Merging the Business Process and Project Methodology

As organizations get to the maturity level where they focus on developing a PMO the first action on the agenda is often the most difficult: develop a company project methodology.

Having been involved in several  consulting services companies efforts to develop such a methodology I very much appreciated Cornelius Fichtner´s interview with Jeff Berkel from Metafuse about the development of PM Methodology Tool.

What some teams may find somewhat perplexing is to differentiate the project methodology from the business processes.  

In a way this complexity is the result of the complexities of matrix organizations with well established processes at the department level mixing with project methodologies which are newer to the organization.

And of course there is the challenge of integrating the tools that are invariably from departmental silos(D) or the buding PMO:

• Financial Reporting and Accounting(D)
• Time Tracking (D)
• Project scheduling (PMO)
• Resource Planning (PMO if you are lucky, Departments if you are not)
• Customer Relationship Management and Sales Software (Sales and Marketing)
• Product Lifecycle tools for version control, release, distribution and version control (Operations, Engineering)
• Project Management Information System with Knowledge database(PMO)