Project Management Maturity Models

Abstract

For an organisation to know its own strengths and weaknesses is key in being able to change and make improvements. This also applies to project management and project management is key to success for any organisation. As projects becomes more and more complex, it is necessary for any organisation to keep improving the competencies in project management in order to maintain competitiveness. Project management maturity models (PMMM’s) is a tool for exactly that. The model helps the organisation to learn about itself and making it aware of strengths and weaknesses. The result of the model is the assessment of which of five maturity levels the project management in an organisation is currently at, as well as creating a plan to achieve continuous improvements and higher levels of maturity. The tool is often used reactive as the strategy for project management often is run to failure. Often because the strategy for project management is not even considered, it is simply done. This raises the question if the model is used optimally? and if there is even more potential in using the model proactive? This article analyses the use and relevance of maturity models in project management.

- Purpose and potential

- PMMM as first step in changing culture

- Reactive or proactive? – the optimal way of using the model

- Workload versus results

Big Idea

The basic idea behind PMMM’s is for an organisation to assess their current level of maturity of the project management performance. Typically, the models consist of five levels, where level 1 represents the lowest level of maturity and level 5 represents the highest reachable level of maturity. The definition and naming of the levels varies from model to model, though many use the original Carnegie Mellon maturity level definitions, which are as follows [Brookes & Clark 2009];

1. Performed/Awareness/ad hoc
2. Managed/ Repeatable
3. Defined
4. Quantitative managed/managed
5. Optimised

The level of maturity is appointed by comparing the reality with standards. The result of the assessment is then used to set a roadmap for the organisation to reach higher levels of maturity in their strive for success. The idea is, that the highest level of maturity, optimized, is setting the stage to continuous improvement. Whereas, the first 4 level are based on comparison to standards, and best performance with existing processes, level 5 focus on optimising the processes in project management, [Grobler 2006].

However, the above is a significant generic description of the idea behind the PMMMs. Firstly, the models did not just arise out of blue air. PMMMs have their origins in the Capability Maturity Model, developed by Software Engineering Institute (thus the abbreviation SEI-CMM). The SEI-CMM take base in the same five levels as listed above and was originally developed to use in software implementation projects. The need for maturity models in project management arose as a result of the eighties’ tendency for project failure and budget overrun as a consequence [Judgev & Thomas 2002]. This was the beginning of development of maturity models. Today, app. 30 PMMM’s exist, which can be divided into three types of models, which all erupts from the SEI-CMM. The first two both take base in the five levels of maturity. Whereas the third one, which is also the latest, is more complex and holistic.

The first type of model is named technical delivery process model. This type is the SE-CMM. As said, this model consists of five levels of maturity, which indicates the organisations current state. The level of maturity is appointed an organisation as the result of a thorough assessment of the organisation’s project management processes. The description of the level indicates the end state of the given level. When an organisation is appointed a given level, they have not yet reached the end state of the level, but are at the beginning state of the maturity level. As an example level 3 is described as “Base practices of the process are performed, but not rigorously planned and executed. Reactive response dominates the actions of the process managers. Performance of the organization is dependent on individual knowledge and effort.“ [Grobler 2006]. This means that if an organisation is at this given stage, they will create the roadmap to reach that description. The roadmap for instance will help the organisation move from acting reactive to being proactive. When being proactive you prevent firefighting (Danish term!?) and short term planning, which can both often be very costly for the organisation. A lot of other arguments to being proactive can be listed, however that is not part of the scope of this article and therefore it will not be discussed into details.

The second type of PMMM is named project management process model. This type of mode also uses the five level of maturity level, though it does so a little differently from the first one. The project management process models take base in project management standards and their processes and knowledge areas within the processes. An example of a project management process model is the one developed by Kerzner in 2001, who describes project management maturity as “a gradual progress from a basic knowledge of the nine knowledge areas and a single process of project management to a singular methodology across the company.” [Grobler 2006]. The five levels in this model are;

Level 1, common language 

the organisation does not recognize the benefits of project management - there is knowledge about project management terms but not necessarily the correct meaning of them – there is a lack of framework for decision making. [Grobler 2006].

Level 2, common processes 

the

Level 3, singular methodology 

bla bla

Level 4, Benchmarking 

bla bla

Level 5, continuous improvement 

bla bla

As illustrated in figure XX, level 3-5 are..

The last type is the organisational models. As mentioned above, this type of model is the latest bid of a maturity model for use in project management and is a more holistic one, that the two types described before. The reason is, that this type of models does not only consider project management but all of the organisation. One of the models within this type is the Organisational Project Management Maturity Model, abbreviated to OPM3, which states itself as “a mechanism to advance your organization’s strategic interests through the efficient and successful execution of projects” [Grobler 2006]. The idea is, that it is not adequate to improve the project management process, if the rest of the organisation is falling behind as they are as important together in being able to reach the organisation’s strategic goals. To be able to look at all of the organisation, this type of model includes eight business processes, where the first of them is project management. The others are as follows 2) programme management, 3) assurance of the management quality in project programme management, 4) assignment of a project or programme, 5) project portfolio coordination and networking, 6) organisational design, 7) personnel management and 8) business process management [Grobler 2006]. Now, all of the business processes’ maturity level are assessed and they are appointed a level from 1 to 5. The result can easily be illustrated with a radar chart where all of the business processes and their appointed maturity levels will be inserted. The radar chart will give a visual look of the organisation’s maturity level and point out where to act to improve the organisation’s overall performance.

As we look back at all the mentioned types of maturity models for use in project management, it is clear that the idea of using the models in order to assess why some projects currently fail is possible to realise with these models. One might fear, that this tool would only be used as an assessment and that the improvements would be hard to realise. Though, the models give an explanation of what needs to be done to reach a higher level of maturity. This raises the question; how? This will be dealt with later on in this article.