The Internet is a gold mine when it comes to personality tests and quizzes. You can find true nuggets of psychological insight: “Which Doritos Flavor Are You”, “Which Pokemon Would You Be”, “Which Famous Justin Is Your Soulmate”, “Which Harry Potter Character Are You”…
Far be it from us to dismiss the relevance and importance of the above mentioned. But, for those of you who might have different interests, we came up with a special quiz.
Proudly introducing the “Which PMO Are You” test! At long last, right?
You know the drill: provide a candid answer to each of the questions below, then count your score, and be prepared for mind-boggling revelations about your true self.
What PMO are you? – The Test!
What is your favorite part about being a PMO?
A. The breadth of interactions with a variety of different stakeholders
B. The ability to have direct impact on project success
C. I get to cut through chaos and uncertainty to make everything clear
D. Most definitely the street credibility
What’s your number one pain point?
A. Projects that don’t create enough long-term value for the business
B. Projects that fail to meet deadlines
C. People who fail to fill their time sheets
D. My boss. With her it’s always all work and no play
What’s the most important thing in a PPM tool?
A. Data analytics to get strategic insight
B. Productivity features. My first goal is to improve project KPIs
C. Support for structured workflow and consistent process
D. The sales rep buying me a beer is a good first step
Let’s say you are introducing a new process. How do you get teams on board?
A. I bring donuts and explain why it’s actually going to be a good thing for them
B. I share a PowerPoint deck with compelling KPIs and ROI measures
C. I release a memo detailing the ins and outs, with guidelines for application
D. I’m the PMO, it’s my way or the highway, duh
What’s the most common compliment you get?
A. I’m relatable, I can think outside the box and I tend to offer good advice
B. I’m straightforward, result-oriented, and I deliver
C. I’m reassuringly consistent and thorough. With me, people know what to expect
D. I have super bright teeth and my joke about the bear in the bar is the best
What is the most important piece of advice you’d give to an aspiring PMO?
A. Build yourself a network of influential champions and sponsors across the firm
B. Define a set of metrics and KPIs to measure, track and communicate value
C. Make sure to implement consistent, shared processes across teams and departments
D. Never ever gamble away your son’s college money. Kids are unforgiving these days
The project you’re proudest of?
A. It helped increase the PPM maturity of R&D teams
B. It was completed 2 months ahead of deadline and 15% under budget
C. It was so perfectly executed from A to Z that I made a case study out of it
D. We nailed it against all expectations. Meaning that I won my bet with Tim from Accounts Payable
What’s your management style?
A. I try to be supportive and offer guidance and insights across teams
B. I’m usually quite hands-on, but I’ll gladly step back when teams don’t need me to perform
C. I’m there whenever there is a need for clarification and process optimization, but I leave it to the teams to do the work
D. “Somehow I Manage”, in the words of the great Michael Scott
What’s the key benefit you have brought to your organization?
A. I’ve helped improve communication and collaboration, and made project selection more insightful
B. Under my lead, we’ve recorded quite a jump in project success metrics
C. I have provided the framework and consistent process that make projects replicable
D. Have I told you about the bear in the bar joke?
Alright, and if you actually were a Harry Potter character…
A. Albus Dumbledore. A well-liked visionary who paved the way for a more agile and cohesive Hogwarts
B. Hermione. She managed to fit two days of work into one.
C. McGonagall is a level-headed woman.
D. Can I be Voldemort?
THE MOMENT OF RECKONING HAS COME!
If you answered mostly As…
The Enabler
You’re a “big picture” kind of PMO, with your eye set on long-term value at the portfolio level. You focus your effort on offering best practices and mentoring to support execution teams and decision makers. You proactively engage in value and risk analysis to empower the firm with insights and foster alignment.
Information is your weapon of choice. You need to make sure that you enjoy perfect visibility at the organization level and that you can leverage advanced analytics or simulations capabilities to support strategic decisions. When considering tools, look for state-of-the-art collaboration features to improve team alignment, and great usability to minimize the change management effort.
If you answered mostly Bs…
The Achiever
You don’t have much time to muse on abstract considerations. Your organization needs bottomline improvement, and it needs it now. To you, it’s simple: as long as the project is delivered on time, on budget and within scope, it’s a win. With your result-oriented culture, you focus on tactical execution and have a track record of boosted performance.
To support your productivity agenda, you need to weed out any waste or process inefficiency that elongates project cycles. Go for a high-performance solution to automate administrative work and replicable tasks as much as possible, with solid budget and resource management capabilities for better efficiency. Moving forward, consider embracing more product-oriented capabilities.
If you answered mostly Cs…
The Overseer
Where there’s a game, there are rules. And you’re here to make sure everyone plays by your PMO’s. You’ve done a great job of institutionalizing standard practices and metrics. You’ve established a clear governance for project activity, along with sets of rules and streamlined processes. You now focus on maintaining them over time and enforcing compliance.
The sound and consistent process you’ve come up with needs to be translated into a digital environment that natively supports structured workflows. With your standardization agenda, you’ll benefit from having an audit trail, libraries of shared documentation, and built-in templates and standard reports. Opt for a flexible and scalable tool to support you as your organization and process grow in PPM maturity as you start experimenting with Agile methodologies.
If you answered mostly Ds…
The Outlier
Sorry dear, there may have been a career counseling error here. Perhaps you should consider moving away from that whole boring project management stuff and embracing a career path more suited to your interests. Did you know that there’s actually decent money to be made as a cannabis strain tester? Just sayin’.
So, what’s your type? Some of you may actually find that they belong in more than one of the broad categories outlined above. The good news is that, when it comes to tools, you may well be able to find a solution that has it all!
Discover our capability brochure to learn more about what a tool-empowered PMO can do.
Read more about PPM:
