paper

Required Topics in Final Paper

Since your final paper involves the development and implementation of a PMO it is essential that

you incorporate into your paper an evaluation of each of the five Program Domains described in

PMI ® 2017 Standard for Program Management, Chapter 2. In addition to the five domains you

may also include other Program Management Concepts including as many supporting activities

as you can complete within the 10 page limit. The five domains that must be included are:

1. Program Strategy Alignment – Explain how your PMO aligns with the sponsoring

organization’s goals and objectives. What is the vision, purpose, goals and strategy of

your PMO? What is the Socio-Technical environment in which it exists? How will you

measure the alignment of your PMO with your organization?

2. Program Benefits Management – Provide a Benefit Cost analysis for your selected PMO.

Include your methodology for calculating benefits and explain the risks involved in

delivering the promised benefits. What are the opportunities and challenges to

implementing your PMO?

3. Program Stakeholder Engagement – Conduct a stakeholder analysis for your PMO and

show how you will measure the performance of your stakeholder engagement. Describe

the risks involved in meeting stakeholder expectations and how you will mitigate these

risks.

4. Program Governance – Develop a program governance plan and explain how you will

structure your PMO governance within the larger organization. Develop an assessment

and performance criteria for measuring the success of the PMO’s governance structure.37

5. Program Life Cycle Management – Track the life cycle of your PMO including the role

of the PMO during each phase of the PMO life cycle and the activities you will be

implementing during each of these phases.

6. Apply the Concepts from PPM with Microsoft Project 2016. This will include:

a. The Building Blocks of PPM including program intake and prioritization,

budgeting and cost tracking, program planning and collaboration and PMO

governance

b. Microsoft PPM – Program proposals and workflow approvals, enterprise

resources, approved task updates

c. Working with enterprise projects and local v. enterprise

d. Submitting a Program Proposal – Creating an idea, a program proposal, resource

engagements, building the team, updating the status manager

e. Budgeting and cost planning and finalizing the program budget

f. Identifying variances and taking corrective action on the critical path

Additional Topics May Include:

1. Program Management Supporting Activities

2. Value Creation Analysis

3. Program Integration

The most important section is "Recommendations."

One way to think about this is to imagine that you have been asked to develop a PMO as a

consultant. You are to brief the CEO on the overall status of the PMO (which may or may not

have started. First, you analyze the PMO itself. Then, you present your findings and

recommendations. The recommendations section of your PMO is essentially the outline of your

briefing to the CEO. It is the most important item.38

You may modify this outline to suit your PMO. Different PMOs have different objectives and

the weight given to each section will vary. The key is clear communication. Do whatever it takes

to make your point.

References are very important. They show that you are aware of the program portfolio, and

program management literature (and that you are not reinventing the wheel).