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Story URL: http://www.silicon.com/research/specialreports/programme/0,3800004583,39128957,00.htm

Leader: Learn to orchestrate all areas of your business
And put an end to departmental bottlenecks...

By silicon.com

Published: Wednesday 23 March 2005

Project management is a term most people are familiar with, as so much has been said about its benefits to IT and about the software that can aid the process.

Programme management, however, is perhaps less well-known yet also more essential to the whole enterprise.

As this publication defines it, programme management is the discipline of orchestrating multiple projects across different parts of the enterprise - whether in IT, HR, finance etc - into one harmonious agenda which lines up with overall business goals.

To do it right, people at the highest levels must be involved. This makes good sense. How much more efficient organisations could be if the people who decide on the budget also contribute to which endeavours will be undertaken.

Such a system prevents the undesired situation where IT directors are left without the resources to complete their projects and thus become a bottleneck for the whole business. Likewise projects that involve multiple departments could have some central control.

Because we believe this area needs further investigation we've dedicated a silicon.com special report to the topic.

Top on our agenda was a look at how - and whether - businesses can benefit from proper programme management, which is sometimes also called portfolio management, and from the software designed to help with it.

We also investigated a trend that has emerged in large organisations with many complex programmes to create a programme management office, or PMO, to take on responsibility for orchestrating the business. Is this necessary or just more bureaucracy?

Since IT departments tend to have plenty of experience in managing projects, we hear about the lessons they've learned and what advice they can offer to the rest of the business.

And finally we look at what why the public sector has gotten a bad reputation for project failures and how programme management can help make outsourcing business processes a success.

Our coverage in the coming weeks will also include best practices and the industry analyst view on programme management as well as breaking news in this area. Stay tuned by keeping an eye on our special report page.

silicon.com will also be holding a breakfast briefing on the do's and don'ts of programme management on 6 April in London. You can find more information here.