Project Management World Today Case Studies and Project Briefs
June 2006

Editorial | Case Study| Papers | Community |Publications

Pension Protection Fund Programme & Project Management Capability Project

by Dominic Joyce

Introduction

In order to improve capability for the management of change within the organisation, the Pension Protection Fund has decided to implement a formal method for delivering Programmes and Projects.

The new capability is to be based on the Office of Government Commerce standards Managing Successful Programmes (MSP) and Managing Successful Projects with PRINCE2™ (PRINCE2™).

Background

The Pension Protection Fund is a relatively new organisation, established on 5 April 2005, as part of the Pensions Act 2004.

As the organisation has grown and evolved, it is becoming important that we ensure we have robust systems for determining organisational priorities and for delivering complex projects and objectives in a timely, efficient and effective way.

To ensure the implementation is as effective as possible, an invitation to tender was issued to appropriate Accredited Consulting Organisations (ACO) to assist the organisation.
Customer Projects Limited was awarded the contract

Timescales for the Project were limited to a 6 month period

Drivers for change

Projects were determined on an ad hoc basis, and were not subject to any robust form of management or governance.

There were no formal processes and procedures for starting, running or closing projects

Looking for greater governance in terms of prioritisations both financially and in terms of resource

Office of Government Commerce chief executive John Oughton said:

"We are delighted to see our PPM maturity models working in practice. These maturity-based assessments help to identify an organisation's strengths and weaknesses and are proving to be a powerful way of planning improvements and increasing capability to deliver".

Pension Protection Fund Investment and Finance Director, Partha Dasgupta, said:

“This is a pioneering approach to programme and project management. Receiving P3M3 accreditation demonstrates that the Pension Protection Fund is a forward-looking and innovative organisation that is committed to delivering results efficiently and effectively.

“What’s even more impressive is that we are the only public sector body in the world to have achieved this level of accreditation, and that we achieved it within six months.”

Aims and objectives

  1. To develop and implement appropriate principles and processes, congruent with the organisation’s existing processes and culture, to affect a complete and coherent, end-to-end ‘MSP’ and ‘PRINCE2™’ programme and project governance and delivery capability enabling realisation of the organisations planned and evolving strategic objectives. Overall solution to meet the requirements of P3M3 (level 3) and P2MM (level 3).
  2. To develop existing staff, enabling them to work effectively with the new processes, as well as enabling them to contribute to the ongoing development and improvement of the capability over time.
  3. To develop and implement a programme management office (PMO) capable of:
    Providing “an accessible source of advice and practical support to project staff”;
    • Providing “relevant, timely and accurate” information and reporting against all the organisation’s programmes and projects;
    • Ensuring compliance with programme and project processes as well as consistency of approach;
    • Driving and promoting the development, effectiveness and efficiency of the capability ongoing

Approach

This Project was delivered within the PRINCE2™ framework.

The Project was broken into 2 phases and further into 5 stages with End Stage Reviews at the end of each of these stages.
The stages were –

Investigation – looking at the Pension Protection Funds current principles and culture and what processes were currently taking place to manage change.

Development – The development of training plans specific to roles and the staff identified to fill those roles and also individual training plans. The Programme Management Office and the development of the Pension Protection Fund Approach to Project & Programme Management Guidebook took place during this stage.

Training – Training workshops for the Sponsoring Group. Senior Responsible Owners and Programme Managers. 3 day workshops for Project Managers based around the approach and the Projects they are currently working on. Overview to all other staff identified with a role within the approach. Foundation exams in PRINCE2™ and MSP offered to all staff with study provided through Computer based training.

Transition – Transition of the projects currently underway to bring them within the new approach governance. Through quality assurance sessions and end stage reviews

Assessment – Assessments undertaken by 4 assessors plus one representative from the APM Group over the course of 4 days 13 people were assessed over a number of roles.

Challenges

Successes

Achievements and benefits

Lessons learned

Wider implications

Future developments

Although we attained level 2 accreditation at both Portfolio and Programme level within the P3M3 assessment we hope to achieve level 3 in each by the next audit which is in November.

We will start our planning for level 4 accreditation in December 2006

Key facts and figure

The process framework’s compliance to level3 of the maturity models was confirmed by independent assessment (NB the organisation’s future level 3 accreditation at the Portfolio and Programme disciplines is dependent on effective implementation of the compliant framework).

All staff key to the operation of the new processes have been trained in their use. In addition, 72% of all staff have been made aware of the new processes with the remainder due to be trained by August 2006. Also during the project:

About the Author:

After 11 years in the British Armed Forces, serving in Northern Ireland, Falkland Islands, Germany, Cyprus and the US, Dominic Joyce moved into Project work. He has worked within various industries including utilities, pharmaceutical and defence, and currently works with the Pension Protection Fund (PPF) which is a public corporation of the British Government.

Within this time, Dominic has worked his way from the role of a Project Coordinator to Programme Office Manager to being the current Head of Change for the PPF. He is also working closely with 2 more organisations to help them embed 'best practice' within their new frameworks, and consults on setting up Programme Management Offices and the role of the Centre of Excellence.

Top of Page

Express your views on any PM World Today Case Study !

Visit the PMFORUM Discussion Center

Editorial Policy: The PMFORUM® has no connection to any national or international project management organization nor does it reflect the policy of any project management professional or commercial organization. The PMFORUM® maintains an objective and impartial view of project management affairs. In the interests of advancing professional project management the PMFORUM® will publish contending and objective views on issues that reflect collegial differences and perspectives