What is the Project Management Office (PMO)?

A major driver of business success is the degree to which special business projects are executed effectively and efficiently. The Project Management Office (PMO) is set up to help ensure this goal is achieved. A PMO coordinates and oversees the special projects that run as temporary initiatives to augment normal business operations and help organizations to change and grow. The PMO acts as a “Centre of Excellence,” designed to help achieve better quality, consistency and oversight of projects across an enterprise – doing so by developing and maintaining project management methodologies, standards and tools.

For example, a PMO might decide which project management certification program is required by its Project Managers – or it may develop an in-house standard. It may coordinate the system to record project expenditures across the business so that executives can track overall costs. It may also be responsible for assigning project managers with the right skills and experience to various projects across a company. Increasingly, PMO’s are playing a part in choosing which projects are undertaken by an organization.

In some organizations, the PMO is called a Program Management Office. Programs typically involve a number of inter-related projects in support of a broad business goal