Page 284 - Untitled-1

CHAPTER 9.1

DEFINING AND IMPLEMENTING
PROJECT PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT

Do traditional measures of project success miss the true business objectives?
Are scope, time, cost, and quality independent measures of success, or are
they only selected components of the objective? What do these popular project
management criteria have to do with meeting the overall business strategic ob-
jects? Are these measurements (scope, time, cost, quality) what the senior opera-
tional managers really watch?

Perhaps this is blasphemous, but I am about to shoot holes in the gospel of
project management. Not that what we are preaching is wrong. But it confuses
the means to an end with the end itself.

Read the PMBOK® (Project Management Body of Knowledge). Read just
about anything else on measurements of project success. They will all dwell on
the four pillars of success: scope, time, cost, and quality. We are taught to identify
the goals for success in each of these areas and then to create plans that balance
these objectives. Then we implement practices and utilize computer-based tools
to measure how well we are accomplishing these objectives.

But talk to almost any executive in the firm and they will not be interested in
this area of measurement. What do they talk about? They respond to measure-
ments of profitability, return on investment, delivery of content, and taking ad-
vantage of windows of opportunity. We used to say that executives are interested
in just two things about projects: when will they be finished and what will they

263