Project One helps FMCG player to improve PMO capabilities
A Programme Management Office is a key part of the delivery function of an organisation with responsibility for overseeing and governing projects, standardising delivery approaches and practices and ensuring that there is clarity on the status of each project in a portfolio. Project One Change Consultant Ed Davies explains how the consultancy helped one client in the FMCG sector get the most from the function.
“Technology is the digital heartbeat of any organisation,” Davies notes. “For our customer, a global FMCG organisation, it is critical to their entire operation. From consumer interactions through social media, managing customer orders, warehousing, transportation and employee’s day to day activities, technology is a key driver of growth and an enabler of efficiency.”
Detailing the project Project One undertook, Davies adds that the customer wanted to “deliver value by driving efficiency, superior experiences for colleagues, customers and consumers”. At the same time, they recognised that significant complexity, duplication and cost had accumulated across their technology and transformation was needed to unleash the capability, capacity and power within their organisation.
Davies continues, “To deliver this highly complex global transformation they approached Project One to mobilise a Programme Management Office. But the PMO we built was much more than admin! The global multi-year Technology Transformation Programme gave our customer a unique opportunity simplify and adapt for the future with impact right across their business. The strategy was to drive efficiency, deliver superior experiences and use new capabilities to fuel growth with speed, scale and agility, all while delivering significant savings.”
According to Davies, the path to deliver the strategic goals was unclear. A range of factors complicated matters, including the fact the amount of change required to meet the organisations strategic simplification goals wasn’t known. There were significant financial pressures at play, and “clear understanding of the strategic destination for technology or where complexity could be found was lacking”.
To tackle the challenge head on, Project One set about rapidly putting “the basics in place to scope and prepare for delivery”. This meant creating “the right controls quickly, so as the change was shaped and evolved the programme could easily adapt to keep control”. But there is much more to successful PMO than that.
What the PMO did
Davies explains, “As the programme was just beginning, we were able to bring our proven controls to enhance the few processes which were already in place and support the customer team as they were getting to grips with complexity of the transformation needed. Recognising that the full scope of change needed to deliver on our customer’s strategic objectives wasn’t known, we were able to structure the programme allowing different projects and initiatives to be quickly introduced to the scope as the required changes were identified. By building close relationships with each initiative within the programme, PMO was able to support, guide and coach delivery teams to get the most from our tools and governance.”
Project One then established and then evolved steering groups, programme boards, stakeholder engagement groups and financial reviews to keep key stakeholders informed and decisions being made to move the programme forwards. As the programme grew, multiple portfolios were established, allowing us to co-ordinate and rive the programme, creating accountability across reporting, actions, progress, and risk, issues and financial management.
“Our structured approaches, adaptability and experience allowed us to continue to refine and evolve governance, ensuring it remained appropriate as the transformation programme matured,” he continues. “Once the foundations were in place, capabilities in business as usual and the programme operating effectively, we were able to bring some of the breath of Project One Consultant’s experience in tackling the trickiest problems.”
Additionally, Project One helped the client to understand how using data analysis and modelling capabilities could impact strategic decisions. Looking at data through a PMO could quickly give clear, data-based actions to deliver the most business value and savings for investment.
He adds, “We could also see momentum building across the organisation around the need for simplification and the demands of rationalising technology, but many questions being raised by business stakeholders were going unanswered. Where exactly is this complexity? What is driving it? How can we simplify it? By partnering closely with the customer’s Enterprise Architects and bringing together disparate threads and silos of information together, we were able to help the organisation understand just what they had.”
The outcome
In the end, Project One helped its client to create a Programme Management Office which continued to support the programmes effectively delivery of the firm’s strategic goals. The project helped transition activities to internal team members, “upskilling them in governance and control methods to leave an enduring capability” after Project One’s departure.
Davies concludes, “By developing a greater level of understanding into the nature and location of technology complexity than the customer had ever had before, we were able to support them in identifying a work-stack of transformation opportunities. With this understanding, and transformation opportunities the Leadership Team is able to make strategic decisions and drive a global shift to simplified, standardised technology enabling growth for years to come.”
