Differentiating the Functions of the Project Manager and the Project Management Office

In this podcast Ricardo talks about the misunderstanding that many professionals make about the roles of the project manager and the PMO. Many professionals assert incorrectly that the management of the project is a PMO role. He also explains the differences between the 2 roles using an analogy with a car in a road with a driver and a instrument panel.

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Episode transcript

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Hello, everybody. Welcome to the five minutes PM podcast. Today. I'd like to talk about when misunderstanding regarding the PMO, when the project manager concept, and a lot of people think that the project management office and the project manager are the same team are the same. People are the same role. And if this is not the right thing, I'd like to explain a little bit better about the PMO and the project manager concept doing an analysis with a car.

Let's think about the road. The road is the plan, the car isn't the road. And there's a fusion is to burn full, to make the wheels turn and move into this road. And who is the driver? The driver is the controller of all the process. He makes the decisions and the driver is the project manager. The driver is not the PMO. The driver is the project manager and to make better decisions.

He used a lot of things, including the instrument panel. And what is the role of the instrument panel is to show the speed, the full consumption, the battery, and support this project manager to make a better decision. And dependable is for us. The project management office, the project management office doesn't make the final decisions for the project.

Things from the panel, the instrument panel that doesn't say reduced speed. The instrument panel shows the driver. You should reduce your speed, but who takes the final decision is the driver is the project manager. So the BMO it's a support to a good product management practice. So the panel provides information. The driver takes the decision, the PMO supply's information, the project manager, they makes the decision.

So this is the key role of a PMO. So is to provide reliable information in a good way with, for a good deep, this is the target for the PMO. But in the other hand, another role that the PMO can take is the drive in school teacher instructor. This is a, not at the center of excellence is to support future and current project managers to use better the information that they provided with the pen now that they are providing.

So this is the strategy, the PMO supply's the panel, and also teach the project manager how to it, but who will decide is the project manager, the PMO that doesn't make any decision. He recommends that he or she inside the PMO, that they recommend changes. But the do not decide to change who decides is the project manager and the third role, this role, I personally, I don't like it it's to be the policy man on the street, inspecting the driver's and the cars.

And in order to make sure that they are feeling all the instructions they receive, they have the driver's license. They know how to the speed limit in that region. They know that they cannot ran out of a fool, but this is third role. It's a very, very complex role for implementation because nobody, I swear, nobody likes to be inspected. So if you create your PMO with this policemen perspective, for sure that all the cool trout obstacles that you can face will increase dramatically in this model, if you compare with an instructor's or with the banner.

So my suggestion to out of you, it's not a good idea to create a PMO in this inspection role with this inspection role, it's much better, much better create the PMO with the whole of helping people. If I don't want to use the panel, the instrument panel in my car, I can just cover it. I will drive, but to why I don't do that because I prefer to have the panel informing the speed, the fuel consumption, the miles, everything because of that, that I don't cover my panel.

And why do I need to use the project management office for the same reason? Because I know because it's not good to make decisions without good and proper information. This is the right way of implementing a good PMO and bought the line for everybody, nobody to want and liked to be inspected. But everybody loves to be helpful. If we create the PMO with the role of helping people to reach better results.

This is the very good speech for selling the PMO idea among all project managers and all future project managers. I hope you enjoy this podcast and see you next week with another five minutes. PMO Podcast. Bye.

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Ricardo Vargas

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Differentiating the Functions of the Project Manager and the Project Management Office

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