Thinking about setting up a PMO in your scale-up? Read on….

About the author

Paula has a background in computer science and French. She started her career working as a linguist before moving into Tech.

What’s it about?

This book is about creating and running a Program Management Office (PMO). It covers Paula’s experience of doing this at Zendesk. The book also touches upon program management skills needed to make the PMO a success.

The book has three parts.

Part One: Building your PMO

This part covers an explanation of program vs project management and then details how to set one up.

This part includes:

• How to structure the PMO
• Funding
• The hiring process
• Branding the PMO

Paula is trying to give you all the steps for success, including the “marketing” part to ensure that people understand how to engage with your newly adopted PMO.

In contrast to project management, which is more vertically focused and more domain specific, program management is focused on broader strategic goals

The second half of this part covers good program management. Things like SMART goals, OKRs and discussing goals. Risk mitigation, program kickoffs, team meetings and status reporting are also covered.

I’m not sure I would have included the second part here. The point is, that to setup an effective PMO…. well… you need good program managers :shrug:. Covering that is a tough ask!

Part Two: Running you PMO

Once you’ve got a PMO setup, how do you ensure it runs smoothly / remains relevant?

This part of the book includes:

• Stakeholders — clarifying roles and responsibilities, building relationships, continually demonstrating competence
• Pair program management (I like the idea)
• Running meetings, retrospectives, status reporting
• Gathering together PMs / building the PM community

When signals get crossed is one of my favourite parts of the book. It discusses avoiding the classic “crossed signals” problems which often result in misunderstandings and frustration in an organisation.

I like this part because it talks to real-world situations and how you might go about addressing them.

Here’s a specific example of something I’ve not read in other books:

But if a program manager is spending an inordinate amount of time on their own, this sends the wrong signal to me and to their team members. If the program manager isn’t making an effort to spend time with the organization they support, that speaks volumes. If a key stakeholder tells me, “I neven see Jorge” I reach out to that person’s manager to find out what’s going on. Why aren’t they visible to their team? Why aren’t they making themselves available in case an issue is bubbling up?

Now, if I came across this challenge, I’d address it differently. But, I like the fact that it’s an example and Paula makes a suggestion on how she’d solve it.

Part 3: Levelling up your PM skills

This is the shortest part of the book. It covers Paula’s view of the key attributes of a PM such as:

• Being super organised
• Proactive
• A strategic thinker
• etc, etc, etc

There’s also a nice checklist for onboarding a new PM onto a program.

Would I recommend this book?

I’d recommend this book if you’re looking to set up a PMO in your scale-up. It’ll help make sure you’re thinking about some of the non-obvious stuff (like “marketing” it!)

IMHO this book is overkill for a startup and possibly not detailed enough for a mature organisation (which I think would have different challenges)