Spotlight on the Programme Management Office (PMO)

For those of you that attended the town hall briefings during January, we hope you found the ‘Spotlight on Programme Management Office (PMO)’ a useful introduction to the PMO and our role.

We found it really valuable to hear your questions and thoughts on the subject. We know that some of you will have had previous experience of a PMO in other organisations but equally that for some of you it was the first time you had heard the term.

There were a number of key themes that came out of your comments and questions. The good news is that a number of your ideas or suggestions are already in hand or planned for later in the year, please read on!

Who is who in the PMO 

Chloe Healy, PMO Senior Manager, leads the PMO team to design, implement and embed the PMO capability for Corporate Shipbuilding, standardise ways of working, establish effective performance reporting and apply appropriate governance. On maternity leave from early March.

Charlotte Green is currently providing maternity cover for Chloe, with effect from March 2020. Charlotte has been seconded in to the Contract Management Team to lead the PMO for six months.

Toni Turner, Planning & Project Support Manager, manages and drives the development of the plan approval process and associated reporting, acting as the expert across all shipyard and brands.

Alex Francis, Senior PMO Analyst, leads the development and standardisation of our reporting approach, internally and externally, and our risk management approach.

Ingrid Speteliunaite, PMO Analyst, supports various aspects of the PMO development, most notably developing the Learning from Experience (LfE) approach.

We are in the process of hiring a second PMO Analyst, as the PMO activity ramps up. Click here to find out more about the role.

Standardising reporting
In the spirit of CCS2021 and working towards ‘One Corporate Shipbuilding’ way of working, we are looking at standardising our reporting to ensure that key information is shared in an effective way. This includes what is reported at a project level, what is reported upwards internally within Corporate Shipbuilding and of course what goes to the brands. We have created a template report which will support the monthly Portfolio (Friday) meeting and brand reporting, which we will be looking to pilot in April, with the plan to roll this out to other projects throughout Q2. Please contact Alex in the PMO for further information.

Plan approval workload forecasting
The plan approval forecasting work is progressing well. Toni is currently engaging with the Meyer shipyards to try and get improved visibility of when we will receive drawings and which ones need approving rather than just being for information, to ensure we focus our time in the right places.

This involves a more collaborative approach with the shipyards, taking the time to understand their processes as well as explaining ours. Progress is certainly being made and as of last week, we now have a Drawing List for AIDA Cosma (hull 709).

In parallel, Toni and Ingrid are also analysing previous and current deliveries to quantify the drawings received, by discipline, to allow us to be able to forecast plan approval workload and therefore plan for busy periods.

Sharing drawings for Project Sphere
The new process for sharing drawings for Project Sphere (hull 6310) is now live, so please refer to the ‘how to’ guide or contact Chrissie Holland or Toni Turner with any questions or requests for support.

Learning from Experience (LfE)
The first Learning from Experience (LfE) workshop took place recently, focussing on key themes for Smeralda as the most recent ship delivery. Actions have now been assigned and communicated, and we are now following up with the action owners ahead of the next workshop in early March, to ensure that lessons really are learnt for future projects. The next steps in Q2 will be to involve the brands in future discussions and to share some of the output. Please do get in touch with Ingrid or Alex from the PMO Team if you would like to contribute ideas or would like our support in facilitating local sessions.

Working more closely with site teams
It was great to hear that there was an appetite for us to get more involved with the teams out on site. We certainly intend to come out and spend some time at each of the sites over the next few months, to better understand how we can best support them.

Toni will also be doing regular site support to help with Docova training or issues, so please get in touch with any requirements. Chrissie Holland is also available to support day-to-day issues, by phone and Webex as well as in the Southampton office.

Risk management
We are developing standard risk logs and a risk management process, to help us get to a space where risks can be actively managed and escalated to the right levels. A template for a standard risk log has been issued and project managers are currently logging project risks. Next steps throughout Q2 are to review and score the risks and to agree upon a common method of scoring and reporting on risks at the Project level and at the Corporate Shipbuilding business level.

Modifications process
As the modifications process has been identified as an area that needs improvement, we have now started to map the entire process, including how they are tracked, approved and followed up, and how the technical specification is updated. As well as standardising the process and making it more efficient, the purpose of this work is to ensure that we track which modifications have been implemented as we go along, rather than waiting until we approach delivery.

Workforce planning, the role of the PMO
The role of the PMO in workforce planning is to support the Exec Team in creating the longer term resource plan (approx. three years ahead) to ensure we know in advance, the size and shape of teams required for each site as well as new sites like China. To avoid any confusion, we are not involved in tactically managing resources, i.e. which inspectors are needed at which sites and when.

We’ll look to share further updates on all of the above as and when we have them.

Thanks for your support and contributions.