Connecting Project & Strategy Management through Integrated Governance - Learning from Wisdom (Knowledge)

Why Attend?

Change projects and programmes come in all shapes and sizes. From operational projects to support business operation, to the strategic that programme that supports objectives in a change portfolio. There is a widely held misconception that strategy delivery is only about change, and that all we need is a strategic change programme and we are covered. Wrong on both counts. Our business strategy relies on:

• Business Performance. Our strategic goals CANNOT be met unless the business operates and generates results.
• Product Development. If our product portfolio isn't / doesn't become what customers want - we will not achieve our goals
• Strategic Change - while we need operational change to maintain BAU performance - there are cross functional strategic initiatives to develop reputation, operational excellence and culture goals.   

So - strategy delivery is much more than just change. We need to develop and exploit our products (physical and service to generate value), and our business operation (grow and perform). The strategic objectives related to value and business performance typically are the focus for leadership time, resources and funds.

Therefore - our change portfolio does clearly not contain all the strategic objectives we need to achieve to meet our business purpose, AND it has to compete for leadership time, resources and funds with value creation and operational entities. There are also dependencies between portfolio items and elements of value creation and / or BAU / Product development.

At the APM PMO conference in June '24 we asked the question - do attendees knows who supports the connection of strategy to delivery across the organisation. Across c. 100 PMO professionals - no one knew. Please see the event report here.

In our first event in this series, we presented evidence that strategy to delivery does not work well for many organisations. We offered a framework for the reasons why not, and we will have engaged a significant group of 360 P3 professionals in the pains of strategy delivery - and we will understand the drivers to make strategy delivery improvements.

We addressed 5 question areas related to strategy delivery, and for each question, we received dozens and dozens of responses. The event report, including links to recordings, slides and response analysis can be found here. The responses very much reflected previous sessions which have delivered this kind of conclusion.

However, for a P3O to step into the broader realm of supporting strategy delivery, not just project delivery, there needs to be infrastructure to support that. In the same way the P3O will have built capability to operate P3 (governance framework, reporting, process / roles, people competence, tools...) the same job needs doing to get hold of strategy delivery.

Who should attend?

 - PMO Leaders who are struggling to support strategic projects and programmes

 - PMO Directors to cannot see how strategy is driving change or how projects are enabling strategy

 - Governance Professionals who want to see effective decision making, application of policy and process to strategy delivery

 - Operations and finance directors who want to see funds / resources deployed in line with strategic priorities

 - Strategic leadership who want to see effective strategy delivery

 - More stakeholder profiles here

Event Specifics

The second session in our series with the APM Governance Interest Network therefore presents the building blocks for strategy delivery that an aspiring and empowered P3O will need to build in order to bring the order of a well-oiled change portfolio to the overall business portfolio.

We will therefore cover:

• Strategy Delivery is vital for existence, and we are not good at it.
• We will recap our view of the strategic process, that it is complex and difficult (will be shared in advance to attendees)
• We will play back a summary / analysis of the (550!) points raised in strategy delivery gathered at the last event
• Does this resonate with the audience today?
• Recap the Introduction to Business Integrated Governance last time (will be shared in advance to attendees)
• BIG Principles - the key underpinnings of Business Integrated Governance - do we concur?
• What is the Body of Knowledge - and where to find it - e.g. Key Concepts and Components
• Example 1 - Delving into Establishing Readiness (this depends on time - this may get bumped into the next session)
• Example 2 - Establishing a Portfolio Direction Group and Project Board
• Example 3 - Defining the governance and accountability model for a cross government change portfolio
• Reflection
• Introduction for Event 3. Having completed :
• Event 1 to stimulate awareness of the issues in strategy delivery, and the part a PMO / P£ Governance body can play in it
• Event 2 to delve into BIG Principles and signpost where Key Concepts and Components can be found
• What do we propose for Event 3 - If you get the drivers for BIG, and understand what it is - how can we equip you to take the message to your organisation?

Event 3 is advertised as session for people who want to know how to get the change ball rolling and explain the BIG Journey. This of course must start with any sponsor, at some level (depending on scale and scope). Structured Topic discussion – stakeholders, Nemawashi, Pain Perception, vision development, the BIG Change Lifecycle, building a business case. This section will brief attendees on readiness for Event 3.

• Remaining Questions
• Formal finish (13.30pm)
• After Party! (the presenters can cover off 15 minutes of further specifics)