Creating an independent project control function

A large global bank was struggling to manage the expectations and requirements of stakeholders involved in a largescale programme. Brickendon was called upon to ensure that everyone involved was confident that the organisation’s money was being spent wisely, that the programme was meeting the organisation’s strategic goals and that the deliverables were clearly articulated, were within budget and on time.

Brickendon ensured consistency and transparency across the programme through a strong governance structure and rigorous standardisation, saving the bank time and money. It also increased transparency and accountability, resulting in a delivery environment finely tuned for success.

The Challenges

• The traditional programme management delivery dashboard gives limited oversight of developments during the programme lifecycle and little opportunity to rectify problems until too late
• External factors that can influence programmes are often not noticed or their implications not fully recognised
• Failure to acknowledge delays, analyse why they are happening and make the necessary changes to prevent them occurring again
• A tendency to simply tick off milestones as they are reached, rather than regularly monitoring progress and learning from mistakes and successes
• Lack of effective communication across the different parts of the business

The Brickendon Solution

• Implement Brickendon’s PMO Assurance Model, where standards are created both bottom-up and top-down through our project discovery process
• Ensure the standards are fit-for-purpose across the whole portfolio of reporting, governance and documentation, and that available tools support these standards
• Collate information at the lowest level and track project, programme and portfolio progress across deliverables, costs and quality
• Ensure quality through the use of a hub, which acts as central point of control across different programme statuses, risks and issues, dependencies, financial variances and documentationEstablish governance forums that work efficiently, are well-attended and meet regularly
• Ensure the development and implementation of a robust and clear communication plan
• Allow all concerns to be voiced, discussed and, where possible, resolved quickly
• Encourage the organisation to embrace innovation
• Assess the quality and appropriateness of management information and design simple and measurable KPIs

Client Benefits

• Increased transparency and accountability resulting in a delivery environment finely tuned for success
• Consistency and transparency across the business, including robust governance structure and standardisation
• An independent and continuous overview of the progress of the programme giving opportunities for ongoing intervention where necessary
• Informed spending of the organisation’s money to deliver a successful programme which is on time and on budget
• Higher return on technology investment
• Cultural change within the business, which encourages the early escalation of issues, better transparency and increased collaboration