190 episodes of the podcast are all pdu
worthy so definitely go check that out
as well excellent now look guys we are
10 minutes over Laura and I will stick
around for a little while longer if you
want us to but um so so bang in any more
questions or any more observations or
comments
um but uh but I do know that some of you
will need to disappear thank you very
much for joining especially those of you
who are in Asia and on funny time zones
compared to this this talk so thank you
for making the time and and turning up
and those of you who didn't and are
watching the recording shame on you you
missed it you missed it you missed your
chance to ask Laura a question
uh but uh thank you all very much for
taking time and uh I hope to talk to you
to a bunch of you very soon
yes they absolutely thank you all so
very much so wonderful see you through
connecting with me on LinkedIn
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