Selecting a Portfolio Management Consultant A TenStep White Paper Contact us at [email protected] TenStep, Inc. 2363 St. Davids Square Kennesaw, GA. 30152 877.536.8434 770.795.9097

Selecting a Portfolio Management Consultant Many organizations look at their entire suite of projects as one or more large portfolios of work. Portfolio management is a process to ensure that an organization or department spends its scarce resources on the work that is of the most value. If portfolio management is practiced, it helps to ensure that only the most valuable work is approved and managed across the entire enterprise. Such a process helps answer questions about the work performed and the value provided: •

Are resources allocated to the most important work?

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Are resources allocated in the right amount to new business investments versus keeping the older, mission-critical processes up and running?

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Is there capacity to do all the work for the coming year?

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When new work comes up during the year, what is the previously approved work that will no longer be completed?

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When is the focus shifted from supporting old stuff to investing in new stuff?

When your organization decides to take a look at portfolio management, a fundamental question arises as to whether you have enough expertise in-house or whether you will need to find some outside help to assist. Many companies choose to go it alone, with varying degrees of success. Many companies choose to bring in one or more consultants to help – again with varying degrees of success. There is no absolute right or wrong way to go. However, if your own organization does not have the know-how to establish portfolios on your own, it makes sense that a more

knowledgeable party can put you on the right track. One way to gain portfolio management expertise is to look at your current consulting vendors. This option might make sense because you have a track record with a current consulting company and you understand their capabilities, strengths and weaknesses. This makes your decision less risky since you have a prior relationship on which to base your selection. Similarly, the current consulting company should have a familiarity with your business, which should make it easier for them to become productive earlier. Of course, you still need to validate that the consultant has the right level of expertise in portfolio management. If they do, they may be able to help you more quickly than a new consulting company. If you do not have a current vendor relationship that you can tap, you can look in the marketplace for one of the many companies that can help. However, you will want to perform a more rigorous vendor selection process. You will be looking for a company that can assess your business needs and help you understand the key aspects of portfolio management as it relates to your business. The vendor selection process could be very rigorous if it is going to be a large contract or if you must maintain strict transparency in your selection process. However, for most organizations, the selection process does not have to be overly burdensome. There are three general aspects of the selection process: requirements, solicitation, and selection. 1. Requirements. It’s hard to select a consultant if you are not sure what your requirements are. You

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Selecting a Portfolio Management Consultant have to know enough about portfolio management to be able to provide an overall vision and to determine the role of the consultant. If you don’t have a vision for portfolio management, you will have a hard time focusing the consultant on what needs to be done. Your requirements should include determining whether the consultant: •

Has a documented portfolio management approach today

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Has an approach aligned to a portfolio management industry standard, such as the PMI® standard

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Will help with detailed requirements for portfolio management

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Will be limited to consulting only or also create the detailed processes, procedures, techniques, etc.

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Will provide training to your staff

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Will help utilize a portfolio management tool.

2. Solicitation. Next identify a list of vendors to consider for your engagement and ask them to respond to your defined requirements. You could send a formal Request for Proposal (RFP) to them or go through a more informal solicitation process. In either case, the vendors can respond to you with formal proposals that describe their capabilities and their approach for working with you. 3. Selection. The selection process can be very rigorous if you solicited with formal RFPs and could be less rigorous if your vendor selection

process was more informal. Criteria for the vendor selection include: •

The formal proposals given to you in the solicitation process above

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Consultant interviews

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References

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Demos if you are looking at portfolio management software

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Price.

The bottom line is that you will find many consultants in the portfolio management marketplace. Some of them will be specialists and some will offer services in this area in addition to a more well-rounded set of other services (e.g., PMO, program/project management, etc.). Some consultants will have portfolio management expertise that is based on a particular model – sometimes aligned around a tool. Some consultants have expertise only and some will have a full portfolio management approach that they can use as a starting point for your organization. There is no scarcity of consultants. The key is to pick one that is right for your organization’s needs. Summary More and more companies are using portfolio management to manage their workloads more efficiently and effectively. Depending on your needs, it may make sense to get the help of a portfolio management consultant. However, you won’t know the type of consultant you need until you go through a process of understanding your own needs, seeing how consultants will help satisfy your needs and then picking one that seems to make sense for your organization. Bringing in a consultant with portfolio management expertise and/or tools

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Selecting a Portfolio Management Consultant may save you time and effort and ultimately help you implement portfolio management much more successfully than you would be able to accomplish on your own.

Selecting a portfolio management consultant does not have to be a daunting task. We have done it before. Contact us for more information. [email protected] 877.536.8434 / 770.795.9097

About TenStep TenStep, Inc. (www.TenStep.com) is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia (USA), and specializes in developing, consulting and training in business methodologies. The company’s flagship product is the TenStep® Project Management Process, which has been licensed to thousands of companies and individuals around the world. In addition, TenStep has training, consulting and business methodology products covering Project Management Offices, portfolio management, software development and application support. The TenStep process is translated into 14 languages, allowing it to be utilized by organizations in most parts of the world. TenStep meets the needs of local businesses with a network of offices in the USA and around the world.

Our training classes include: •

Project Management (advanced and basic)

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Preparing for the PMP® Exam

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Earned Value Management

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Setting up and Running Project Management Offices

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Setting up and Running Portfolios

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Gathering Business Requirements

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Many, many more

Our consulting services include: •

Project management deployment and customization

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Project Quickstarts

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Setting up PMOs

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Project management coaching, auditing documentation review

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Managing your projects

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Many more

About the Author: Tom Mochal, PMP is the president of TenStep, Inc. (www.TenStep.com), a methodology development, consulting and training company. He is also the head of The TenStep Group, a network of TenStep offices supporting the TenStep process in numerous languages and countries around the world. Mochal is author of a book on managing people called "Lessons in People Management" and a companion book on project management called "Lesson in Project Management”. Mochal also authored all of the TenStep methodology products. Mochal recently won the Distinguished Contribution Award from the Project Management Institute

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Selecting a Portfolio Management Consultant for his work spreading knowledge of project management around the world. Mochal is a speaker, lecturer, instructor and consultant to companies and organizations around the world. He is a member of the Atlanta, Georgia (USA) chapter of the Project Management Institute (PMI), the American Management Association (AMA), the American Society for the Advancement of Project Management (asapm®), and is a partner in The Management Mentors, a group dedicated to building knowledge in project management, IT management and leadership/personal development. Contact us at [email protected] TenStep, Inc. 2363 St. Davids Square Kennesaw, GA. 30152 877.536.8434 770.795.9097

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