Project management maturity models:
How to gauge an organisation's project management capabilities

By Tony Kippenberger, Editor, PM4Success

While organisations that make wide use of project and programme management go on developing and learning from the experience, one of the problems they face is the difficulty of knowing how well they are doing, compared to other organisations. As larger, more expensive, higher-risk and more cross-functional projects are being tackled, so project management is being increasingly seen as a core competence, with considerable competitive advantage being possible if the organisation can outperform its competitors.

A new process has been specifically designed to enable organisations to benchmark how successful they are at managing programmes and projects, through the use of a maturity model.

What is a maturity model?

The best-known maturity model was created by the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) – a federally funded research and development centre sponsored by the US Department of Defence – at Carnegie Mellon University. SEI’s ‘vision’ is “The right software, delivered defect-free, on time and on cost, every time” and its role is to help organisations achieve this by providing both technical and management practice guidance. The basic SEI framework describes an evolutionary improvement path that organisations should take through five stages of maturity: initial level, repeatable level, defined level, managed level and optimising level.

SEI’s first model was for developing and managing software. This proved so successful and useful across the IT industry that it has subsequently been used as a basis for developing maturity models in a wide range of other processes. These include software acquisition, systems engineering, systems security and, more recently, product development and even people management.

Their relevance to project management

During the 1990s a number of reports and academic papers considered the link between the maturity of an organisation and its success with projects and then went on to propose possible frameworks for analysing project management capabilities. By the late 1990s, a number of maturity models – based on the SEI’s CMM and the Project Management Institute’s (PMI’s) Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBoK Ò ) – were being actively used. In May 1998 PMI itself started its own programme to create a standard that would describe how organisations that manage by projects might become increasingly more capable. Known as the Organizational Project Management Maturity Model (OPM3™), it was launched in December 2003.

In the meantime, the UK’s Office of Government Commerce (OGC) – which produces and promotes the use of Best Practice guidance such as PRINCE2 for project management, Managing Successful Programmes (MSP) for programme management and the Management of Risk (M_o_R) – decided to develop its own maturity model for programme and project management. To do so, it took SEI’s Capability Maturity Model and developed it for this particular purpose, creating a Project Management Maturity Model (PMMM) standard.

Now, in a further step, the APM Group (APMG), the accreditation and certification body for PRINCE2, MSP and M_o_R, has taken the OGC’s PMMM and, rather than leaving it as a passive self-assessment model, turned it into an externally assessed model. This has a number of specific advantages.

Advantages

By turning the model into an objective assessment, an organisation’s current maturity level can be directly compared to others in the same (or a different) field with the knowledge that the assessment process is set at a common standard. This provides the organisation with a solid, repeatable form of external benchmarking.

The assessment takes the form of a detailed, tried-and-tested questionnaire that has been developed by APMG. But the critical factor is that a fully accredited consultant will carry out the assessment process. In order to gain accreditation, the consultant (called an APMG Programme and Project Management Registered Consultant) will have to prove a deep understanding of both project and programme management as well as management consultancy, so that not only will they be able to probe the answers given but also offer advice, help and guidance on how to correct areas of weakness.

The clear intent is to help organisations progress through the five stages so that they ultimately achieve the highest level of maturity in the way they handle projects. Of particular value is the fact that – since it is externally assessed and underpinned by an accreditation process – certification is possible. So the organisation’s success in achieving higher levels of maturity can be communicated meaningfully to the users and consumers of its products or services.

How will it work?

The PMMM is based on five levels, with the emphasis of each level indicated by the question beneath it in Table 1 below.

Each level focuses on a limited set of key process areas, with the PMMM describing the key practices related to each of the process areas, both in terms of what an organisation should be doing to establish and improve its ability to manage projects effectively and its overall organisational capability.

In describing the project-related activities within these key process areas, the PMMM recognises not only the project management activities being carried out at the individual project level, but also those activities within the organisation itself that provide focus and help sustain effort to build an effective project infrastructure. The point being that, in the absence of an organisation-wide project infrastructure, repeatable results – i.e., project success – depends entirely on the availability of specific individuals with a proven track record. This does not necessarily provide the basis for long-term success or continuous improvement throughout the organisation.

Although an organisation that is judged immature in project management terms may occasionally deliver individual projects that produce excellent results, the managers at both organisation and project levels are likely to be working in a reactive mode – i.e., focusing on solving immediate issues. Project schedules and budgets are likely to be exceeded because of a lack of sound estimating techniques. Similarly, if deadlines are imposed, project-deliverable quality is likely to be compromised to meet the schedule.

A mature organisation, on the other hand, has an organisation-wide ability for managing projects based on well-defined project management processes that can be tailored to meet the specific needs of individual projects. The project approach is communicated effectively to project team members and stakeholders, and project activities are carried out in accordance with the project plan and the defined process. Managers are also capable of monitoring the progress of the project against the project plan, including the quality of project deliverables and customer satisfaction. Such an organisation should be capable of having repeated success with both its projects and programmes, without being dependent on particular individuals.

Assessment and accreditation

The assessment process requires the Programme and Project Management Registered Consultant (PPMRC) to answer the full series of questions laid out in the PMMM methodology. Organisational questions will be asked of the most senior person within the organisation responsible for projects, or project management and its improvement. The answers will then, wherever possible, be verified by the answers given by those interviewed on project questions or by other senior staff within the organisation. This will include at least one project sponsor and up to two project managers in smaller organisations (those with fewer than five projects at any one time), and at least two sponsors and eight project managers in large-project organisations (those with 50 or more projects running at any one time.)

Only then, based on the results, will the PPMRC recommend a maturity level for the organisation. As a further safeguard, this level is then reviewed by an APMG-appointed independent arbiter who – if in agreement – accepts the organisation for Maturity Level Accreditation (at the recommended level) by APMG. Also, APMG itself will carry out random audits of the work of its PPMCs.

All this is a big improvement on the internal self-assessment of many other models and provides a consistent standard that will enable organisations to find out how well they manage projects and how they can improve what they are already doing.

About Tony Kippenberger

Tony Kippenberger is editor of pm4success. This is a best practice web site for people who have taken PRINCE2, MSP, M_O_R examinations or the Diploma in Programme and Project Management. The site contains the latest OCG Best Practice Toolkit, and articles and information about project management. For further details visit www.apmgroup.co.uk or register to attend The Best Practice Showcase taking place in London on 17 th June 2005 at www.bestpracticeshowcase.com