Project Performance Management (EPM)

Project Performance Management covers the endeavours associated with systematic provision of knowledge to management in order to make programmatic decisions.

• Enterprise - A large or small organisation in a Single or Multi-Project Environment
• Systematic - A set of disciplined processes rather then Tools
• Management - Any involved decision maker
• What information does management need? - That which changes their behaviour

Project Performance Management ensures that an organisation and all of its subsystems (processes, departments, teams, employees, etc) work together in an optimum fashion to achieve desired results.  It brings focus on establishing a baseline of performance expectation, objectively measuring intermediate performance, analysing performance trends and making necessary planning adjustments to achieve desired business outcomes.  SYPAQ specialises in assisting organisations to establish effective Project Performance Management Systems.

Project Performance Management requires several ongoing activities, including identification and prioritisation of desired results, establishing means to measure progress towards those results, setting standards for assessing how well results were achieved, tracking and measuring progress towards results, exchanging ongoing feedback among those participants working to achieve results, periodically reviewing progress, reinforcing activities that achieve results and intervening to improve progress where needed.  Note that results themselves are also measures.

Although many of the underlying principles have been practiced for some time and the general activities are somewhat similar to several other major approaches in organisations, eg., strategic planning, management by objectives, Total Quality Management, etc.  Performance management is considered a relatively new concept to the field of management.  What differentiates Project Performance Management is the focus it brings on overall results, measuring results, focused and ongoing feedback about results, and development of plans to improve results.  The results measurements themselves are not the ultimate priority as much as ongoing feedback and adjustments to meet results.

Performance Management encompasses the integrated application of a number of techniques to the management of projects or outputs.  Common Performance Management Techniques are:

• Earned Value Management
• Activity Based Costing/Budgeting
• Project Management Methodologies including PRINCE2
• Risk and Opportunity Management
• Balanced Scorecard
• Theory of Constraints
• Six Sigma
• Capability Maturity Models
• Practical Software Measurement
• Scheduling
• Cost and Schedule Estimation